Chelmsford Chieftains 3, Wightlink Raiders 4
CHIEFTAINS and their fans were left disappointed after a terrible weekend for the team. Going into Sunday's game off the back of a 5-1 defeat on the Isle of Wight on Saturday, much was expected and early expectations were high as Danny Hammond notched an early goal 99 seconds into the game.
The game was end to end and the extra large crowd of almost 500 almost saw Hammond make it 2-0 but his shot went just wide. Late in the period Chieftains doubled their lead thanks to man of the match BT Williams being in the right place at the right time in front of the net to poke the puck home thanks to Blaho Novak and Aaron Connolly's build up work.
26 seconds of the second period was all it took for the Chieftains to go three up when Ross Brears capped a fine performance with an excellent solo effort that he tucked past Matt Colclough in the Raiders net at the second attempt.
Darren Brown almost made it 4-0 a few minutes later but was denied by Colclough. A few moments later and it was Ben Clements's turn to be a hero as a good save denied Stewart Tait a goal. Clements was finally beaten on 32:46 when a near post goal from player-coach Jeremy Cornish found its way past Clements in what looked to be an impossible angle.
Youngster Ruairidh Garrett threaded through a great pass for Hammond but Hammond slipped when he was one-on-one with Colclough and the score remained 3-1.
Raiders pulled another one back at 46:58 when Dan Scott rifled in a shot from the top of the circle, although there was some debate about whether the puck did cross the line or not. Hammond again went close moments later when a good pass from Alex Staples, who later picked up player of the month award, found it's way to the hard-working forward but the crossbar came to the rescue and the score remained nicely poised at 3-2 with just under 10 minutes to play.
Chieftains’ hearts were broken on 54:05 when Scott combined with Danny Hughes to give the former Chieftain a game-tieing goal. Chieftains players were rocked and then the game turned right against them when Hughes turned provider for Tait to score the winner with just under four minutes left.
It was quite ironic that Tait would be the game winner for the Raiders as he had spent the best part of both games getting under the skin of both players and fans of the Essex side, so it was no surprise to see him and his teammates celebrate in the manner they did.
A disappointed and frustrated head coach Dean Birrell said after the game: "Sometimes you look at games and think 'did they win that or did we lose it?' Tonight we definitely lost it. We competed with them early on and were the best team for the first half of the game, but then we got lackadaisical and sloppy at times and gave the Raiders chances to get back into the game and they did.
“We stopped hitting, we stopped forcing issues, we were dominating early on and then just slipped away. We've been in this position and we've got to learn from it. We are a young side and they are still learning, but if we want to play with the big boys we've got to start playing like big boys.
"It's a weekend to forget. There are positives to take from it though and we will, but it's frustrating that it's overshadowed by a big negative that we've not scored any points this weekend and all the teams around us have picked up points.
"Looking ahead to next week when Oxford come to visit us, they've obviously lost their coach recently (Simon Anderson left the City Stars to take up a coaching role at Premier League side Swindon Wildcats) but they've brought some guys in who can play and will play and we have to be aware of that. Oxford are never a simple side to beat and we haven't had any easy games against them. We've got to pick our game up again, as we head towards the play-offs, and I hope we can start with a win over the Stars as we play game two of our six home games in a row series.”