Raiders ring changes

ROMFORD, UK – Romford Raiders endured a weekend to forget, losing to both Guildford Flames and Manchester Phoenix, and have subsequently been forced to make some player changes. On Saturday Romford lost at home to Guildford 6-2. They put on a decent performance, and import forward Dallas Costanzo finally found his scoring touch as he netted both Romford goals, but the strong Flames team were too much for the Raiders to handle in the end. Romford coach Jesse Hammill said: “I think that we played ok, and we were even out-shooting Guildford going into the third by eight shots but we are not capitalising on our chances, and we are making too many dumb individual mistakes.” Romford travelled to Manchester on the Sunday to take on ex-Elite League Manchester Phoenix, and suffered a humiliating 7-0 defeat. Nothing went right on the night for the Raiders as they managed just seven shots on the Phoenix goal, and only the heroics of Joe Myers in the Romford goal stopped the score from being even worse. Among his highlights were two penalty-shot saves from top British forward Adam Walker. Hammill was understandably angry at the performance, saying: “It was one of the worst experiences that I have been involved with in hockey, we got behind early and did not battle to get back into it. Manchester are a very good club but I expect more out of the guys. The team was, well seven shots for and seven goals against says it all really. Having said that Phoenix have a great mix of everything and I believe they will be up there come the end of the season for sure.” These disappointing results have led to the release of import forward Kamil Vavra and import defenseman Michal Palik. British grinder Steve Maile has also left the club by mutual consent, while impressive youngsters Joe Allen and Frankie Harvey have been permanently added to the Raiders roster after starting the season with Romford’s ENL team, the Romford Fury. Vavra had shown a lot of potential but ultimately failed to find the net in eight games, while Palik failed to repeat his excellent form from last season. Hammill said, “Unfortunately those guys did not adapt to the style of play that was required from this team, and we need to find some scoring and be better defensively, as those are our two main worries at the moment. I don’t doubt their abilities but unfortunately they did not work out for us”. Romford will now search for their replacements in the hope that they can kick-start their season. It remains to be seen if they will go for like-for-like replacements, one forward and one defenseman, or if two new import forwards will be brought in to boost the stuttering offense. Hammill added, “I am in the process of finding the players we need.  I have made an offer to a couple of players and I am waiting on their answer.” “Morale in the dressing room is ok. We know what we need to do, we have 4 injuries to key players which is never good, and we have to find two non British trained players, but we have a great bunch of guys who are determined to get out of this funk we are in,” he concluded. Contact the author dave.lambert@prohockeynews.com