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Giants recover after Phoenix lightning start

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Manchester Phoenix 2 - 3 Belfast Giants

Manchester Phoenix hit the Belfast Giants with two goals in the opening 48 seconds on Sunday night, but the team still with eyes on the league title fought back to take the points in a tremendously entertaining game.

Right from the opening face-off, Phoenix tore into the Giants like men possessed and on 29 seconds, Joe Tallari had netted his 44th goal of an inspired season as the Giants failed to clear their goalcrease and the puck looped over netminder Stevie Lyle and dropped over the line. With the home crowd still celebrating, Phoenix doubled their lead 19 seconds later as Brett Clouthier forced the puck home assisted by Sean Starke and Luke Stauffacher. The home fans were delirious, but the Giants were to recover and recover strongly as both the period and game went on. Scott Fankhouser began to see more of the puck as the Giants hit back with fluid attacking moves and a blistering shot from the right wing into the top corner from George Awada in the ninth minute put the visitors on the scoreboard. The Giants were now beginning to look like a team chasing the league title and outshooting the Phoenix on a two to one ratio and an unbelievable miss by Trevor Johnson saw Phoenix take the lead into the first interval.

Phoenix steadied the flow of shots on their goal early in the second session and Lyle in the Giants goal again began to see more of the puck. A Charging penalty on Phoenix captain Scott Basiuk quickly followed by a Holding the Stock infringement on Omar Ennaffati proved to be costly as on the two-man advantage, Awada found space at the back door to sweep home the equaliser on a feed from Mark Dutiame in the 27th minute. In a game being played at a tremendous pace, there was no shortage of physical play and a big hit by Awada from behind on Simon Mangos went unpunished. Tempers came close to fraying on a couple of occasions before Phoenix came close to regaining the lead when Brian Passmore saw a close range effort come back into play of the goal frame. Belfast were forced into penalty errors, but their defence held firm and kept the Phoenix powerplay units at bay through to the end of the session.

Belfast got the all-important go-ahead goal inside two minutes of the third period as they got bodies forward in numbers and Shaun Sutter got his stick to the puck for the close range finish that brought the travelling fans to their feet. Phoenix poured forward in search of an equaliser of their own and Lyle in the Giants goal became much the busier goalie making good stops from Stauffacher, Clouthier and Passmore while in front of him, his defence blocked shots as if their lives depended on it. With just over a minute to play, Phoenix pulled Scott Fankhouser in favour of a sixth skater and only a tremendous defensive play from Mangos prevented Peter Campbell from scoring into the unguarded home goal.

Phoenix player coach Tony Hand commented, “Even after the quick start we got, I always knew that the Giants would come back at us. I’ve said before that they are arguably the best team we’ve played all season and they proved that. I can’t fault my guys tonight we played and worked tremendously hard, and I think that was the best the Giants have played against us all season.”

Phoenix travel to the league-leading Coventry Blaze on Wednesday, before weekend games away at the Newcastle Vipers before entertaining the Edinburgh Capitals in Altrincham next Sunday at 5.30pm.