Talking done on the ice as perfect weekend completed

Peterborough Phantoms delivered the perfect response to a traumatic start to 2022 with back-to-back National League wins last weekend.

The city side were down in the dumps after losing their first two games of the year, while shipping 16 goals in the process.

There were mitigating circumstances with a player roster bedevilled by a long injury list and positive Covid cases, but the results would still have hurt a proud coach and his team.

But they did their talking on the ice by following up Saturday’s come-from-behind win in Basingstoke with a 5-0 shutout success over Swindon Wildcats at Planet Ice 24 hours later.

That’s 10 unanswered goals in the last five periods of play.

Joe Gretton got the Phantoms off to a flyer with his first competitive goal for the club.

When he found himself alone in front of goal, Gretton had the awareness to redirect Nathan Long’s blue line effort past despairing Swindon netmninder Dean Skinns.

Then, with 17:21 played, redhot forward Duncan Speirs picked up his fourth goal of the weekend, ripping an unstoppable effort into the top shelf of the Swindon net.

And things got better for the Phantoms in the opening moments of the second period as Will Weldon marked his return to the team with a goal, tapping home a rebound after Tom Barry had thrown the puck on net.

Both sides traded chances and penalties as the game went on, with the Phantoms’ players regularly throwing their bodies in the way of Wildcats’ attempts at goal and netminder Jordan Marr standing tall against any shots which did sneak past his defenders.

Nathan Pollard added his name to the scoresheet with 47:47 played, ripping home a thunderous wrist shot right into the top corner of the Swindon goal to get the home crwod on their feet.

And Glenn-Billing notched the fifth Phantoms goal from an unlikely angle as the game headed towards its inevitable conclusion, to completely seal the win.

Marr picked up the manof-the-match beers for the Phantoms for his 41-save shutout in goal.

Swindon are another team to have been struck hard by unavailabilities, but they started this game in third place having won their two previous matches.

But it was a result that announced Phantoms are happy to fight their way through the most difficult of circumstances.