Welcome to your weekly Hockey Soapbox. With only one game last weekend, we had a chance to improve on our Erhardt Conference standing and that's one of the questions that the panel are debating this week. On this panel are your main Editor Mark, the man with the vuvuzela - Andy Roberts, the entertaining Eric and the ever honest Fay and Sarah. Care to join them? Details at the end.
With that, it's time to get on your soapboxes.
1. Five words on Saturday
Another loss to conference opposition
Big points lost to Cardiff
Looked tired, need replacements quick
Caught
napping in first minute
First period cost us game
2. Which player has impressed you the most
this season so far?
Andy: Can't
pick one player out so I am going for three (one from each role). First up is
Matheson. He has been a cracking find by PT. He is smart with the puck,
sensible when making defensive challenges and when he unleashes in front of
goal the shot is a rocket. (Aarssen has also impressed if I am honest). Second
is Mustukovs. He has his critics with his different style of play to a lot of
netties. The Moose has kept us in several games, that we have won when we had
no business even having a chance of the points. For me he has really stepped
his game up. Third is Marquardt. He completely passed me by last season (not
that I saw Blaze much last year) and with the moaning of the SkyDome faithful I
wasn't expecting much when he signed. Even though I am sure his early season
injury hasn't fully healed yet he is battling well in the corners, dishing the
puck to team mates and tickling the twine on a regular basis. Hope it continues!
Fay: Armstrong is on fire at the moment. So is Moose.
Sarah: Matheson
by far. He’s a smart hockey player and just does the little things right. I do
have to stay though that Aarssen has changed my mind about him, I didn’t rate
him at the start of the season but the last few games he’s been great and stood
out.
Mark: It has to be the guy who shares the same nickname as me, Mark "Mad Dog" Matheson. His experience and unfussed play remind me of Darrell Hay from a few seasons back. "Big John" Armstrong has been a revelation up top, Marquardt is showing what a very useful player he is and Moose seems to be as dependable as ever. But "Mad Dog" shines brighter than most for me now.
Eric: Obviously
with the group we have at the moment, it's difficult to pick any one player.
The simple fact of the matter is that not one player has shone through at all
this season, as yet. But
I won't pick one player. No! I will pick a line, and again obviously it's the
Dowd, Nelson, Valdix line, if any line was anywhere near to pulling us through
the tougher games it's this one line. The commitment, the energy and the
passion come out of this line. If other lines where committed like this line
then we would be having more ups than downs.
Just
thought! If I had to pick one player it's Fitzgerald, the guys ability this
season, his stick handling etc have impressed me greatly. Well done Zack..
3. Which player needs to step up to avoid
being gassed?
Fay: I don’t know. I don’t think anyone is playing particularly
badly. Many will say Ramsay or Westerling.. Hard to make judgement when they
rarely get played!
Sarah: Westerling
possibly. Had a couple of good games but that’s all. Don’t feel like he’s
settled on a line and I don’t know where he fits in with the team.
Mark: One player I had big hopes for, and I guess I won't be alone here, was Tim Wallace (Gromit). The guy has a good shot on him but hasn't been great so far. I hope he starts to show us the real reason why he played over 100 games in the NHL.
Eric: Really
Mark.. You ask this question as if it was easy to answer! And if there was just
one guy that sticks out as not pulling his weight, or earning his corn it would
be simple. However,
that sadly, is not the case... Poor recruitment in the summer has left us with
over 50% of the team being poor and worthy of being gassed NOW!! Take
out The Moose, Fitzgerald and The Dowd line then you can pick who ever you
like from the rest I'm afraid.
Andy: I
guess Ramsay would be the one. He has shown flashes of skill and has dropped
the mitts several times but seems to go missing in many of the games he has
managed to feature in. It could be he doesn't gel with the line mates on the
4th line who knows. For me; we should have kept Ferrara and run an import less.
This obviously would have been dependant on wages for both.
4. Is the 3 points out of 14 a concern in
our own conference?
Sarah: It’s
early days but yes. We can’t afford to drop points at home. Doesn’t look like
we’re competing with the “big boys” on paper
Mark: Hell yeah, it's undermining the season so far and some of the results we've got elsewhere. Sort it and we'll be fine but allow it to continue then it could seriously affect where we finish at the end. It's our Achilles Heel at the moment, needs treating.
