In, Out, Change it all about

EDINBURGH, UK – Like all hockey clubs, in the UK at any rate, the hockey season seems to be a battle about finances, achievement on and off the ice and keeping or adding to your fan base. Edinburgh Capitals are no different in any of those regards. That they are currently in a War of Words with the Sheffield Steelers organisation is a hindrance on all of those fronts but more of that later. Suffering with a long term injury to Doug Christiansen and medium term injuries to Captain Martin Cingel and Darius Pliskauskas, Caps made the decision to fire Chris Allen and replace him with Marc Lefebvre and Dan Welch. In, out, shake it all about right enough. This piece is written too early to say whether this was a good move or not but it has certainly stirred up debated amongst the Caps faithful. The same Caps fans that launched a fund to help bring in a new player or two. The fund approaches £2000 to this date. Not a huge sum but an indication of the desire of the small band of supporters to offer as much support as they can. Caps lost 3-6 at Coventry last night where young Ben O’Connor was given a cold hand on his entrance by the Blaze fans who still resent his moving to Caps. If this happened every time a player in the UK played against an ex-Club we would forever be booing them rather than cheering on our own team. Of course fans pay their money and they can boo or cheer whosoever they choose. Caps take on Blaze at Murrayfield tonight in the reverse fixture and this may give us a better idea whether Caps change in personnel will bear fruit. As for the situation with Steelers the only fruit that is springing to mind is sour grapes or rotten tomatoes. Steelers came to Murrayfield and won on Penalty Shots 8 days ago. That the game was physical and had an edge cannot be denied. That Matt Hubbauer slashed at Jeff Hutchins with his stick following some discussion cannot be denied. Whether he slashed at Hutchins’ body is debatable. As some Steelers fans claimed whether there was any head butt movement beforehand is debatable.

Unfortunately as a member of the Caps commentary team I can confirm that the Webcast lost transmission for 3 minutes during which this incident took place. That Steelers only commented when this fact became known cannot be denied. And it is there that a certain Mr Dave Simms, prominent and vocal member of the Steelers organisation, became involved and described Edinburgh on the BBC as “a village team from a Third World country”. He calls it ‘any publicity is good publicity‘. I say tosh. The circus is in town and, in my eyes, I can see who the clown is very clearly. This story may well rumble on but surely we should be publicising just how vibrant, exciting and gripping our sport can be rather than resorting to the language of the primary school playground. I am more saddened than angered, a position not shared by many Caps fans who are not going to let this one go away. Hope you enjoy your Hockey wherever you are and go support your team. It is far better than any circus. Contact the author Jim.Sneddon@Prohockeynews.com Prohockeynews would like to make it clear that the views expressed by it’s columnists are those of the writer and not necessarily those of Prohockeynews.