Good Times/Bad Times...

Lets start off with the good stuff:

3 points from the weekend! A Penalties loss in Newcastle (probably some kind of karma at work there) for 1 point.......

then we beat the Squeelers on penalties! It feels soooooo good to beat them, 2 weekends on the trot even! Absolutely blinding game. End to end hockey, outstanding netminding from both teams, and some solid physical play. A little bit of handbags in the 1st, but nowt to write home about.

But we beat the Squeelers!

YES!

Now the bad shit.....

Grant Jacobsen has 'done a bunk' and buggered off back to the CHL. We ain't the first club to suffer this kind of shoddy treatment from CHL based 'pro' (and in this case, that is a term I use loosely). Happens every season. They come here, at no small exp-ense to British clubs, get a months worth of training and money, then do a sudden 'I got a better offer....BYE!' type phone call, leaving us short manned and out of pocket.

And sadly, with the NA leagues operating outside of the IIHFs control, we can't even pursue any kind of contractual claim against either him or his new club.

Bastard. Never even gave the club an oportunity to improve its terms to him.

Personally, I hope he injures himself. Will serve the git right. (Yes, I'm pissed off. More about the wasted expenditure for the club than anything else).

Grrrr.

That was bloody close...

Well, it looks like the Edinburgh Capitals won't be the easy points that they have been in previous seasons, if last night is anything to go by. They came down here and made us work fucking hard for the 2 points, giving us our 2nd shoot-out win in just 5 games played. Thank the Gods of Hockey we got Beauregard. I sincerely doubt that there is a better penalty shot taker in the EIHL.

Slightly disapointing crowd size, but given it was A: The Capitals (never a draw for us), and B: Saturday (not our usual game night), this was somewhat to be expected.

And I got my shirt! Yay! Anyone wants to chat to me, just look for the guy with 'LEARNED 1' on the back of his jersey. That would be me.

I will also freely admit to having spent much of the pre-game drinkies making jokes and generally having fun at the expense of 'the Honourable Sarah Walmsley'....more to come on this front...hehehehehehe. Keep 'em peeled is all I will say.

No pub crawl this week, as Russ, Matt, and myself just couldn't be arsed. Next week should see a trip to 'The Malt Shovel', though, which will come with a full report.

That bloody woman....

Yes, its another rant......

So Sarah Walmsley has now gone to the Local Government Ombudsman to try and stop the entire Altair development from being built.

She claims to have collected 43 individual objections, which she clearly feels should have been enough to stop planning permission being granted. 43. Out of how many resident in Altrincham? Hardly the views of the 'majority'.

Fact is, this woman is a serial NIMBY, having lodged complaints against all the recent Altrincham town centre developments (Tesco, the cinema/restaurant complex). A fact she seems unable to grasp is if you buy a house near to, or in, a town centre you will have higher than average levels of traffic, noise, and pollution.

If, by some bizarre hapenstance, she ever gets her way, I hope she is prepared to explain to all the upset kids who will lose their skating and hockey why exactly this has happened to them: 'I'm sorry kiddies, I know you all enjoyed your lessons, but my opinion was more important than yours'.

Hmm, something thells me we have not heard the last of this odious woman.

Post game musings....

...Well, we lost.

Or, to be more exact, thanks to a (literal) minute of madness from the D in the 2nd period, we lost what was, up to that point a pretty tight game. There were plenty of positives to take from it though. Beauregard looks sharper each game, and is starting to gel with Tony. The 2nd line looks like it will give defences some real hard nights throughout the season. And the PP looks liek a massive improvement on last seasons.

Negatives....well, the D still are not in sync yet. Smurph needs to learn when to kill the puck and when to play it (ie not when the oppositions forwards are bearing down on you), and thats it really.

Now, the much vaunted 'new' ice.............

Well, it certainly looked good from the stands. Pretty painted sponsor logos, clear lines, and a nice uniform finish. Down at ice level however, and the 'mend and make do' nature of the job became apparent. The ice had clearly been cut down to a level above the old markings, as the patch of sand that was visible infront of the timekeepers/announcers box was still fairly visible. The corner of the pad infront of block 11 is grey, not white (sand showing through I assume), and the gap round the boards has been filled in, but bizzarely not painted, so in places there is a brown.grey strip nearly and inch and a half wide around the base of the boards. And it looked soft.

Personally, I think we will be ina similar situation regaridng the ice in a couple of months. The current work hasn't really address the fundamental problems with the ice. I feel that the whole pad needs redoing, and I mean the whole pad. Take it right down to the sand, and start again. But Silver Blades won't do that (too much lost revenue).

