Autocraft Telford Tigers faced off against Yorkshire rivals Sheffield Steeldogs in a midweek clash at Telford Ice Rink.

Tigers sat third in the league standings and were level on points with the Steeldogs. Tigers home form was exemplary with the Shropshire side having won all six games at home so far this season. The form would be tested as Sheffield had won all four of their away games, so something had to give!

Tigers had cost themselves the game in the first period against Hull in their last game and made a similar poor start to this game. With Sheffield’s first shot in the second minute of the game, they scored the opening goal. Kyle Watson shot over Brad Day’s shoulder into the top corner of the net.  

Tigers hit back whilst short handed after Scott McKenzie was called for high sticking. Eric Henderson led a breakaway and passed across the goal to David Thomson who shot into the open net.

Sheffield were in front again five minutes later with a shot by CJ Garcia from the blue line that beat Day who was screened by a defender.

Once again Tigers’ special teams produced a goal when the power play unit were sent out after Sheffield were called for too many men. McKenzie sent Patrick Brown in on goal allowing the import forward to shoot into the top left hand corner of the goal to draw the sides level.

Unfortunately for Telford this was as good as it got as the home side were outplayed for the rest of the game.

A routine shot from Walker Sommer went in and out of Day’s glove and dropped into the net to give Sheffield the lead again. In the final minute of the period, Watson hit a low shot past Day to double Sheffield’s lead.

Tigers performance so far had been flat and this continued into the second period as the visitors seemed to be more determined to win battles and made Telford look sluggish. 

It was therefore no surprise when Sheffield added a further two goals in the latter stages of the second period. Bair Gendunov scored from close range and then Watson completed his hat trick with a break away goal after a poor turnover by McKenzie gifted Sheffield the puck.

At the start of the third period, Tigers changed netminder with Ben Norton replacing Day. But Sheffield showed no mercy and the first two shots Norton faced went behind him for a goal. Sommer scored a delayed penalty goal after being tripped by Caelan McPhee as he shot at goal. Then thirty seconds later, Joonas Larinmaa shot from the right circle over Norton’s shoulder for Sheffield’s eighth goal of the game.

The rest of the game dragged on with Tigers just wanting the game to end and Sheffield earned a comfortable victory and took the two points.

Tigers now have to bounce back and face a double game weekend against reigning champions Leeds Knights.

Final Score: Autocraft Telford Tigers 2 Sheffield Steeldogs 8.

Scorers: David Thomson and Patrick Brown.

Man of the match: Kyle Ferguson.

After the game Head Coach Tom Watkins, commented, “We were far from our best this evening, we got a bad start and were quickly behind in the game.

“We didn’t manage their speed, Our defence made bad decisions pressing pucks where we had no back pressure and forwards doing a poor job tracking back allowing them to get above us way too easily. You give any team that many odd man rushes you are going to struggle. We didn’t turn up, there was no push back or physicality and I was really disappointed with our poor game management. I expect much more from this group of players. We simply weren’t good enough.”