Weekend Teaser: Tough weekend ahead as the Bees face two teams with perfect first weekends

 Tough weekend ahead as the Bees face two teams with perfect first weekends

Two points are on the board after the first weekend of action

The opening game of the season saw a Friday night clash with the Phantoms. Powerplay and penalty killing were going to be the deciding factors as there were only three even-handed goals out of the nine goals scored. Phantoms made the most of the extra man opportunities with four of their goals coming on the powerplay, but this was a closer game than the score suggests. A 2-minute penalty call on Dom Gabaj at 48.10 was ironically going to provide Bees their best chance of the night to level the game. Phantoms scored as Dom sat in the box which should have been enough for them, but Joe Gretton had other ideas and thought an unprovoked attack on Dom was required. This resulted in Bees being gifted a 7-minute powerplay and an early exit for Gretton. Despite their best efforts Bees were unable to break through the Phantoms defence and there were no more goals in the game which finished 6-3 to the Phantoms and with a huge sigh of relief for Gretton whose actions could have been very costly for his team.

Plenty of positives for Bees to take from the game. The pairing of Juha and Brendan proved they are going to be a handful for future opposition and the Bees saying thanks for the 7-minute powerplay and refusing to dance with Gretton was astute.

Sunday's home game against the Bison saw the Bees come out all guns firing, some exceptional saves from Lawday in the first period keeping Bison in the game as the buzzer sounded at the 20 minute mark. From this point on the Bees were in control and, whilst you can never write the Bison off, the Bees ensured any comeback Bison had up their sleeves  wasn't going to happen. The final score 6-3 to the Bees and a hat trick from Alan Lack provided the fans with plenty to cheer about but it was a great all round performance from the whole team which gave the Bees the result they deserved.

Player of the Weekend Results

Congratulations to Alan Lack who is the latest player of the weekend thanks to your votes on twitter with 79% of the vote. Juha Lindgren was the runner up with 16%.

A tough weekend ahead

Bees head to Milton Keynes on Saturday night. The MK Arena is not an easy place to pick up points, the home fans are loud and passionate and the away fans get drum envy! MKL have made a good start to the season under the helm of new coach Tim Wallace with two wins, one in overtime against Steeldogs and a 9-0 win against short benched Hull. Whilst there is plenty of depth in the MK team, Bees need to pay special attention to Liam Stewart who scored two hat tricks last weekend and will be looking for another to add to his collection. 

Here is the roster for the Lightning this season:

The results from the first weekend of the season proved that Wildcats will be a force to be reckoned with. Two shut outs and a multitude of goals showed they will be tough opposition this weekend. I think it's fair to say the Seahawks were no match for the Wildcats, missing imports and some key players, but their time will come. 

This weekend Swindon have three fixtures, they have a double header with Bison on Friday and Saturday evenings before heading to Slough on Sunday. It will be interesting to see what Aaron Nell and his team have left in the tank after their Bison encounters.

Now let's have a preview of the Wildcats line up: