Peterborough Phantoms are excited to be back on the ice this weekend

New Phantoms signing Austin Mitchell-King.

The city skaters take to the ice for the first time this season this weekend in a double-headed challenge match against National League rivals Raiders.

Phantoms host the first game at Planet Ice on Saturday (7pm face off) before making the return trip on Sunday (5.15pm start).

“We’re really excited to get started again,” Koulokov said. “The past few weeks have really picked up and we’ve been really busy getting everything prepared.

"It will be good for the puck to drop on that first game and for all of our plans and preparations to be put into action.

“Raiders are an effective, hard working side.

"They’ve made some changes to their roster this summer, but the minimum expectation is that all of their players will be play and work hard for a full 60-minute game, regardless of the score or situation. That’s what they do.

"They’ve made some good additions to the team which will help them out and we have to make sure we’re ready to compete and come out of the starting blocks strongly.

“We’ve also dded some new faces to our team over the summer, so we’ll probably have a mixture of bedding in and brushing off the cobwebs, but we want to ensure we start strong with good performances and results in pre-season, to prepare us for what I’m expecting to be the most competitive season in NIHL National history.”

Phantoms also have back-to-back challenge matches against local rivals MK Lightning on September 10 (away, 7.30pm) and September 11 (home, 5.30pm) before starting their National League programme with a League Cup tie against Bees at Planet Ice on Friday, September 16 (7.30pm).

Koulikov has added forwards Lukas Sladkovsky, Ralfs Cirencis and Austin Mitchell-King to the squad that worked a minor miracle to reach the play-offs last season.

Phantoms suffered a slow start and were bedevilled by injuries for most of the campaign.

The National League has 11 teams this season with the Bristol Pitbulls and Hull Seahawks joining the nine that did battle in 2021-22.