GAME THREAD: Steelers v Blaze: Sat 12th Sep: CUP

[mark]

Result

Steelers 6-0 Blaze

[smbmetal]

Don’t think we could have wished for an easier game to start the season.

Coventry offered nothing and still looked in pre-season mode.

You can only beat who’s in front of you, but I thought Diffley was outstanding and should have been MOM instead of IBN.

A very solid performance and great to start with a shutout. Well done lads.

Different game tomorrow.

[Doom]

A good performance, but certainly not a 6 - 0 game.

Tracking only had it at 52/48 in our favour, which is quite close.

It should give us plenty of confidence moving forward and has certainly boosted my confidence.

Nice to see us playing square pegs in square holes, the only one I'd question is Balmas LW.

I liked the lines, but let's see what they can do in Guildford.

Regards

Doom

[ginger]

Obviously early days but thoughts on a good start to the season;

- Offensive zone was good. Cycle is much better on last year's.
- Teissala can do stuff that should have him playing in a better league
- Aarnio quietly impressed
- Ice was awful
- Gettinger/Collins experience really shows with them at centre
- Liam Steele can eat minutes
- Coventry poor
- felt like we've got a good level of physicality without ever going to be the most physical team

[Doom]

Good to see Cormier have a good night, because he's been awful pre-season.

He was -7 pre season, with the second worst being -2.

Tonight +3......maybe Diffley is the partner he needs.

Top of the +/- pre-season was Aarnio. I think he'll be very good for us.

Regards

Doom

[steeler pete]

I may have been a bit harsh on Blaze netminder but all in all I thought they were poor and their frustration showed.

We seemed well organised, willing to work for the win and there’s some good skill in the team. If we can stay fit and continue to grow as a team we show promise. It’s early days.

I can’t say the officiating has improved.

[MLL79]

Lots of positives I thought, looks like players are clicking already. Coventry looked in some disarray for a lot of this, but it was good to see how clinical and incisive we were to take full advantage of it.

Great to see IBN net and get the MoM, but I would’ve given it Jasper tbh as thought he was a beast tonight. Energy and work rate outstanding - and if it wasn’t for “Accidentally”-Kick-the-net-off he would’ve gotten 2.

Good to see a spread of goals across the lines, speaks well of the balance.

Greenfield also - game 1, shut out 1.

Disappointing on a team front that no one stepped up for Tait after a blatantly dangerous hit.

[Bryan]

Better tonight. Two big improvements. We won a reasonable amount of faceoffs.. I had it more or less equal. We more often entered the offensive zone in possession of the puck rather than the last season when we dumped the puck far too much and often didn’t recover it.
PK was very good. PP rather less so and clearly needs work done on it.
I felt the two step ups from Steeldogs justified their selection.
I like Teissala a great deal, 25 Gettinger seemed to improve from his rather lacklustre pre-season. Still not convinced by 91 Rockwood although seemed to get more involved than in pre-season. Armchambault looks skillful and got more involved but am left with the impression he is capable of more. At last we have a player getting in front of the opposition netminder.

Now, off ice. The extravagant increase in ticket price, bar prices and parking are simply not justified. Only an estate agent could falsely present the new season ticket lounge as an improvement. It is disgusting. It’s a dungeon not a lounge. No seats, no tables, hardly anywhere to stand and put your drink down. The more heralded access (by the estate agent) entrance is a subterranean corridor. I don’t know the crowd but it was probably 2000 down from what we got last season. Are the prices doing the damage? Several people around us in 104 (which is almost entirely season ticket holders) are absent and after many years have given up. The cost of the season ticket given as the reason. I’m a big supporter of our owner but he badly needs to come clean about the reasons for the ridiculous increase in prices and lowering of standards for the season ticket deal. It’s far from what it was. Not good enough.

[Keith Sheppard]

Now, off ice. The extravagant increase in ticket price, bar prices and parking are simply not justified. Only an estate agent could falsely present the new season ticket lounge as an improvement. It is disgusting. It’s a dungeon not a lounge. No seats, no tables, hardly anywhere to stand and put your drink down. The more heralded access (by the estate agent) entrance is a subterranean corridor.

We went into the season ticket lounge for the first time last night. The title ‘lounge’ implies a place that is comfortable and welcoming, it really is an inappropriate name for that area because we found it to be neither of those things. In future, our pre games will be spent in the far more comfortable surroundings of the concourse, (yes, it is that bad).

Despite this, I’m not blaming the Steelers, I can imagine that due to the refurbishment to many parts of the arena, imcluding the old Arena Club, the Steelers will have been given an option/ultimation to use this new space, or have nothing at all.

In last weeks programme Tony wrote that he was aware of the problems and was trying to sort something out. I hope part of this solution includes a commitment by the arena to allow the club to use the refurbished lounge on concourse level,(the old arena club) once work has been completed. I’d also hope for an update on progress, because there were a hell of a lot of disgruntled season ticket holders around that lounge last night.

The club should be asking themselves the following, ‘would we be happy to entertain our main sponsors in this area? ‘ If the answer is no, then it should not be suitable for their season ticket holders.

[Doom]

A few stats taken from the EIHL website.

Last nights attendance is listed as 7,183, which is not as bad as I initially feared

The corresponding fixture last season against Guildford was 8 009.

I don't think there's much doubt attendances will be down this season because of the big price increases, but I guess by how much will be driven by on ice performances. Performances like last night should certainly limit the damage, because it was entertaining to watch.

Faceoffs we won 30 of 56 (54%), which is decent.

Gettinger won 9 of 16
Whistle won 5 of 7
Dowd won 4 of 8
Collins won 9 of 17
Rockwood won 3 of 6

There were also a couple of players who only took 1 faceoff.

Overall I'm quite happy with that.

Top of the +/- were Dowd and Jasper, both with +4.

Let's see what a tough away day in Guildford brings tonight.

Regards

Doom