Tendy trouble, Bison joy and the mystery skid mark

LONDON, UK – With Swindon having a weekend off and no doubt enjoying free Dominos pizza from their sponsors, the window was open for some serious movement at the top of the table as the NIHL South moved a step closer to the finish line.

Tough night for the Mo’s (Fusional)

With the season edging towards it’s finale in the league competition at least, PHN conducted a fan poll to understand who supporters think will win the Britton Conference title.

Unlike most polls these days, this one had a convincing winner with Peterborough Phantoms deemed hot favourites earning 61% of the vote, Swindon next with 22% and then Bracknell and Basingstoke on 9% each.

The Phantoms now have 17 league games to prove all those voting for them have nailed it.

Koulikov heads to the land of Poom

At least three of those games would be without Head Coach Slava Koulikov on the bench as he jetted out to Estonia to lead the GB U20 side in their World Championship Division II Group A campaign.

The residents of Bracknell were instructed to “Catch the Buzz” in the latest marketing campaign from the Bees. Large adverts on the back of the local bus fleet grabbed the attention of pedestrians and drivers alike.

It immediately eased the pressure on those players allocated branded team cars, who can now enjoy some extra downtime at home, rather than cruising at 20mph round the town centre and Legoland Windsor hoping to attract new fans.

The EIHA released details of play-off dates during the week including the showpiece weekend in Coventry which will take place on April 13^th and 14^th.

The rush for hotels in the West Midlands now begins in earnest, with everyone hoping to avoid accommodation in the city with reviews like this beauty below.

Don’t catch the bus… catch the buzz.. oh and enjoy the traffic jam

“Everything was so bad about this hotel, more like a hostel. It was so dirty (skid marks in the toilet, mould on the ceiling, bits on the bed), uncomfy bed, the whole place smelt of smoke, I actually saw someone walking round the corridors just having a fag…. weird/creepy noises in the night kept waking me up (I think the people were shooting some drugs all night)…. I actually can’t believe this place is still open”

Your Pro Hockey News columnist tried to get in touch with fellow NIHL media outlets 482 Days and Banners on the Wall to see where they stayed last year to try and join the dots on the noise and smoking comments but at the time of writing we’d had no response.

The EIHA also released their discipline log with the latest addition being Invicta Dynamos forward Anthony Leone who was handed a two game ban for unsportsmanlike conduct in the final game of 2018. Streatham’s Leigh Jamieson had his ban for checking to the head overturned. The top three NIHL South 1 bad boys prior to the weekend were Blaho Novak with 112 minutes, Liam Morris with 111 minutes and Adam Wood with 84 minutes.

Saturday review

Basingstoke ice rink was rocking for the return of former Coach Doug Sheppard and his Bracknell Bees side as the Bison looked to move above the Berkshire outfit in the table.

Ashley Tait and his players rose to the challenge delighting the home support with a 6-2 win, secured by a hat trick by Dr Russ Cowley and lone goals for George Norcliffe, Michael Klejna and Sam Smith.

It was former Cardiff junior Smith’s first goal for the Bison and indeed at this level so congratulations to him. For the Bees Zack Milton and Roman Malinik were on target, while Tyler VanKleef had his penalty shot saved by Alex Mettam to seal a disappointing evening for those of a Bees persuasion.

Banners on the Wall took some time out from marking hotel toilets to write a review you can read HERE

Streatham beat Invicta 8-1 in front of the biggest crowd of the season in South London. Ryan Webb hit a hat trick for the RedHawks to add to a brace from Leigh Jamieson and lone goals from Adam Carr, Ziggy Beesley and Tom Soar. Invicta’s consolation goal came from new Latvian signing Oskars Ancitis but the main talking point came when goalie Conor Morris was ejected in the second period for slashing Jacob Ranson.

Defenseman Harrison Lillis stepped up to the plate and donned the pads to allow the game to continue in the 3^rd period, but was shown mercy by Streatham coach Jeremy Cornish who did the right thing by instructing his team not to take full advantage, despite the bumper crowd and appetite in some quarters for a demolition job.

Lillis ended up with a 91% save average and man of the match award as a result.

Peterborough Phantoms needed to secure a four point weekend with rivals Swindon enjoying a rare weekend off and they made no mistake in the first test as they beat MK Thunder 5-0 at Bretton Way.

James Ferrara, Ales Padelek, Martins Susters, Petr Stepanek and Glenn Billing scored a goal each for the Phantoms with goalie Jordan Marr enjoying a 21 shot shut out.

Sunday review

After their eight game winning streak came to a sticky end in Peterborough last weekend, the Raiders faced Bracknell knowing that a win was needed to try and close the gap on the top four.

The Essex side were seven points behind the Bees before face off, having also played a game more, but despite a gutsy effort went down 4-2 at the Hive, thus dividing the two halves of the league clearly again.

Shaun Thompson, Aidan Doughty, Josh Smith and Roman Malinik scored for the Bees, with Liam Chong and Juraj Huska replying for the Raiders.

Peterborough eased into the top spot with a win over Milton Keynes Thunder at the Thunderdome.

Callum Buglass scored his first goal for the club to add to a brace from Petr Stepanek and lone efforts by Will Weldon, Ales Padelek and Tom Norton.

The Buglass goal also gave the Phantoms social media team the opportunity to dust off their previously unused GIF which to showed the former Cardiff blue liner arms aloft in a style frequented by goal-scoring footballers of the 1980’s – maybe John Toshack.

For MK it was Ross Bowers and Rio Grinell Parke with the goals.