Telford Terriers Tamed

Bison 5 Telford Tigers 2

12/10/13

Heavens above. Where to start? I will try not to dwell for too long on the disgraceful (but very entertaining) scenes of discord which descended upon Planet Ice last night. The hockey was well worth watching as the Telford Tigers came to the Bison shed to avenge a 3-2 defeat inflicted 3 weeks ago. They returned home empty handed, but with their reputation somewhat altered. More about that later. In hockey terms the game turned out to be as unequal as an arm wrestling contest between Hulk Hogan and Honey Boo-Boo (Honey who? If you must, Youtube her, but prepare to be nauseated). Bison should have scored more, but fine goaltending displays from both Tigers goaltenders (I don’t mean they had two in the net at the same time) kept the score down to a respectable level. Starting goaltender, Declan Ryan, won the Tigers’ Top Banana award and his 3^rd period replacement, Sam Gospel, made 7 saves from 7 shots on his net.

It would be the Tigers who would snatch the lead in the 2^nd minute. Bison netman, Dean Skinns, gave up a rebound which fell fortuitously to Gareth O’Flaherty in the slot. The Tiger (is he Welsh, is he Irish?) made no mistake with his return shot and it was 1-0 Tigers.

On 14 minutes Bison leveled it. Nicky Chinn sent Tomas “Grandmaster” Karpov away behind the net. He chased onto the puck and fired an unexpected pass to the slot where Cuddly Joe Greener was skating in unchallenged. Joe’s snap shot found the gap between Ryan and post and it was 1-1. The concession of the goal caused the small contingent of visiting fans to chunter. Thankfully, no-one chundered, at least not that I noticed.

On 16 minutes Bison grabbed the lead.  It was a hockey game, not a performance of Swan Lake by the Royal Ballet, but the set up by Coach Sheppard displayed a similar degree of artistic merit. In on Ryan he delivered what looked like a behind the back blind pass from where I was sitting across the face of the goaltender and there was Miller at the back door. Which Miller? Glen, Sienna, Max? No. Not even Mutch the Miller. It was of course Bison’s own Joe Miller. All Joe could see was net, net and more net as he hammered the puck through the gap created by the bamboozling stickwork of Doug for 2-1 Bison. Aaron “Billy” Connolly picked up the second assist.

 

Into the 2^nd we went. The Tigers had to keep it tight. To allow Bison to get on top would have been as undesirable for them as it would be for the Bearded Rabble Rouser of Block A to come home and find that his eccentric butler has borrowed his diamond encrusted Mont Blanc fountain pen to clear a blockage in the u-bend. Alas for the men from Telford, keeping it tight didn’t seem to be on their menu because, within 4 minutes of the restart they were floundering 1-4 in arrears. First a shot from Kurt “The Knife” Reynolds was tipped by Connolly in front of the net. Ryan made an excellent save but, unable to hold the puck, gave it up to Shoeless Joe Miller in the slot. Joe returned it with interest and it was 3-1 Bison. The Bison faithful wanted to lionize their team, whereas supporters of the Tigers wanted to feed their team to the lions. Then Lumberjack Joe Rand and Tim “The Mole” Burrows set up Reynolds who arrowed in a wrist shot, screened by Rand, which beat Ryan catcher side and found the space just under the angle of bar and post. The goal made it 4-1 Bison and was heralded neither by a fanfare of trumpets nor by trumpeting elephants, but instead by a fanfare of many human voices trumpeting their approval of the goal at an elephantine level of noise (Eh? They cheered loudly).

