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London caught by Phoenix backlash

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Manchester Phoenix recovered in style from their midweek loss to the Nottingham Panthers with an emphatic road win in the nations capital on Friday night.

A brace of goals from Mike Morin, captain George Awada and Chad Brandimore with Mark Bultje also on the scoresheet leapfrogged Phoenix two places up the Elite League table ahead of Cardiff and Basingstoke.

Mike Morin opened the scoring on a 6th minute powerplay and George Awada doubled the advantage 90 seconds later with a sweet finish. Racers pulled a goal back as Warren Tait fired home straight from a faceoff, but the second period was all Phoenix as they ran in three more goals through Bultje, Morin and Awada for a 5-1 second interval lead. Racers player/coach Jason Robinson blasted home on a powerplay, but this only served to fuel the Phoenix offence as Chad Brandimore scored twice in a five minute spell, the final goal set up by a superb defence-splitting pass from Rick Brebant.

Head coach Paul Heavey smiled as he commented, "It's a funny old game. Where we were disappointing on Wednesday, we were very good tonight. We played solidly at the back in protecting the goalies and up front we stayed wide and used our speed to make the scoring chances... and tonight we put them away. We rested Mike Lankshear late in the second period and dropped Mikey back on defence as cover and we gave Dave Clancy the final seven minutes or so in goal, and he made one very good save. All in all, I'm much happier tonight than I was on Wednesday. We've taken two valuable points and put pressure back on Cardiff and Basingstoke who meet on Saturday while we're in Coventry - we'll be keeping an ear out for that score line for sure."