LONDON, UK – NIHL South got back to business as Wightlink Raiders showed they wouldn’t go down fighting and London Raiders shocked their local rivals. In amongst that there were human chains, more tattoos, a theme night and a trip down memory lane.
Not Buddha… but already has good karma (John Scott)
In less serious times, the question of how many people would it take to link arms around the Ryde Arena might make a decent quiz question, but with the future of the Arena still uncertain, the mood was still sombre in the Isle of Wight.
A human chain around the arena by users got lots of media publicity and talks are ongoing with the owners of the building and the group operating it.
By the end of the week there was some relief as the Raiders announced they would play their next two games out of the newly refurbished Gosport Arena and to top things off, supporter Heather Jepson published pictures from the team’s 2006 calendar on Social Media.
Glocks and the gang
There are many beauties but this one of Brian Mcloughlin and his team mates posing in costume is our favourite.
Streatham IHC announced the signing of Conor Redmond from Invicta, after the Irish international quit the Kent club citing a cut in ice time as his primary reason.
Redmond joins defenseman Adam Mahoney as a new face in the Londoners line up, after a mixed start to the campaign.
Also coming out of Streatham was a real treat for all the ladies and gents who like a bruised bum cheek as Captain Joe Johnston paraded his blue butt earned after stacking it on the ice against Milton Keynes. Joe’s elbow also looked like the aftermath of a scene from 90’s hit movie Trainspotting!
Magic Bum
When he wasn’t parading his cheek around Streatham Ice Arena, Johnston was also featuring on the excellent NIHL midweek round up on Oxfordshire Sports online radio. Other guests included Oxford City Stars coach Simon Anderson, NIHL North correspondent Michael Black of the British Ice Hockey website and Stars pair Joonas Liimatainen and Tom Annetts.
You can listen to it HERE
Citing the sumptuous carvery in the restaurant near the rink and the plush refurb of Planet Ice Gosport as primary motivations for the move, 25 year old American blueliner Mark Baroni signed on the dotted line for Solent Devils.
Obviously the afore mentioned reasons were no doubt part of Baroni’s thought process but his official statement read:
“I moved to the UK to get more involved in the sport as it is very difficult to find legitimate competitive opportunities in the US once you leave school.”
You say Baroni, we say.. er Baroni
“I expect that the games will be challenging given our current league position and our recent results. I guess I have goals rather than expectations and I am confident that I can play well enough to reach them.”
Another new arrival to the league was Slovakian forward Slavomir Buda who joined London Raiders and replaced the outgoing Kamil Kinkor.
Kinkor of course joined Bracknell Hornets a week prior but Buda’s hockey CV made mouth-watering reading for Raiders fans concerned that the team would be import-less whilst Marek Nahlik is out with a wrist injury.
Raiders coach Alan Blyth also took the opportunity to bring in Peterborough goalie Dan Lane to cover the suspended Michael Gray. No statement was made whether this was a permanent deal or that Lane was simply helping out on a two way deal with his home club.
Bowers inks Green
Regular readers may recall our request for NIHL tattoos a fortnight ago and our mailbox has been snowed to such an extent it rivalled Valentine’s Day for volume of mail. Ok so half on the lovers day are spam from Interflora and Moonpig but that’s not the point. What is the point we hear you ask? Don’t expect any answers on that one.
In any case it was an oldie but a goodie from Oxford goalie Shannon Long and an absolute peach from MK Thunder defenseman Ross Green that stole the show.
The best thing about Green’s effort is that team mate Ross Bowers helped ink him!
If Wightlink Raiders Coach Jeremy Cornish can class his Montreal Canadians sleeve as a Da Vinci, it’s fair to say that both Long and Green’s tatts are firmly in the Todd Cleary stable of artwork.
Saturday action review
London Raiders fans have had to endure some disappointing defeats in the last couple of years against their old rivals Chelmsford, but at Lee Valley Ice Centre they tasted a sweet victory at last in the NIHL Cup.
Racing into a 5-0 lead thanks to the inspiration of Mr Buda, the Raiders then wobbled towards the end before posting an impressive 6-5 victory over the Chieftains.
Raiders scorers were Buda (who also got a couple of assists), Bailey Chittock, JJ Pitchley, Matt France, Mark Robinson and Julian Smith.
Cameron Bartlett scored twice for the Chieftains with Sean Barry, Darren Brown and Alex Staples getting the others.
Chieftains hold court in Lee Valley
Bartlett also dropped the gloves with former team mate Matt France in the second period and his brother Grant was ejected with 12 minutes remaining on a game misconduct.
The win for the Raiders could prove significant as they are now level on points with Streatham at the bottom of the Cup table and only one of them will secure a semi-final spot from the five team group.
It was a fairy tale 7-3 cup win for Wightlink in their game against Invicta Dynamos down in Gosport.
The Dynamos travelled without a number of influential players including Captain Callum Fowler, whilst Wightlink were without suspended trio Danny Ingoldsby, Ben Paynter and Corey Watkins.
