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Berkshire on Saturday and Milton Keynes Lightning at home on Sunday

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J Davidson sponsored Manchester Phoenix travel to Slough on Saturday for their last regular meeting of the season.

Phoenix have had the better of the five previous encounters with 5 victories. Slough have had their problems this season and have lost a fair number of key personnel, including player coach Slava Koulikov.

Top players such as Ryan Watt, Michael Wales, Greg Rockman, Lee Richardson, Ciaran Long, Darius Pliskauskas and netminder Kamil Jarina have left the club.

New coach Craig Moran was appointed from within the club and he has worked hard to bring in replacements. Kamil Tvrdek is a proven goal scorer and has joined them along with Andrius Kaminskas and Croatian netminder Andrej Vasiljevic. Coach Moran said on Phoenix TV last week that it has been difficult to find players at this stage in the season but he will continue looking until the deadline at the end of the month.

Phoenix will travel with confidence after a comprehensive 7-2 win last weekend and will be hoping to bring the points back North on Saturday night.

Nick Poole’s Milton Keynes Lightning make their last visit to the Dome on Sunday, looking to tie up the 6 game series after two excellent 7-2 wins in the last two weeks against Phoenix. The team are sitting comfortably in 4th place in the league and are looking likely to hold on to that position come the end of the season. Top scorer for Lightning this season is Stanislav Lascek with 28 goals, closely followed by fellow import Janne Jokila on 24. British forward Tom Carlon is having a good season with 19 goals and veteran Lukas Zatopek at the back keeps the ship steady.

Phoenix lead the series 3-2 despite those two heavy away defeats and their excellent home form should see them through a very tricky fixture.

Sunday’s game faces off at the usual time of 1730hrs.