Eric: Goodness
Yes! The
gap between us and the others in our conference is a major worry, there maybe
not a lot between us if you look at us loosing to our conference partners by
the odd goal here or the odd goal there. But the grim reality, in the grey
light of day is that we have a mountain to climb. We
currently lie bottom of our conference, after the European distraction and the
other teams playing their games in hand, then the true situation will be
frighteningly revealed. At
the moment I see us finishing bottom of our conference come April 2018 and probably
7th or 8th overall in the league. Hope I'm wrong, but feel that is where we
will be come April..
Andy: It is definitely a worry that we seem to be off the pace
when playing other teams from the Erdhart conference. To have a chance of the
league we need to be gaining 50 to 60% of these points minimum (ideally 70%)
over the season assuming we win a large chunk of the cross conference games. We
saw in Fife recently them cross conference points are not a gimme though.
Fay: I don’t care much for the conference system, but yes I feel
we need to pick it up and dig a little deeper in these games.
5. Cole Shudra, where would you fit him into
the line-up?
Mark: I really don't know. He's got the potential to be a solid defensive centre but PT and JA see him as a defenceman which isn't what I see him in. I reckon they want him to be an absolute clone of his Dad and to be honest that could be career damaging. He needs regular ice time but unless we have serious injury issues, we will only see him in fits and starts. A shame, because the kid has talent. But it's not being utilised to good effect at the moment.
Eric: Cole
is a forward, that's his natural position, where he likes to play, why the
coach is grooming him for D is a brave move, and one only he can answer. What
I don't get is that as part of the D, as part of the Steelers team. Why! Why?
Does the coach dress him, then give him limited ice time to then just bang on
about being short on D. Surely giving him any ice time is good for the lad,
good for the other D players and he will feel more confident and at least
contributing to the overall effort. Begs belief really?
Andy: It is hard for Cole at the minute. He has spent most of his
playing life as a forward and now being asked to learn the role of a
defenceman. Until he makes the strides necessary to hold a regular spot he is,
unfortunately, playing a bit part role. While we were down to 4 D over last
couple of weeks I thought we may have played him a little more just to give the
main D men a rest. Cole is a longer term project and is only young so we will
hopefully see some him gain more ice time over the rest of the season and in
seasons to come. I have faith he will continue to work hard and will make one
of the D spots his.
Fay: I’m certain Cole is happy to play wherever coach needs him
to and he’ll give his all to fill that role. I see him more as a spare forward
myself, rather than on D - I thought he was centre when he played at
international level but could be wrong.
Sarah: Probably
going to upset a few people here but honestly I wouldn’t fit him in the line up
anywhere. He’s just not at the calibre of Kirk and Brown. I understand he
thought he was a forward but Thommo thinks otherwise but he just looks lost
whenever he’s given ice time. I don’t know what the solution is apart from him
being on a 2 way contract.
6. What’s your realistic expectation of our
finishing position this season based on what we have seen so far?
Eric: Realistically...
As stated earlier. Unless my prayers are answered, or the 3 other teams in our
conference plus the Storm, The Flyers and maybe one of the new teams all
collapse or have a flu pandemic run through their team then 7th.. AT BEST!!!
Sarah: 4th
or 5th but who knows. There’s been some strange results so far this season and
there’s along way to go.
Mark: We won't win the league, that I do really believe. Can we finish 2nd or 3rd? Yes but we need to sort out the conference form to make that happen. Realistically it'll be a 5th placed finish at worst, teams will burn out and we will squeak in the top five. We're basically gonna replicate Panthers season 16-17 in 17-18.
Andy: Realistically at the moment we are looking at fourth place
for the league. There is plenty of time left for that to change but we need to
start going on a serious winning run. The playoffs or the Challenge Cup are
looking like our most realistic domestic silverware. I am really hoping we make
a good show of the Continental Cup and make the finals and the with a big push
win it with the hope of a return to the CHL.
Fay: Anywhere in the top 4 overall but bottom of conference,
challenge cup final, final 4 at playoffs.
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