Hands up if you want a tattoo like Ross Green (Kev Slyfield)
As a result Cornish brought former forward Richard Nembhard back into the line-up and gave youngster Dan Shier a call up.
After a back and forth opening the Raiders pulled away and posted a confidence boosting win thanks to a brace each from Vaclav Drabek and Jaroslav Cesky, and lone goals for Chris Cooke, Aidan Doughty and Daniel Rose.
Dynamos goals came from Haydn Wootton, Adam Rehak and Ondrej Zosiak.
The only league game of the night took place in Bracknell, where the resident Hornets went down 6-1 to visitors Oxford City Stars.
Dom Hopkins fired home a hat trick against his former club and there were also goals for Darren Elliott, Ondrej Pekarik and Joe Edwards.
Danny Hughes got the consolation for Bracknell.
It was a convincing win for the in-form Stars that took them to the top of the NIHL South league table.
Sunday action review
It was 80’s night in Oxford with everyone wondering whether former City Stars supremo and now EIHA man Gary Dent would get behind the wheels of steel in his notorious leather jacket. In the end it was former player and coach Darryl Morvan that stole the show by cutting the ribbon on his newly named stand. Well done Darryl.
First song of the night was apparently ‘Don’t stop believing’ by Journey, and the home fans certainly tried not too, despite the City Stars shipping 10 goals to the visiting Chieftains.
Unfortunately there are no goal judges at Oxford due to the netting so we are unable to recycle our Amsterdam red light anecdotes to highlight the constant bulging of the net in what turned out to be a fifteen goal thriller the Stars lost 10-5.
Darryl Morvan opens his stand at Oxford (Paul Foster)
Danny Hammond notched a hat trick as did Juraj Huska with Matt Turner, Lukas Zatopek, Grant Bartlett and Jake Sylvester getting the others.
Dom Hopkins made it five goals in one weekend with a brace to add to efforts from Josh Florey, Joe Edwards and Wilson.
To add to the talking points, Dax Hedges and Cameron Bartlett dropped the gloves in the third and NIHL web Queen Nancy from 482 days allegedly showed up dressed as Frances “Baby” Houseman from 80’s hit movie Dirty Dancing.
Wightlink Raiders unbeaten record came crashing down in Milton Keynes as the Thunder shocked them with a 5-2 win.
Icing a full quota of players the Thunder fired a warning shot to the rest of the league thanks to goals from Ross ‘The Artist’ Bowers, Jamie Line, Jamie Randall, Tom Mboya and Jakub Klima.
Aidan Doughty and Richard Nembhard were on target for the Raiders, who actually outshot the hosts but found Thunder goalie David Wride in fine form.
Invicta Dynamos beat Streatham 7-4 in an NIHL Cup match at Silverblades.
The Mo’s were missing Captain Callum Fowler again and then suffered a double blow when starting goalie Damien King picked up an injury at the start of the second period.
King an injury worry for Mos
Fortunately for the Mo’s, the Londoners were in no mood to take advantage of rookie back up James Richardson and instead decided to make camp in the penalty box.
Six power play goals flew in past Streatham goalie Euan King before he stepped out to let Stefan Nubert make his first appearance in two seasons. Nicky Lewis was chief beneficiary with a hat trick, Adam Rehak notched two and both Haydn Wootton and Adam McNicoll got one each.
Michal Oravec scored two for Streatham with Callum Best and Sean Scarbrough getting the others.
Richardson (no relation to the smooth talking Gazetta Della Sport correspondent of the same name we are told) picked up a leg injury to add to the Mo’s worries but clung on to the end earning himself a man of the match award as a result.
At the bottom of the table the crunch clash between Solent Devils and Bracknell Hornets was a tense affair that the Hornets snatched with a 2-1 win.
Matt Lawday put the Devils ahead but goals from Ben Ealey-Newman and Jaroslav Kucej sealed the points for the Hornets and give them their first win of the campaign.
In all ill-tempered game, it was Danny Milton in the Hornets net and Chico Cole in the Devils net that stole the show with both posting a 96% save average after 60 minutes.
So after a month of action it looks like the league will be unpredictable and hopefully Wightlink Raiders can burst through those doors at Ryde Arena and get back on the ice sooner rather than later.
Results
Saturday 15 October 2016
Bracknell Hornets 1-6 Oxford City Stars
Wightlink Raiders 7-3 Invicta Dynamos (NIHL Cup)
London Raiders 6-5 Chelmsford Chieftains (NIHL Cup)
Sunday 16 October 2016
Invicta Dynamos 7-4 Streatham IHC (NIHL Cup)
Solent Devils 1-2 Bracknell Hornets
Oxford City Stars 5-10 Chelmsford Chieftains
MK Thunder 5-2 Wightlink Raiders
Contact the author david.carr@prohockeynews.com
For anyone in the UK who wants a copy of this seasons The NHL Hockey Annual or copies of The Hockey News please contact: martin.danes@googlemail.com
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