joshmat said:
Have not followed ice hockey for last 5 seasons but have bought a season ticket for this season . What have I missed in 5 seasons ? Are the Blaze still our closet rivals, who are the hard men to look out for , whose top dog, who are the whipping boys ? List could go on !
In short....
We have been the "nearly" team for much of the last five years, in contrast with our first five years, there has been no league championships and a range of near misses. We should have won the league two years ago.... but didn't due to a misguided attempt to buy Sheffield and a nonsense ban of one of our key players..... we should have won at least one playoff championship but our penalty shots consistently suck..... and we should have won a Challenge Cup but didn't....
Having said that.... the last five years have been pretty entertaining, at home our style of play has been physical, high energy and the aim tends to be to bully teams out of the tent... this generally works unless Belfast are in town (well based on last season at least)..... the atmosphere in the tent is consistently good, especially when one of our Southern Conference rivals are in town and we win far more games than we lose at home.... Don't expect tape to tape passing from us but do expect commitment and plenty of goals, oh and the occasional brawl behind the benches when Hull are in town.....
Away from home we are rather less successful and frankly rather less exciting to watch.... we have relied on a tight, ultra-defensive game that either works brilliantly at frustrating the hell out of the home team (hello Nottingham last year...) or is no match for a well oiled offence. Away support is generally pretty good thanks to the efforts of various Inferno members and although we don't win a vast number of games away, when we do it is memorable!
I suspect we will have two big rivals this season..... Coventry for lots of reasons and Sheffield thanks to two men (well actually three if you include our owner who bought them two years and then sold them after they pipped us for the title....) In terms of size and budget Coventry are our closest challenger and rather entertainingly we have had the voodoo sign over them in recent times.... we have still never lost the first competitive match at the Skydome and it is rare for a match between the two teams to end with a full compliment of players... especially true this year with the addition of a number of "character" players down Coventry way...
Sheffield are coached by a former Devil in Ryan Finnerty who split support down the middle, half thinking he was God's gift to South Wales, the other half thinking he was a mouthy so-and-so who took dumb penalties... they have also just signed the most popular player the Devils have had in the last five years in Tylor Michel.... he has now become the least popular player in the last five years and a lot of history is being rewritten..... Given the Steelers won the league we should have won two years ago when our owner bought them then it all adds up to a rather tasty rivalry....
Sheffield and Belfast have shared out the league spoils in the last few years which amuses everyone who wants Nottinghams run of 2nd and 3rd places to continue..... the Panthers still haven't won the league for approximately 500 years but in retaliation they have won pretty much everything else in the last five years.... This year looks pretty similar, the Panthers are skilled, talented and lightweight, they should win most of their home games but have their lunch money stolen when they go outside the city.... Coventry and the Devils will chase hard but the league will go to either Belfast or Sheffield... cos it always does....
The Northern teams are basically not very good with the exception of Braehead Clan who have the disadvantage of a hideous purple kit but the advantage of the leagues best player in Jade Galbraith, who despite evidence to the contrary is a) male and b) not vastly overweight.... the other Northern teams will beat each other and occasionally spring a minor surprise at home, normally against us... our record in Scotland is rather less than brilliant....
I think that is it, you missed the genius that was Craig Weller, the Brad Voth years and the return of Stevie Lyle but I suspect you will come back to a pretty exciting season..... as long as we beat Coventry and Sheffield more times than they turn us over....
