BILLINGHAM, UK – At 8.00am today the EIHA dropped the Moralee Conference fixtures along with both the Midlands and North Cup.
Whilst there have been some failings with regards to the upcoming season, these fixtures have been organised very well and appear to be far better thought out than in previous years.
The weekends of 18th and 19th January and 15th and 16th February are earmarked for cup semis and finals and no team plays an individual opponent more than twice in a calendar month.
As such we will take a look at how the fixtures shape up for each team:
Billingham Stars – Opening Fixture: Sunday, 15th September @ Solihull Barons
The Stars bookend their season with games against the Barons, away for the first game and home to close out the year.
Billingham’s first home game comes in the cup against Solway Sharks the following Sunday (22nd).
The Teessiders are one of five teams who do not officially kick off their season until the second week of the season as things stand along with Blackburn Hawks and Solihull who have challenge matches arranged, Solway who we believe will have SNL games and Sutton Sting who requested that weekend be kept free. After that their only free weekends at present are the aforementioned cup dates.
The Stars have seven double weekends including one set of double away fixtures as they travel to Sutton Sting in the League on Saturday, 19th October, followed by Murrayfield Racers in the cup the following night.
This is slap bang in the middle of a tough looking October for the North East side who play four of five games on the road that month.
Billingham’s fixtures are quite evenly spread and they will face all eight opponents across both competitions within their first nine games.
One positive for the Stars is a three game home stand to close out the season and possibly make that final push in the standings.
Blackburn Hawks – Opening Fixture: Sunday, 15th September @ Nottingham Lions
The Hawks kick things off with, what shows on paper at least, an easier start than most.
Last placed Lions up first should mean two points, before a trip to Sutton the following Saturday and a cup game against D2 Widnes Wild as the Lancastrian’s first game on home ice the following evening.
Another side who don’t officially get underway until week two of the season, Blackburn have four empty weekends to rest up including a Christmas break and again including the blank cup weekends.
Whilst this is could be good in some ways, it does mean that they have more double weekends to contend with – nine in fact.
However, they have the added benefit of being one of only two sides with zero double away weekends.
The Hawks’ longest home stand is a three game cup run against Nottingham Lions, Sutton and Solihull in December.
Blackburn finish up the year and with a four week slog of seven games in four weekends down the stretch.
Nottingham Lions – Opening Fixture: Sunday, 8th September @ Whitley Warriors
The lone fixture on opening weekend sees the Lions make the trip to Whitley Bay to kick-off their year.
On home ice Matt Bradbury’s side will kick things off against the previously mentioned Hawks on 15th after an away game in Dumfries the night before.
Nottingham have two free weekends and six doublers although they will hope that extra cup fixtures will make that zero free weekends. The Lions have tough looking final four weeks of the season which sees them on the road for five of seven fixtures.
This a long double away weekend late on in the season as they travel to Solway on the day that only occurs every four years (29th February) and Blackburn on 1st March before a home and home with Sutton to end the year.
Solihull Barons – Opening Fixture: Sunday, 15th September v Billingham Stars
The first of our teams to open their campaign at home, the Barons have their first taste of road hockey the following Sunday as they make the trip to Nottingham in the cup.
With a challenge game organised for opening weekend, the West Midlands outfit are another team with two weekends off, although they will again hope to make this zero with a cup run. They also have seven double headers to contend with.
Daniel Brittle and his side are the first on this breakdown to have more than one away double header as they have to deal with this twice over the year, firstly on 5th and 6th October as they travel to Dumfries and Blackburn on consecutive nights before repeating the feat with the same teams on 4th and 5th January bang in the middle of a four game swing away from home.
Those four away games mark the start of a hard run that sees the Barons at home just twice in nine games before returning home for the first three of their final four games. Solihull finish up the year away to Billingham.
Solway Sharks – Opening Fixture: Saturday 14th September v Nottingham Lions
With the Sharks joining the SNL at the eleventh hour alongside their NIHL commitments, it is difficulty to fully dissect their fixtures as the SNL list is not due out until next week. Also, there is one fixture that is yet to be arranged between the Sharks and Sutton.
On the face of it the Sharks have ten free weekends, although this is likely to be almost entirely scrubbed out by SNL fixtures and, they will be hoping, extra cup ties.
What this does mean is that the Dumfries side will have a lot of busy weekends, with only five of eighteen game weekends currently scheduled having just the one game.
It would appear the Sharks management want as close as possible to double weekends every week which will be a long hard slog for the remaining players.
Solway also have two double away weekends with two separate trips to the Midlands with stop overs likely.
The first sees them take on Solihull and Nottingham on 16th and 17th November with the second coming in February as they face Sutton and Nottingham on 8th and 9th.
Martin Grubb’s side will be the first to finish their league campaign as their final fixture comes on Saturday, 7th March, at home to Sutton.
Sutton Sting – Opening Fixture: Saturday 14th September v Whitley Warriors
After opening up on home ice against Whitley, the Sting stay at home for their second fixture as Blackburn come to town in the cup the following Saturday with a first foray on the road coming the next night with a trip to Whitley Bay.
Whilst there is still a fixture to arrange between Sutton and Solway the Sting currently show as having seven free weekends, potentially reduced to five with cup fixtures. Once the Sharks’ SNL fixtures are pencilled in, this will most likely be the most in the league.
This does mean that they have a high number of double weekends with ten at present. Sutton also have the most double away weekends with three.
The first of these comes on 2nd and 3rd November against Blackburn and Nottingham, next they head to Blackburn and Solihull on 22nd and 23rd February and finally they head to Solway on 7th March and Billingham the next night.
The Sheffield-based Nottinghamshire side are another with a tough looking run in with five of their final seven games on the road with a pair of home games against the Lions thrown in. They end the year against the Lions at home on 15th March.
Whitley Warriors – Opening Fixture: Sunday 8th September v Nottingham Lions
A strengthened Warriors roster will be looking to start as they mean to go on as last year’s basement side Nottingham travel to Hillheads Road in the season opening game.
The Warriors’ first road game comes the following Saturday as they travel to face Sutton in Sheffield. Whitley have the joint least free weekends with just two through the full 28-week season which are the cup semi-finals and final which they will feel they should be a part of.
This does mean that they have the fewest double headers with just six across the year and zero double away weekends.
Whitley look to have the most balanced season on the face of it with no home or away stretched of over three games and several consecutive one game weekends through the tough middle section of the season.
The Warriors finish the season with two games against Blackburn over two weeks home and away to bring one of the nicer schedules to a close.
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