And I still don't have my crested ST holders cup jersey. Ordered through White Magic on the web before the season started, and I wouldn't really be annoyed at waiting 3 weeks, but folks who orederd through the club office, or from Matt and Becky on the desk after I did ahve recieved theirs already. Went to the shop to ask where my order was....... and they had no idea. I admit I got a teeny little bit angry (no shouting, mind, just a very clipped tone), when no explanoation was forthcoming, but thankfully the ever wonderful Mags from the office is looking into it for me.

Oh, and the pub this week was the Faulkners. Nice beer, clean toilets, but not a very welcoming atmosphere. definately a 'local pub for local people'.

Pre game banter....

So, today see's the begining of a special pub-crawl around Altrincham (to be undertaken by Russell, Matt, and myself) as a replacement pub for pre match drinkies is sought.

After spending the last 2 seasons ensconsed within the welcoming walls of The Station Hotel, we have returned this autumn to find the soul ripped out of the place. The walls still carry all the sports memorabillia, but the Sky TV and plasma screens have been removed! Ladies and Gentlemen, we have a first....a Sports Bar with no Sports.

And last orders is now 8.30pm.

Bollocks to that.

I will report back later withy my findings.

Oh yeah, 6 points from 3 games. Sweet. Makes tonights game a 'top of the table' clash.

New season, same problems....

...on the 'official' club forum.

Some folks come on and quite rightly ask if any details are available yet regarding the clubs offer on Sunday to offer a discount for the next time that the Vipers visit us.

Cue the usual suspect jumping in feetfirst, flaming said poster for daring to ask for something the club offerd. One even saud 'Who would wnat to claim a discount anyway?'...how about someone who has to make sacrifices and budget very tightly to get their weekly hockey fix, numb-nuts. Not all of the people we see each week in the Dome have the disposeable income that you clearly do.

I mean, the club offered to discount people, so how is asking about this wrong? Or is it another case of the forum nazis refusing to allow our club (who never get anything wrong, honest) to be criticised or held to account over a problem they are involved in?

Plenty of folks I know won't visit the officila forum anymore because they are sick and tired of the relentless 'the Club is Brilliant, don't you dare say otherwise' attitude of a significant (in terms of post count not actuall numbers) portion of the users on there.

Shit, the whole 'you can't say that' attitude is one of the reason this blog exists. I got sick of taking flak for speaking my mind (even to the extent of club officials contacting me at one point over the content of one of my postings).

Phew, rant over.......

What a friggin palaver......

So, its the first home game of the season. The game is balanced 4-4 at the end of the 2nd period.

Then we have an hours delay whilst the Vipers bitch and moan about the state of the ice at the end they have to defend for the 3rd period. Now, I'm not insinuating that the Vipers were after getting the game abandoned, but..........

Yes, the ice was poor, but allegedly, one of the Vipers players claims it was 'down to the sand' in the patch which was in question. Right. It was rough for sure, but nowhere near the sand.

Personally, the Vipers looked like their hearts were not in the game after we levelled it at 4-4, and seemed to be looking for the cheap ways to get something (anything) from the game from that point onwards. Given how the Vipers players were twatting about on the ice after being asked by the announcer to leave for re-surfacing (ie not leavbing and acting like idiots), they can't have been that fussed. But, c'est la vie.

We had penalty shots instead. And we took the win.

Big credit to Adam Walker, who took his 2 shots calmly and efficiently. Adam is the recipient of this weeks 'Balls of Steel' award.

And don't get me started on the reffing....Darnell was shocking tonight, missing blatant infringements left, right and centre. I shall refrain for posting more for fear of descending into a shower of expletives.

One game in.....

.....and the numpties are already trolling about the official forum:

(Phoenix have gone from 3-0 up to 3-3, still with plenty of the game remaining)


'blabla' (quite apt for someone posting shite like this): Another useless bunch at the phoenix then! Woohoo a great season awaits! Not!!!

What a tosser. The idiot isn't even at the fucking game, yet thinks he can sum up how the entire season will pan out.

Every fanbase has folks like this. Complete tossers who love to hide behind their forum handles, passing comments that they know will annoy/irritate other, far more sensible users. Personally, I'd restrict his access until he/she/it can promise to behave themselves.

Anyways......first home game tomorrow. Should be a goodie. Newcastle have some exciting looking players on their bench, and a nettie who could be this seasons Fankhouser (ie shit hot one night, plain old shit the next). Prediction: an odd goal in 3 win for the Phoenix.