Banners On The Road – Slough Jets vs Invicta Dynamos 18/11/23
Posted: 22/11/2023 Filed under: Banners On The Road, NIHL | Tags: Banners On The Road, invicta dynamos, NIHL, slough jets Leave a commentNIHL 1 South
Slough Jets 6-4 Invicta Dynamos
Jets: Goodchild x 3 (1sh, 1 pp, 1eng), Hemmings-Maher, Bradburn, Mohr pp
Dynamos: Springer-Hughes, Huggett x2, Scott
How it fits together: Having done it in Guildford earlier this season and seen separate teams from the same rink, it was exciting to head back to Slough for a different purpose. During their days in the old English Premier League, the Slough Jets were always an entertaining watch. Then when the money ran out and the Zoran Kozic era ended, they disappeared to reform in NIHL2. A National Division 2 title later and after a long rebuild under Lukas Smital, the Jets are now not just being talked about but giving Streatham something that they desperately needed; a challenge.
Also rebuilding in their own way, the Invicta Dynamos have had an inconsistent season but have a variety of top end weapons in South 1. Where the Jets had built on kids, as we know from earlier in the season, Karl Lennon had taken some chances on guys with his roster.
The immediate difference between Jets and Bees games was noticeable right away. Bees games are punctuated by a sudden onrush of fans into the seats just before faceoff. When I arrived at the rink, there was a larger visible queue as well as parents milling about after the junior game but very few turned up later.
The other immediately noticeable thing was the difference in the number of players. Slough took to the ice with a bench at maximum size and Invicta definitely weren’t. Lennon himself was dressed and there were a lot of absentees. The list would also grow after this game.
It was all energy from the Jets to start the game, with the visitors keen to sit back. It gave the impression of making the game a bit one sided when actually it was a lot of effort by the hosts to be rather easily dealt with in the final third. However the pressure was obvious and Slough were crafting chance after chance.
Then out of nowhere, they were behind. The Dynamos had not had many chances but they caught the Jets flat footed. Some neat cycling of the puck saw Ruskin Springer-Hughes take the puck down low and with few options, he fired on net. The puck hit something and it was enough to deflect the puck off of Brett Massey’s equipment and in.
The Dynamos were immediately on the front foot when they were given a powerplay and they immediately felt the sharp end of the Jets’ sword. Jack Goodchild, the league’s top scorer, poked the puck loose and sprinted away. Owen Rider saved the shot but the puck squirted free from under his arm and sat on the goal line. Goodchild, who was averaging 3 points per game heading into the game, was on the spot to poke the loose puck over the line to tie the game.
The first period chugged to its conclusion and the second started in a similar way. The two sides were cancelling each other out until Josh Condren got into an altercation with Lewis Clark. The Dynamos man was called for roughing and this saw the Jets poke their nose in front. On the man advantage, Luke Smital fed Ollie Hemmings-Maher who used the screen in front of Rider to good effect and ripped it home to give the Jets the lead.
However the Dynamos hit back almost immediately. Mads Thune’s shot was tipped in front of Rider by Tommy Huggett to tie the game at 2-2. From here the visitors realised that they needed to press and see what they could do before the legs on the bench started to tire.
Instead they were handed two gifts. The first saw Invicta go to a tried and tested tactic for many years, tee up Dan Scott for a shot. Massey read the shot well and pushed out his blocker to deflect it away. However the Jets’ goalie got the angles wrong and instead of meeting the meat of his equipment, it clipped the bottom edge, sending the puck careening downwards into his own net.
The second came a few minutes later. Having upped the intensity, sensing that now was their chance to try and convince their younger opponents that they were in charge, the Dynamos sprung the two one one. Tommy Huggett looked up, saw the pass and fired it across but it didn’t find his team mate. Instead the puck took a massive deflection off of Timo Lindgren and found its way past Massey to make it 4-2. As the second period came to an end, the Jets looked lost, seemingly putting effort into just doing anything.
That second period break came at the right time for the Jets. They needed a regroup and a rethink.
The Jets came flying out of the dressing room, pun intended and pushed Invicta onto the back foot. The Dynamos were expecting this however and seemed initially to be dealing well with the pressure. However they hadn’t, and I confess I hadn’t either, banked on Kyle Bradburn just appearing out of nowhere and firing past the glove of Rider less than 5 minutes into the third.
The Jets kept pushing but fell foul of the official. Luke Smital was called for elbowing, which sorry to the Jets fans around me as it was 100% an elbow, and then Seb Mohr was called for tripping. They survived the Dynamos powerplay and when the visitors were called for too many men, it seemed that the door was open.
Then Joe Stephenson had a brain fart and opened the door wide open for them. Seemingly goaded into reacting by Jack Goodchild, Stephenson threw off his gloves and started throwing hands. The issue is that Goodchild didn’t reciprocate, utterly uninterested in fisticuffs. Stephenson got a 5 and a game miscondcut for fighting the unwilling combatant and the Jets shot the Dynamos down.
