ENL DEVILS 5 - 4 OXFORD STARS

The Cardiff ENL Devils ground out a hard earned 5-4 victory over the visiting Oxford City Stars in the Cardiff Bay Arena on Sunday night to leap frog the Chelmsford Chieftains in the league and now occupy 2nd position in the table.

The Oxford management team have been busy of late and strengthened their already solid line up with fast, hard working forwards Juraj Rusic and Alan Green, the pair returning to the club following short spells in the EPL. With the Stars also boasting big hitting defenseman Andrew Shurmer back amongst their ranks having left Cardiff only 2 weeks ago, it was clear that Oxford fancied their chances of being the first team to take 2 points away from the ENL Devils barn this season.

The game started in lively fashion with the Stars clearly setting out with a game plan to try and ruffle the feathers of the home side, with seemingly great effect. The Devils constantly found themselves short handed in the first period and whilst they showed signs of threatening during brief spells of 5 on 5, it was the Stars who had the upper hand. Whilst it was clear that the Stars had a well organised power play that moved the puck around nicely, some stout defending from Cardiff and solid goalkeeping by Mike Brabon saw the period end 0-0.

The second period continued in similar vein, with Cardiff again finding themselves in the box more often than their opponents and facing heavy pressure by the Stars. As the pressure mounted, one of the Oxford players seemed to get under the skin of Cardiff stopper Brabon, the resulting melee ending in a 10 minute misconduct for the keeper for protesting too strongly to referee Decaux. It was the visitors that got the scoring underway with Wojciak firing home from close just inside the hash marks whilst one the powerplay. Decaux deliberated for a short while whether to wave off the goal due to a man in the crease but in the end the goal was awarded. Cardiff immediately looked to hit back and it was a Ricky Deacons shot from the slot that beat Glen Jackson in the Oxford goal through traffic. Oxford continued to press hard though and soon found themselves back in front at 2-1 as the new boys combined, Rusic scoring assisted by Green and Shurmer. The period ended with the Devils frustrations clear, and words were exchanged as both sets of players looked to leave the ice, the Cardiff goaltender being targeted as Oxford looked for the psychological edge.

Cardiff sent out their 6ft 9 enforcer Gareth Rowlands at the beginning of the third to try see if he could bring things to a head, but with Stars tough guy Lucas declining the option of a bout with the giant, Cardiff seemed to wise up to Oxfords game plan of trying to coax retaliation penalties out of them and finally got down to playing hockey. In a rampaging 8 minutes Cardiff showed the class that reflects their league position and went on to score 4 goals. Good work on the powerplay saw Luke Piggott scramble the puck in to level the game at 43:38, then 4 mins later a sublime piece of passing saw Fisher racing down the left wing, cutting inside towards goal only to slide across an inch perfect pass to the tape of Ben Davies who made no mistake in applying the one timer finish to go ahead 3-2. Tim Burrows then added a 4th assisted by James Manson to go 4-2 up.  Piggott completed Devils scoring at 49:27 as he added Devils 5th and his 2nd of the night on a breakaway thanks to a great pass from Watkins.  That seemed to jolt Oxford back into life and a quick fire double first saw Stars Captain Darren Elliott deflect one up high and past the glove of Brabon after a pass from the corner and then debutant Alan Green finished low blocker side to make it a one goal game.

With the score now delicately poised at 5-4 and only 8 minutes to go, a nail biting finale ensued. Cardiff found themselves short handed twice in the final minutes of the game as Chris Jones first got a penalty for illegal equipment following a heavy hit that removed his helmet, then Jordan Powell was sent to the box for high-sticks. With Oxford pulling their goalie to make the advantage 6 on 4 nerves were rattled, but Cardiff were able to see the game out and claimed two valuable points.

Special mention must go to Oxford keeper Glen Jackson, who left the ice injured shortly after the Cardiff 5th goal mid-way through the 3rd period. A check by Deacon on a Stars defender saw the D-man knock into his own goalie and Jackson took an injury to the neck as he hit the cross bar on the way down. Glen was taken too hospital for precautionary assessment as with all neck injuries and we wish him a speedy recovery.

Match Stats:

Devils Scorers: Luke Piggott 2+0, Ben Davies 1+1, Ricky Deacon 1+0, Tim Burrows 1+0, Corey Watkins 0+2, Steven Fisher & James Manson both 0+1
Man of Match: Gareth Dixon

Period Scores: 0-0, 1-2, 4-2
PIMS: on Devils 62, on Stars 28
Shots: on Devils Brabon 46, on Stars Jackson 25/Skaife 11