News Article | 7th September 2009 » Scims lift Silverware in Fife

A successful raid north of the Border brought the Scimitars their 1st trophy of the new season in the Scottish Tournament.

The Scimitars were invited by tournament organiser, Barrie Grieg (Fife Flyers), to attend this weekend's tournament, along with the Dundee Stars, Fife Flyers and the Solway Sharks. Head Coach, Jon Rowbothom, jumped at the opportunity of a pre-season tournament in Fife as a good team bonding opportunity and for the incoming imports of returnees Joakim Millqvist and Peter Slamiar plus new defenceman Daniel Slyk to get some game ice under their belts. This was a close run thing for Peter Slamiar who landed in Edinburgh just 3 hours prior to the first game. Not travelling were Raitanen, Jones, Gibson and Wallace.

It was all high flying from there on though as Jon Rowbotham's Scimitars took on Solway for openers and Slamiar scored within the first minute. Solway were straight back at the Scims with an equalising goal just ahead of 6 mins, but is was the Scimitars who were clearly the stronger team and Steve Duncombe re-instated the lead with a bullet from the blue line on 9 mins.

After that the Scimdogs out-hustled, out-shot and out-skated the Sharks with additional goals from Robert Farmer and two more from Slamiar to bring up his hat trick and complete the 5-1 win. The young guns showed they couldn't be pushed around as James Archer and local returnee Fraser Goldie showed they would stand up for their team mates.

Coach JR was very pleased with his team and he said "the guys were awesome, still plenty to work on but we dominated the game from start to finish. Slamiar looked sharp and well up for it, that said they all did".

The Scimitars went straight on into Game 2 against hosts, Todd Dutiame's Fife Flyers, who must have fancied the advantage. Dutiame said that the Scims against Solway 'gave as good as they got in the physical battles but were clearly a much stronger, fitter and talented side'. And added that "That said I'm sure my boys will give them a hard game this time around."

The Scimitars then went on to beat his team 2-0, albeit in a tighter game, with Slamiar again on target, taking the water bottle off the net. The Scimitars, with some slick passing made the Flyers look pretty ordinary and it wasn't long before Archer was given the opportunity to stretch his legs from the neutral zone, going inside, then outside, passing Fife's defencemen with pace and control to hit what was probably going to be the goal of the season.

After the 2-0 final score, JR spoke after the game saying how pleased he was with the work rate, cohesion and clear ability of his young team.

On Sunday morning, the Scimitars faced off against Dundee (who needed 3 clear goals to knock the Scimitars out of the Final) and found themselves on the back foot for the first time as Dundee scored in the 1st period. However, JR rallied the troups and the team eventually got back into the game after Archer destoyed McGill from the right hand hash marks with a bullet to tie it at 1-1.

Into the Final against Fife Flyers and again the Scimitars found themselves behind as Fife beat Bowns early on to take the lead with 2:35 on the clock. Archer hit back on 10 minutes with another quality goal, and with only 45 seconds to play in the 1st period it was one of JR's young guns, Matt Haywood, who beat netminder Daly from close range to take the Scimdogs into a strong position for the final period.

In to the last 15 minutes it was the Scimdogs again who had the higher work rate, fitness and ability. Farmer made the last D-man and netminder Daly look like rabbits in headlights as Farmer hit the top left hand corner with a superb fake at pace to stetch the lead to 3 1.

Fife then hit back on the powerplay for 3-2 but Tom Squires added the insurance for a 4-2 win to enable new captain, Peter Slamiar, to lift the first trophy of the season.

Speaking after the game, Ops Director Ian Johnson had this to say " JR and the guys have worked really hard pre-season, and with the arrival of Slamiar, Millqvist and Slyk they are starting to gel and display passion, skill and ability. I was really pleased with the young guns too, Strawson, Goldie, Bowns, M Haywood, Squires and Bell were all magnificent, that said they all were.

Things get interesting next weekend when the Scimitars play host on Saturday at iceSheffield 7.30pm, in a pre-season warm-up with back to back games against Tony Hand and the Manchester Phoenix.

Great value tickets of £6.00 Adults, £4.00 Child and Concession and £15 Family are obtainable from iceSheffield reception and on matchnights.

Next News Article: Scims V Phoenix in 'War of the Roses'
9th September 2009
Previous News Article: Meet the Players' Evening
6th September 2009

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