Visitors win both, but plenty of positives to take forward

A look back at the pre-season games at Ice Sheffield against top DEL side Thomas Sabo Ice Tigers.

On the third weekend of August, Steelers played their third and fourth pre-season games of the new campaign ahead. Having shared the spoils with Sodertajile the weekend previous, Paul Thompson’s men took on a much sterner task in hand because in opposition were former Steelers defenceman and captain Rob Wilson’s Nuremberg Ice Tigers or for commercial reasons; the Thomas Sabo Ice Tigers. Nuremberg finished third in the DEL last season, and presented a tough set of games in the confines again of the en-suite bathroom known as Ice Sheffield.

However, whilst the end results show that the German visitors won both games, 4-2 and 4-3: the pleasing aspect was how well Steelers acquitted themselves in both games. In fact, with a bit more luck in front of goal then they could have taken one of those games and ensured a potentially split series.

Game one saw the visitors go into a 4-0 lead thanks to goals from Dupuis (no, not Pascal the Pittsburgh Penguin and Stanley Cup winner), Fox (twice) and Pohl and all this had happened before the 32-minute mark had even been reached. Steelers were on the receiving end of a numerous amount of penalties being called by referee Stefan Hogarth with Zack Fitzgerald and Davey Phillips being the two most penalised; perhaps Davey hadn’t had his Scooby snacks? Yet whenever Steelers did have a sight on goal, and they did have a fair few looks too, they found Andreas Jenike in the visiting net gobbling up everything – some of us later found he was the back-up last season. Some back up, eh?

Yet a brilliant strike from Colton Fretter, high and into the top shelf blocker side broke the shutout at 35:20 and it gave Steelers more confidence. That confidence increased with a little over 11 minutes to go when Fretter notched another and another brilliant strike top shelf – three goals in three pre-season matches for the Canadian winger. But despite giving it everything, there no further goals and the Ice Tigers took game one by 4-2. The game also saw new power forward Matt Marquardt exit before the end with a nasty looking shoulder injury: the unforgiving boards of Ice Sheffield not helping matters and the fact Marquardt left the ice immediately spoke volumes, he knew it was a bad one.

Many left Ice Sheffield Saturday far from disappointed, but reckoned we were in for a more tougher assignment 24 hour hence and probably a bit of drubbing from the well drilled and organised German outfit. Nuremberg took an early lead in game two thanks to Pfleger and that’s the way it stayed until the end of the first. Yet almost after the restart, Steelers were level with a power play goal: new Swede Jonas Westerling being first to react after a bit of pressure on the Ice Tigers net. But it didn’t last long as three minutes the experienced Steven Reinprecht put the visitors back in front and it was extended to 3-1 by Oliver Mebus at 32:06. 3-1 Ice tigers at end of two, and most would have expected the visitors to run away with it from there.

The third started and we had a couple of quick goals in the first five minutes of the period: both goals coming within 41 seconds of each other. Fretter continued his hot streak of goals to make it a one goal game at 44:03 before Dupius and Fox combined again (in fact they were so instrumental for Rob Wilson all weekend) to restore the two-goal margin at 44:44. Steelers pushed towards Niklas Treutle’s goal to get back on terms, and reduced the arrears again with 97 seconds left in the game when with the extra skater on the ice for Moose: Rob Dowd and Tim Wallace combined, and “The King of Sheffield” banged the puck home past Treutle for 4-3. But Steelers couldn’t find a fourth and the Germans held on. Whilst the results didn’t go the Steelers way, they certainly battled away against the third best side in the DEL and gave a great account of themselves even if a certain misguided fool who has nothing to do with the Club thought otherwise.

Here are some of your thoughts from the weekend.

On Saturday:

Pete Watson: “Westerling looked cleverer and nifty, Ronnberg composed and strong…Great experience, thought that the team did good overall against a top team in opposition.”

Harry Verity: “Very good performance however Fitzy kinda ruined it for me. Again, Fretter was absolutely key. All in all, I sense a promising season.”

Richard J Allen: “Kirk = God tier hockey player”

On Sunday:

Robert Newbolt: “Stand out moment was the dipsy doodle and near goal from Kieran Brown.”

Zoe Birrell: “Great starts from both Liam (Kirk) and Kieran (Brown). Strong team developing.”

Lara Page: “Youngsters all look good. Ramsay and Ronnberg look strong signings."

So that was the weekend against Nuremberg, and already a few of you are impressed with the class of 2017 especially the young talent and new boys such as Joonas Ronnberg. We’ll be doing this throughout the season so keep those post game comments coming. We’ll be back with more next time after the two games against the Storm. Until then, enjoy your hockey.

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