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Around the Rinks: Cardiff Devils jump to Elite League summit

By Luke James

Posted on 28th December 2025

Riley Brandt, Cardiff Devils (Image: Scott Wiggins)

It’s all change at the top of the Elite League.

The Cardiff Devils now lead the way, vaulting over the Sheffield Steelers and Nottingham Panthers with back-to-back wins over the Coventry Blaze.

At the foot of the table, nothing changed on Saturday [27 December] night.

Defeats for Coventry and the Dundee Stars leave the bottom three as they were, with the Fife Flyers out of action until their rematch with the Belfast Giants this evening.

Welcome to Around the Rinks: our daily summary of every team’s post-game media remarks.

Around the Rinks: Saturday, 27 December

Coventry Blaze 0-5 Cardiff Devils

Riley Brandt, Cardiff Devils (Image: Scott Wiggins)

Kevin Moore, Coventry Blaze:

I loved our fans showing out, it was awesome to have a packed building and I thought they really supported our group tonight. I thought the guys poured everything they could into a game that was really hard on them. It’s really hard coming into a game with five imports in the stands. We’re certainly not trying to make excuses, that’s not what we’re about, but having five imports in the stands makes it really tough.

I thought the guys poured their hearts into it and it’s hard because Cardiff are a really good team and being short-benched stretches you. Obviously, the result doesn’t reflect the effort, but we certainly did the best to push as hard as we could for our fans.

It’s really tough, but I felt the effort was there against a really good team, who brought it and got the result they were after.

Paul Thompson, Cardiff Devils:

You’ve got to be pleased with a five-nil road win. It got off to a feisty start, a little retribution from yesterday, but the guys, from both sides, took care of that and we move on.

Ben [Bowns] has been good for us all year. He’s got a good team in front of him, as well. Overall, it’s been a very pleasing two-game series.

It’s a lot nicer [knowing that Joey Martin is on his bench]. Every time he’s out there on the ice, he’s a great player and pro. He’s been an outstanding player in this league for many years and he still is.

Guildford Flames 3-2 Manchester Storm

Andrew Hemmings, Guildford Flames:

It was a huge game for us tonight and a massive two points for the league standings. It’s always a tough schedule over Christmas, with a difficult game in Manchester last night where we felt like we should’ve come away with something but didn’t.

We’re pleased with the bounce back from the guys. It wasn’t the greatest of starts, we changed a few things, and a special mention for Taz [Burman], it was a late decision to put him in and he stepped up big time.

Cam Critchlow, Manchester Storm:

It’s a tough feeling coming out of here with nothing, but I’m sure Guildford felt the same way coming out of our rink yesterday. Bit of a long day with the travel, but we can’t complain as some of the teams in this league have it way worse than we do.

I thought we competed and were mentally switched-on. In the third period, Guildford really came hard and were tough to defend. Ultimately, we were in the box too much and that cost us. It made us too tired in the third period and it showed: they were the better team.

It was a great two-game series over the weekend, we came to compete, and we’ll move on.

Dundee Stars 1-4 Glasgow Clan

Tristin Langan, Glasgow Clan (Image: Derek Black)

Marc LeFebvre. Dundee Stars:

It’s a frustrating loss tonight because I thought we competed hard for the most part: we only gave up 18 shots and it was one of our better defensive displays all season. The three [non-empty net] goals were all from our mistakes.

Jarrett [Fiske] gave us a chance there, which he’s done the last couple of nights. We’ve been playing better defensively the last three games, but we’ve got to reward him by being better offensively. We take shots, but we’re very perimeter and we don’t go to the net-front. We’ve got to take away goalies’ eyes because they’re good in this league. We’ve got to get going on the offensive side.

It’s going to be nice to have a practice on Monday because we haven’t practiced in ten days because of the schedule and rink availability. It’s going to be a hard practice to get us ready for Tuesday.

Corey Neilson, Glasgow Clan:

You know what, I thought we were excellent offensively in the first two periods and great defensively in the third. We also had great goaltending.

Dundee played hard, we have to give them credit, but I thought we deserved the win.

Nottingham Panthers 4-3 Sheffield Steelers

David Noël, Nottingham Panthers (Image: Panthers Images)

Danny Stewart, Nottingham Panthers:

It was back and forth, the same as our previous games. They were certainly the better team in the first period and earned their lead. They got the second one too and, in the first half of the game, it looked like we weren’t going to be able to generate too much.

But then we put together three or four shifts to shift the momentum a bit and our first goal gave us a bit of life. Again, it was just back and forth.

After the first, I thought we did a good job and didn’t give up too much. When we did, [Jason Grande] made some big saves.

We made a couple of big mistakes and, unfortunately, they were to Mitchell Balmas, who is probably the league’s MVP right now. It’s the wrong guy to be giving the puck.

I can’t credit the guys enough for the resiliency they showed tonight. To keep coming back and digging in, it was a well-deserved two points.

Aaron Fox, Sheffield Steelers:

It was another good, entertaining game for the fans. I felt like we controlled the early parts of the game, but we turned the puck over when we didn’t need to and it gave them some life. Overall, Nottingham pushed back hard and we had some decision-making issues. We’ve had three ‘too many men’ calls in two games: switching off mentally has cost us this weekend.

I thought we probably deserved a point tonight: Balmas was outstanding and gave us a chance, but we’ve been giving up leads, and have to manage the game better. It’s something that we’ll have to look at and be better with.