Goodchild struck during the period of 5on3 as the neat passing gave him space to skate into and pick the top corner of the net to tie the game. The powerplay continued and eventually came the hammer blow. The move to feed Goodchild was repeated in the opposite direction, Seb Mohr taking the feed beating Rider past his blocker to make it 5-4 with just over three minutes to play.
An exhausted Dynamos didn’t have the legs or ideas to come back, struggling even to get the space to get Owen Rider out of the net for the extra attacker but when they did, Smital and Goodchild played a bit of hot potato with the puck, Goodchild eventually slotting into the empty net for his hattrick and his 20th goal in his 13th game this season.
The Dynamos will rightly see this as the one that got away. The short bench obviously didn’t help but they tried and did all the right things. They couldn’t make the Jets for energy or speed so they didn’t try to. They knew what they had, veteran savvy and the ability to disrupt a heavily passing orientated game.
Whilst there was a lot of injuries and guys missing, the big names were there and mostly seemed to be effective. Stanislav Lascek and Mads Thune look as good as any import seen at this level. Tommy Huggett, Josh Condren, Ruskin Springer-Hughes and James Laming got stuck in as well. I was also very impressed by the energy and output of Brandon Chard. Thune took the man of the match but it really should have been Dan Scott. Aside from showing repeatedly in this game why he’s arguably one of the best players in this division, he must have played somewhere between 40-45 minutes of this game. The man was a machine.
Ultimately, tired legs combined with Joe Stephenson not heeding the words of Admiral Akbar (it’s always a trap, friends) took their toll. The difference between success and failure are usually thin margins but this really was there for Karl Lennon’s side and they couldn’t drag it over the line.
Slough will obviously be very pleased. Lukas Smital’s young charges were tested, fell behind, faced a bit of adversity and pulled it around. I said last season watching highlights from the Jets that they were a fun team to watch. With my eyes on them and this, my second viewing of them of the season, I can safely say it again that you will not be bored watching this roster.
Still missing Christian Mohr to suspension didn’t seem to bother the top end of the Jets. Jack Goodchild and Christian’s brother Sebastian combined with Luke Smital as the top line and at South 1 level it looks utterly terrifying. Smital, known to South 1 and National Division fans as a gritty and aggressive player happy to go to the front of the net is the perfect foil for Goodchild, a talented finesse goalscorer and Seb Mohr who feels like the second coming of Vanya Antonov. Mohr in particular looked superb in this game although for scoring a shorthanded goal, a powerplay goal and an empty netter, you can’t begrudge the beers going to Goodchild.
However it wasn’t just those three. Up front, Ollie Hemmings-Maher and Roman Cathcart looked solid and the depth forwards like Lewis Clark and Kyle Bradburn appear to have found a solid niche.
It wasn’t Brett Massey’s best night in goal but he did well to recover from a couple of mistakes and keep his composure. His defence didn’t do a lot wrong over the course of the evening and held firm at the end when it needed to.
My big criticism of Slough is they’re almost too structured. Having a coach like Lukas Smital, there was always going to be a system, there was always going to be a lot of passing and everyone needs to buy in. The problem is that it was almost too obvious at times. Invicta had long periods where it looked like they’d solved Slough a bit, forcing the young side in a bit of a panic and just doing the same thing faster and hoping for better results. The youthful exuberance is great but it must be tempered with calm heads and ultimately a plan B. If they develop one, a really solid one, this team could win the championship and that’s not hyperbole.
All in all, this was a good game. Everyone told me that Streatham vs Chelmsford would be the game of the weekend but as Streatham cruised to a 6-0 win, I think for once I can claim to be right.
Lowlight of the night: The Dynamos third goal, oofff.
Highlight of the night: There was a moment in the first where Seb Mohr and Dan Scott were battling for the puck and it was just superb viewing.
Banners On The Road – Solent Devils vs Invicta Dynamos 16/9/23
Posted: 19/09/2023 Filed under: Banners On The Road, NIHL | Tags: invicta dynamos, NIHL, solent devils Leave a commentNIHL 1 South:
Solent Devis 5-3 Invicta Dynamos
Devils: Forsyth, Llewelyn, Lackey, Osman, Peacock
Dynamos: Condren, Dell, Stokes
A question of scale: In a different world, I’d have gone to games in Gosport more than I have. When I moved back to Britain after living in Germany, looking for a hockey team meant finding somewhere within easy public transport reach. I was also aware of the Elite League and knew Basingstoke was easy to get to. I wasn’t aware of a rink in Gosport. How things could have been.
For those of you unfamiliar, the ice surface at Gosport is small. That’s not to belittle it but the ice surface is unique. Grimsby, Sutton and the Isle of Wight spring to mind in terms of size. On a humid night like this, everyone walks in to be slapped in the face by the blast of cold. You’re immediately hit with an element of claustrophobia as people pack into the bleachers or stand around by the end closest to the cafe. Kids were playing with sticks and pucks in the walkway between the bleachers and the Plexiglas, being forced to stop or shuffle to the side and breathe in as Owen Rider leads the Dynamos out from behind the seating and past the fans towards the ice. There’s no separation, no barrier, just the opposition marching past the fans. It’s a surreal sight.
