Saturday 24th March 2012English League Division 2 North
Fylde Flyers 7 - Sutton Sting 4
Period Scores: 0-1, 5-2, 2-1
Shots On Goal; Flyers 77 - Sting 78
Penalties In Minutes: Flyers 52 - Sting 51
Flyers Scorers: Ric Hulme 2+2, Mark Gillingham & Elvis Veldze 2+1, Andy Clark 1+1, Bobby Caunce 0+2, Tony Melbourn, Kurtis Hall, Wayne Whitby, Stewart Marriott all 0+1
Flyers MVP: Stewart Marriott (in photo)
Referees: Guy McKenzie, John Freeman
Attendance: 127
Our Match Report:
Fledgling ice hockey team Fylde Flyers put in their best home performance of the season so far to take the scalp of high flying Sutton Sting, who have booked their place in the end of season promotion play off, having already been confirmed runners up in English League Division 2 North.
The Flyers narrowly lost the previous home encounter with Sutton 5-6 back in January and had also been beaten 7-3 and 13-2 in away matches so this hard fought and well deserved 7-4 victory came as quite a sensation.
I have been (privately) critical of the Flyers for losing concentration during the second period of games where a close scoreline has run away from them and also of not making the most of powerplay situations where they have not been able to make their man advantage count but, thankfully, none of this came to pass in this game.
After a very close first period, by the end of which the Flyers were “only 0-1” down, it looked as of the second period hoodoo was going to set in again as the Sting scored after just 13 seconds of the restart with their first attack of the second period. Undaunted, however, the Flyers held their ground and finally managed to find the net themselves after 25 minutes when Ric Hulme got on the end of a Mark Gillingham pass to open the home account.
The almost by now obligatory “Second Period Game Changing Incident” came shortly after this but, happily for the home crowd, it favoured the Flyers on this occasion. A minor altercation involving Flyers Dan Bracegirdle suddenly turned very nasty as his heftier Sting opponent ripped off his helmet and smashed him in the face. This earned the aggressor a “2+5+10+game” penalty while Dan picked up a 2+10 for his part in incident. The 2 minute penalties cancelled each other out in “sin bin” terms meaning that the Sting then found themselves a player short for the entire duration of the 5 minute major penalty.
There followed what I consider to be some of the best ice hockey that I have seen in 30 years of watching the game at various levels and certainly at the SubZero ice arena this season. Penalty-punishing has not been the Flyers strongpoint but three clinically executed powerplay goals – one from Andy Clark and two from Mark Gillingham (just thirty seconds between the first two) – really turned the game on its head – and announced the Flyers coming of age in ice hockey terms.
The Sting did hit back before the end of the second period but that was cancelled out by a superb Elvis Veldze strike – 5-2 for the period, 5-3 overall, and the Flyers just didn’t look back from then on. A Ric Hulme goal early in the last period served to settle any nerves and Sutton’s last goal of the game was quickly countered by another Elvis strike.
The last 10 minutes were goal-less but still full of end to end action with Flyers taking most of penalties as they fought to keep to resurgent Sting out of the game.
This highly entertaining encounter saw Flyers being marginally outshot by 77 to 78 and a whopping 103 penalty minutes being dished out (Flyers 52 – Sting 51) but if they can play like that in their remaining home matches, Flinsthire Freeze, Sheffield Senators and Hull Stingrays are in for one hell of a game!
Flyers Remaining Games:
Saturday 31st March: home v Flintshire Freeze
Saturday 7th April: home v Sheffield Senators
Saturday 14th April: home v Hull Stingrays
Sunday 15th April: away at Lancashire Raptors.
More info: http://www.eiha.co.uk/Leagues/EnglishNational/North2.aspx
