HockeyTalk: Netminder Matt Greenfield on his decision to re-sign with Sheffield Steelers on a new three-year deal

Yorkshire Post

Netminder Matt Greenfield on his decision to re-sign with Sheffield Steelers on a new three-year deal and how the Elite League has developed since his first game back in 2022...

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00:00what makes the place the organization so special for you in in order for you to sort of come back

00:15again uh for me it's the people it's uh from ownership to the coaching staff to the staff

00:22around the team the media the players in the room and then obviously the fans um it's kind of people

00:28we've got along with from the hop off day one and uh we've been able to make some just incredible

00:34memories of my wife and i over our time in sheffield and yeah when you're playing in

00:39sheffield it feels like you're playing for something bigger than yourself yeah and that's

00:44something that i felt my very first time putting on the jersey and it's a feeling that i don't take

00:49for granted and that i don't um i don't want to ever lose and want to try to hold on to it for as

00:55long as i can so um that's kind of uh one of the some of the many things that makes sheffield

01:03such a awesome place to plan and it's also an awesome city yeah to live in like we we've been

01:09able to make friends outside of hockey and um sheffield's kind of become a second home for us

01:14and that's important or it's almost as important as um as what you do on on the ice or anything

01:20related to the ice isn't it you have to be comfortable in your surroundings don't you have

01:23to be happy in your surroundings otherwise it impacts on what you do in terms of your job i

01:28suppose yeah absolutely i think that uh those two things are very highly correlated with the happier

01:34you are off the ice the easier it is to kind of perform on the ice and you're able to kind of get

01:40away from the game when you know it's uh a wednesday that we don't have a game or tuesday or

01:45you know regardless of how the game goes on the weekend you're able to kind of get away enjoy and

01:50live your life and be happy and you know we we have such a short as personal athletes there's

01:55such a short career right so being able to truly make the most of every second of every day whether

02:03that's at the rink or whether that's going for coffees or walking in the peaks or going to football

02:10matches it's um it's all part of the experience and the the happier you can be off the ice the

02:15easier it is to put aside all the distractions and show up to the rink every day and uh

02:20you're all for your job when it when it came to the end of the season did did you have other options

02:26did you want to explore other options i mean there was lots of talk i think over the last couple of

02:30summers that you were probably going to be enticed away because you were one of the steelers uh better

02:35players as it were regarded as one of the steelers better players was was that something that you looked

02:39at uh again this summer perhaps again it's a it's a balance right like i think again as i'm happy to

02:49it's such a short career and it's such a brutal industry um and that's just the reality of it so

02:55whenever you kind of get the chance to uh have teams cover you i think you owe it to yourself as an

03:02athlete to explore those off options and to hear everyone out so um we definitely explore but probably

03:09this summer honestly more than any other summer because this summer is where i had the best

03:13opportunities uh especially with the champions league success yeah we had as a group i think uh

03:18that really opened up some eyes and just said get some respect uh on the league which is again you

03:24talk about playing for something bigger than yourself like that was really cool to be a part of

03:28um but yeah so i definitely had some interest definitely explored and looked but at the end of the

03:33day the sheffield offer made the most sense for my wife and i and um we decided that the offers

03:39forgetting it it wasn't worth uh how good we have it in sheffield it's obviously your fourth year coming

03:46back just in in that time from when you from when you first came over in 2022 have you noticed a step

03:53up in the quality of the league of the league overall have you noticed it becoming say more competitive

03:58generally absolutely i think it's pretty night and day i think from uh the first team and team

04:07everyone's gotten significant significantly better year over year the quality of hockey has been

04:14awesome it's another factor for why i personally want to come back just because of how much fun it

04:19is to play every night playing against good teams every night now and um there's there's really

04:25no such thing as an easy night and i think if you look at just the rosters throughout the league

04:31like some of the guys that these other teams are sending like holy smokes like the league's good

04:36it's a good league it's hard to have success in and you know i think that's demonstrated by

04:41our success in uh the champions league and being able to go to these other leagues that are

04:47best teams in europe and not only hang in there but beat them so um yeah the league as a whole i wouldn't

04:54even win a trophy yeah and uh so i think the league as a whole has really taken taken a step up each

05:01year since 2022 it's gotten better and better and better and better yeah so yeah absolutely i think

05:07that's a very good comment yorkshirepost.co.uk

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