It’s these unique environs that Solent live and thrive within. Theirs is a one of a kind venue to play and watch hockey in. Having been runners up to South 1 champions, Streatham so often, clearly Alex Murray’s side can do the business on big ice as well but this is where everyone has to adapt to them and if you don’t then you will pay.
The first if a prime example of that as the Dynamos got their game plan all sorts of shades of wrong. Coming out with a gameplan and experimenting in the first game of the season is fine but it took the visitors from Kent too long to adapt. Invicta were attempting to play a big pad game on a small pad and it didn’t work at all. Faced with a host side playing an aggressive forecheck and content to clog the passing lanes at every opportunity, the Dynamos were too cute on the puck and were trying to get a passing game going.
The visitors had no answer for the physicality of the Devils and were made to pay. Ryan Sutton muscled his way behind the net and fed out front for Luke Forsyth to fire in and a faceoff win by Drew Campbell went straight back to Joe Llewelyn to fire home.
After the game, Dynamos coach Karl Lennon told me that he’d had a stern word with his team in the first intermission and it showed in the second. Things started going the way of the visitors. A brief period of time where Devils’ player/coach Alex Murray was forced into medical attention after taking a puck in the face but also, the hosts were either tired or forced into a period of energy retention. The aggressive forecheck of the first period was gone, replaced with a more standoffish approach. That, combined with a more direct game plan from the visitors saw them edge their way back into the game. Josh Condren connected onto a balloon of a rebound off of Aaron Taylor before Owen Dell tied the game at 2-2 with a textbook wrist shot by Taylor. It had been a game of two very different periods. So what would the third offer?
The answer was actually a mix of the two but ultimately, and sadly for the visiting fans, more of the first. It started as a very open period with both teams managing to score; Dan Lackey’s near mirror image of Llewellyn’s goal being cancelled out by Michael Stokes to keep both sets of fans excited and invested.
It was going to take a moment of magic to win the game and as I found myself wondering “who is the hero here?”, the answer was Steve Osman. Having played such a close, disruptive style of play, the one bit of space that the Devils were given was used to great effect. With Dynamo defenders desperately diving to stop him, Osman skated into the available space and fired an absolute laser of a shot past Rider into the top corner. Just less than two minutes later, an uncharacteristically lax rebound from Rider dropped into his crease for Jack Peacock to tap home and that was the hammer blow.
The game itself was not the exhibition of free flowing hockey that some might have been wanting but I’ll tell you this, it was a lot of fun. 8 goals, end to end action, momentum that see-sawed in all directions; I’ve paid more to watch worse.
I said on the Zero Pucks Given preview podcast that I had no idea what we’d get from Solent but that I was looking forward to not knowing. Now that I have some idea, what are we getting? We’re getting the Solent Devils. Even with their summer changes, this team is going to come crashing towards you at speed and zero finesse. Then, just when you think you’ve been ground into dust, they’ll exploit their high end skill. It is hard to really read them at home, as daft as that sounds, because Gosport is such a unique location for hockey that they should really win every game there.
For all the critiques you can make of their home, this was an entertaining game and a really entertaining style of play from the Devils. It wasn’t only that, it was clever. Against a visitor that had played the weekend before on bigger ice and thrives off of passing the puck around, they gave them no time or space to do it. The second was an issue and their inability to keep up the momentum for 60 minutes almost cost them but having found a second wind, they got over the line.
Aaron Taylor got man of the match on his return to senior hockey which is fair enough although it wasn’t the most convincing of performances at times, his rebound control not quite on point. However if this is what he does one game in, that only bodes well. It was also very Solent like for the outskaters to act as a unit and the netminder to stand out.
For Invicta, they got the game plan wrong and got beaten trying to answer a game plan that they weren’t ready for. Don’t get me wrong, the quality of the Dynamos was clearly on display and this is a good looking side. You could see the talent on the roster but they just didn’t adapt to what they were facing well enough to really make any headway. Yes, when the Devils took their foot off of the gas, they exploited it well and man of the match, Josh Condren took his goal very well, but too often they tried to do too much with not enough space or time to do it in. The times they played that more direct style, it worked. When they didn’t, it didn’t. He wasn’t available but the availability of Dan Scott would have been interesting in a game like this.
I was very impressed with young defenceman, Matt Bell who I thought looked very assured on the puck made some very good plays. Owen Rider gave a decent account of himself in net and has an assured way about him.
The Dynamos rebounded the following night against the Romford Buccaneers so it wasn’t a totally lost weekend for them. I can’t help but feel that they might rue this loss later in the campaign. Many teams will lose in Gosport however the Dynamos had the talent to beat them and didn’t find a way to stop themselves being beaten. That will likely frustrate.
Lowlight of the night: Mistakes happen but when the clock is left running during a break in play, put all the time back on and not an arbitrary amount, please Mr Referee.
Highlight of the night: The Osman game winner was very pretty.
Banners On The Wall 