Prešov
Angry hockey president sacks 14 players
Fourteen players from the Slovak second division VTJ Prešov hockey squad were sacked by team president Miroslav Cina March 8 after what he called the team's lack of desire to qualify for the first division. The top two teams in the second league move up to the first league the following season; Prešov is in third place, a point behind Nitra, which had already beaten Prešov twice this year.
"They were given notices of the termination of their contracts because they failed to fulfill the goals we agreed upon at the beginning of the season," Cina said.
With two games left on the schedule, only five players remained on the roster.
Trnava
Human leg left on river bank in protest
A human leg was left on the bank of the Trnavka river in the western Slovak city of Trnava March 8, allegedly in protest of local hospital director Rinaldo Simansky. Simansky said that hospital staff who want him removed from his post stole the leg from the hospital and informed media of its location by the river.
The leg, which had been amputated in February, had not yet been incinerated because the Trnava hospital's incinerator was shut down by the local Environment Department Office. The hospital has consequently had to use an incinerator in Galanta, some 30 kilometres away, as other hospitals have refused the Trnava hospital use of their facilities because of concern over payment.
Simansky said that the Trnava hospital's financial woes could be blamed on the "discriminatory" behaviour of health insurers, adding that he had warned his staff for over a year of the looming financial problems.
Health Minister Roman Kováč said that the theft of the leg could be considered a crime. He also ordered a check on the hospital's handling of biological waste.
