Phantoms extended their unbeaten hot streak with a narrow win over the Wildcats tonight but both sides will fancy their chances in the return leg in Swindon next Friday.
Games against the Wildcats are so often decided in the opening exchanges when one side or other grabs and then retains the momentum and on that basis this one was heading south within five minutes with the visitors camped in the Phantoms zone. The pace and intensity backed by aggressive fore-checking had Phantoms unable to clear their zone and, after a rather harsh tripping call on James White, the Cats took a deserved lead on 5:38 when Sam Jones fired through Jordan Marr with what looked, on the face of it, a relatively tame slapshot.
With Phantoms still unable to match the intensity of the visitors, it remained the Cats who looked the more likely as the period midpoint passed and on 11:43 they doubled their lead with a freak goal from a falling Toms Rutkis that ballooned over the shoulder of Jordan Marr …… probably a second one that the Phantoms stopper would want back.
At 0-2 down so early, things were looking bleak for Phantoms but a momentary lapse in discipline gifted them a way back when referee Hewitt quite rightly made a double call to leave Phantoms with two minutes of 5on3 at 13:15. Phantoms moved the puck around well but their dogged determination to find the perfect opening saw the clock running down fast and it was left to Tom Norton to crash one through Renny Marr for the breakthrough at 14:24.
Phantoms were gifted a further powerplay opportunity at 16:00 but were unable to tie the game, leaving Wildcats with a deserved lead at the first break.
If the momentum was fully in the back pocket of the Cats in the first, it was most definitely wrestled off them from the start of a middle period that saw Phantoms find and maintain their A-game for the full twenty minutes. Now the intensity was all in Phantoms favour as they closed the Cats down in their own zone and left them chasing shadows with some excellent open-ice passing .
At 27:06 it was a tied game as Glenn Billing skated out from behind Renny Marr’s goal to find the door slightly ajar at the near post and he wasted no time in bouncing the puck home off the back of the netminder’s pads. There was no respite from a dominant Phantoms and at 36:35 it was Tom Norton who once again found the sweet spot when firing home from distance and then we had the best goal of the game as Corey McEwen held his nerve to pick out the trailing Martins Susters who one-timed into a largely open net for 4-2 with just 52 seconds left of the period.
To their credit, and borne out of necessity, Wildcats stemmed the surging tide in the third period and matched Phantoms to set up a very attritional twenty minutes with clear cut chances very few and far apart but the one breakthrough crucially came the way of the visitors on the powerplay when an Aaron Nell wristshot appeared to take a big deflection to beat Jordan Marr at 47:04.
Phantoms finished the game with the extra man advantage for most of the last four minutes but were unable to capitalise as the Cats held on for what they will consider to be a half decent result.
Phantoms MOM was two goal Tom Norton.
A win over the in-form and, in the eyes of some, #1 ranked NIHL1 South side is always a decent result but both sides will fancy their chances going into next Friday’s second leg.
Phantoms will take heart from the manner in which they destroyed the Cats in the middle period and perhaps from the limited chances they gave up against a talented offensive unit that, in truth, relied on three pretty soft goals to get on the scoresheet so more of the same in a week’s time should be enough to see Phantoms through to the final.
Game stats HERE