Rinne off to slow start, on the bench for Finland at World Championship

Goalie Pekka Rinne watched Monday as Finland defeated Germany 1-0 in a preliminary round contest at the IIHF 2010 World Championship.

Rinne, the Nashville Predators’ top netminder, allowed three goals on 16 shots in Finland’s first game Saturday, a 4-1 loss to Denmark. Petri Vehanen made 28 saves against Germany, the host country.

Rinne made his national team debut at the 2009 World Championship and went 4-2 with a 1.93 goals-against average as he appeared in all but one contest.

Finland’s next game is Wednesday against the United States, which lost 2-1 in overtime to Denmark on Monday.

Nashville general manager David Poile is the assistant GM for the Americans who have lost their first two games – both in overtime. The U.S. fell to Germany 2-1 on Saturday in the opening game of the tournament.

Two Predators, center Marcel Goc and defenseman Alexander Sulzer, are playing for Germany. Neither has registered a point in the Germans’ first two contests.

Goc is the team captain and will be featured in an online question-and-answer session early Tuesday.

He has a plus-1 rating and three shots on goal through two games. He averages 16:30 of ice time.

Sulzer is second on the team with an average ice time of 18:57.

The only other Nashville player competing is defenseman Denis Grebeshkov, who played 10:37 in Russia’s 3-1 victory over Slovakia on Sunday. Russia plays Kazakhstan on Tuesday.