Photograph of Guildford Flames Gary Clarke in action against the Manchester Phoenix courtsey of Alan Bone.

The Manchester Phoenix visited Spectrum on Saturday night and were turned back home after suffering a 6-3 defeat at the hands of the home side Flames.  The win was a precursor to another success the next evening when Spectrum’s men travelled to Romford Raiders and unloaded a 10-1 win over the Essex side. 

In the Weekend opener, the 2100+ people attending the game may have anticipated a high scoring affair after the two teams shared 26 goals over a weekend set just two weeks prior, but a 1-1 tie beyond the midway point of the match looked to disappoint the goal seekers until the offensive gates opened with a pair of quick Flames goals near the 40 minute mark.  First, though, former Flame Adam Walker put the Phoenix ahead in the 12^th minute, but Adrian Saul followed Manchester’s opener at 14:54 when he evened the score.  The teams played a scoreless 15 minutes of the 2^nd frame before Tom Duggan finally brought the sellout Spectrum crowd to its feet at 35:57 to give Surrey’s outfit their first lead of the evening.  Gary Clarke extended the advantage to a pair shortly after that to offer a firm momentum boost to his side ahead of the concluding stanza.  Clarke added another just over 3 minutes into the 3^rd to widen the gap to 4-1 before he completed the natural hattrick in the 51^st minute.  The high scoring Phoenix replied at 52:50 through Stephan Wallace and pulled the game that much closer at 55:19 with an Andre Mattsson strike.  As quickly as the response began, however, it ended and the last goal of the night was a Martin Masa credit inside the final minute to guarantee the result. 

During Sunday’s encounter, the Flames netted 8 unanswered goals split evenly between the 2^nd and 3^rd periods to blow the game open and secure the result.  Saul opened the scoring before the ice was barely dry when he collected a shorthanded marker less than 2 minutes in.  The Raiders replied in the 12^th minute with a Darius Pliskauskas goal, but Paul Dixon put his team in front again just a couple of minutes after that on the powerplay.  Jez Lundin scored the Flames 2^nd shorthanded marker at 20:44.  About 12 minutes later Nathan Rempel extended the Flames lead to 4-1.  Inside the last 5 minutes of the period, Rick Plant and David Savage ensured a 5 goal lead to play the final 20 minutes.  Rob Lamey continued the attack at 47:12 and Masa added another less than a minute later.  At 53:08 Duggan posted the 9^th before Clarke made it double digits just seconds after that to complete the scoring. 

Flames Head Coach Paul Dixon was obviously much more pleased with the 4 points as opposed to being shutout of the league spoils the weekend prior:

“Heading into a couple of weekends ago we were on a 10 game winning tear and when you do that you very much get used to getting all the points.  When it suddenly comes to a halt and you get shutout over a pair of games it can be extremely devastating and often can shatter a team’s confidence.  In such circumstances it can be quite some time before you shake it off and re-establish yourselves, but in our case, however, we are pleased the guys put it behind them early in the week of training.  We were focused and ready to play Manchester on Saturday and fortunately we got some timely scoring to put us back in the results.  We carried it over on Sunday to dominate the game and finish the weekend as we planned.  The key thing each and every week now is to really focus only on what each of us can do on a nightly basis to help us remain consistent from now until the season times out.  We are still in the race with a lot of hockey to play, but you can’t win all the games at once.  This week we will focus again on a repeat visit by Manchester before turning our attention to a trip to Peteroborugh in one of the most difficult building in which to register a win.”