Peterborough Phantoms in top form ahead of tough start to the National League season
Peterborough Phantoms will start their National League campaign on Sunday in excellent spirits.
The city side won their final two challenge matches against league rivals Romford Raiders 13-2 last weekend. They won 8-2 on opposition ice on Saturday and 5-1 at Planet Ice on Sunday.
Phantoms start their National League/Cup season with a tough one though, at home to Leeds Knights (5.30pm face-off).
New head coach Ashley Tait has been pleased with the developing culture within the squad.
Tait said: “The previous week I let the guys play with minimal instructions, but it now became more structured and I was impressed with what I saw.
“It’s important the guys get into habits where they’re not having to think about what they do and I was pleased with how it went.”
Phantoms took a while to make their domination count in Romford with the only goal of the first period coming from Dillon Lawrence on the powerplay after help from Janne Laakkonen and Callum Buglass.
But the city skaters really caught fire in the second period with Lawrence, Cam Hough and Ralfs Circenis scoring in the first 5 minutes.
Morgan Clarke-Pizzo then capitalised on some resolute hold-up play from Joe Gretton to finish smartly for 5-0 just past the halfway point.
Lawrence completed his hat-trick in the first minute of the final period before Phantoms netminder Hayden Lavigne lost his shutout. Clarke-Pizzo delivered an immediate response although the hosts kept fighting and made it 7-2 with just over 5 minutes to go.
The final word belonged to Brad Bowering who claimed a superb team goal after interplay with Luke Ferrara and Laakkonen.
The Raiders were more stubborn the following night at Planet Ice, after they’d fallen 2-0 down inside 8 minutes after goals from Laakkonen and Louie Kynaston.
The visitors scored the only goal of the second period past back-up Phantoms’ netminder Luke Clark, but Ferrara struck in the opening minute of the 3rd period which was followed by goals from Cam Hough and Lawrence.
It was clear Phantoms had further gears to shift into and they did so after the second intermission - with Ferrara notching a lovely finish after a good pass from Lawrence just 34 seconds into the third period.
Cam Hough added his name to the scoresheet four minutes later and the scoring was rounded off at 51:52 when Lawrence picked up the goal his performance had merited.