Phoenix vs Wildcats

Sunday, 4th March 2012

Manchester Phoenix 6 - Swindon Wildcats 5 (in overtime).

Phoenix scorers : Jaroslav Spelda (2), Tom Duggan, James Archer, Stephen Wallace and Luke Boothroyd

J Davidson sponsored Manchester Phoenix played the Swindon Wildcats for the second time in 48 hours, looking for revenge for the defeat in Swindon on Saturday night.

Phoenix were missing Slava Koulikov but welcomed the return of Tony Hand from injury and Ryan Johnson from suspension.

Phoenix made a disastrous start to the game, going behind after just 21 seconds. Aaron Nell scored high over Steve Fone, assisted by Jonas Hoog and Leigh Richardson. Shane Moor went to the box for holding at 6.36 and with 10 seconds of the penalty left, Phoenix equalised. James Archer found Tom Duggan and his second effort on the backhand beat Dean Skinns for 1-1. There was just 2.25 to go in the first period when the Phoenix second line came up trumps again. This time Archer scored, assisted by Tom Duggan and Ladzi Harabin. End of the period, 2-1 to Phoenix.

The second period provided the crowd with a goal fest, as the crowd was treated to 5 goals in 8 minutes. Unfortunately for the majority of that crowd, 4 of the goals went to Swindon. The Wildcats caught Phoenix cold again at the start of a period. This time it took 53 seconds for Nell to hit his second of the game. 35 seconds later, Phoenix went behind to a Michal Pinc goal. Three minutes later the game was tied once again as the Archer, Wallace, Duggan line came together to give Stephen Wallace a goal. Horrific defending then allowed the Cats two more goals to put them into a commanding 5-3 lead. Firstly, Richardson made it 4-3, then Aaron Nell got his hat trick after a mix up in front of the Phoenix goal. That was the end of the scoring for the period and a shell shocked Phoenix trooped off for a post mortem with Coach Hand.

Not sure if the famous Manchester tea cups came out, but whatever was said at the break obviously worked. It was Phoenix’s turn to hit an early goal as Spelda scored one of his trademark rockets from the blue line. Then, with Shane Moore taking another penalty, Tony Hand, back in his office behind the goal, found Spelda on the blue line and another rocket found its way past Skinns. 5-5 and still 15 minutes left in the game. End to end play ensued and both teams had chances to go in front, however both goalies kept the puck out and the game went to overtime.

With 2.38 gone in the extra period, Luke Boothroyd threw a high puck goalwards from just inside the zone that took a wicked deflection of a Swindon player’s hand, totally deceived Skinns and ended up in the net for the winner.

Man of the match for Phoenix went to James Archer.