An ugly fracas erupted on 32 minutes. The result was a 2 + 2 + 10 misconducted for Joe Miller after he threw off his gloves and waded into Michal Pavlu in an attempt to reduce the aforementioned Tigers blueliner to an unrecognisable mass of blood, bone and sinews. It was not apparent what had caused Joe to become so angry from where I sat and certainly the officials missed it completely as Pavlu received no penalty. However, I was informed by both Cake Lady and Duracell Man who were within yards of the incident that Pavlu had brought his skate down on Joe’s arm. If he had connected properly it would have been a broken arm for Joe for sure. Fortunately the skate glanced across his glove and caused no injury, but clearly the intent was there. Just before the final buzzer Pavlu high sticked Carl “Scooter” Graham in the face and was given a game penalty, somewhat meaningless as only seconds remained. He seems to be the sort of malicious player hockey can do without.

Further trouble erupted at the buzzer to end the 2^nd. Following a confrontation in the corner, the benches cleared and the ice became a mass of hockey players pushing, shoving, grappling, jostling, jabbing, slipping, sliding, mouthing, threatening, prodding, pointing and posturing. Enter Owen “The Terrier” Bennett. Now here is an arch goon if ever there was one, right out of the mould of the fictional character Doug "The Thug" Glatt from the film "Goon". Bennett has no hockey talent and, in fact, can barely skate. After the handshakes at the end of the game he nearly fell over, drawing a massive cheer from the Bison crowd. He played for not one second in the game. We all know why he is on the bench. He is there solely to perpetrate violence. He behaved like a dog on a leash for the first 2 periods, much to the entertainment of those behind him. The Bearded Rabble Rouser of  Block A even claimed that Bennett turned round periodically to bark at the crowd.  His body language clearly indicated that, as the Man with 3 Earrings put it, “he has issues”. Now was his opportunity. He piled on to the ice looking for trouble, but either he said something inappropriate or the officials had his card marked, because he was ushered away, much to his very grave chagrin, and was unable to fulfil his role. It was pure panto. Eventually the players left the ice and all appeared calm. Or did it? Well no actually, because before even the first puck had been dropped in the 3^rd, Andy “Machine Gun” Melachrino angrily confronted players on the Tigers bench and only 1 minute into the proceedings, Tigers coach, Tom Watkins, charged at Marvelous Miroslav Vantroba and delivered a Mick McManus style forearm smash straight into the hapless D-man's face. In steamed Cuddly Joe, with earlier wounds clearly not healed, and gave Watkins what for. Each received a 2 + 2 roughing, Joe a 10 misconduct and Watkins a 2 charging. A bench bound Bennett became bellicose, belligerent and bolshy, mouthing off in all directions, waving his arms, banging his stick on the wall, but was not let off his leash. Issues? It looks like there are no issues he DOESN’T have. 

On 43 minutes Bison romped further ahead. Reynolds and Chinn set up Connolly who fired in from a tight angle. At 1-5 behind the Tigers fans adopted a funereal mood. They might as well get out the black armbands to mourn the untimely death of their team. They had been in grave position before, but Bison’s 5^th the goal really was the last nail in the coffin. They had been well and truly buried. Best to call the undertaker, order the headstone, turtle wax the hearse and embalm the coach without further ado. The coroner was filling his fountain pen to write the death certificate, fortunately not the one borrowed from the Rabble Rouser (see above).

Attempting to stop goal No. 5 proved to be the final act for Declan Ryan as he was pulled from the net to be replaced by Sam Gospel, who took to the ice and lived up to his name by preaching the gospel of good goaltending, keeping out 7 out of 7 Bison shots on his net. Shortly after the return of miscreant Shoeless Joe Miller from naughty boy’s step was greeted with a massive ovation from the Bison backers. A Wallace sized grin broke out on Joe’s face.

Midway through the period Bison found themselves defending a 5 on 3 with Marvelous Miroslav and Coach Sheppard banged up at the same time. The Tigers reduced the arrears with a bizarre goal. A shot deflected off James Preece’s …. some said skate, others knee, others shoulder, others a combination of all three …. and looped tamely over Skinns, who was unlucky not to pick up the unexpected trajectory of the puck. The Telford players seemed surprised. The Bison backers seemed apoplectic. The general consensus of opinion was enunciated by the Bespectacled Youth. “He kicked it in”, he bellowed. In front of him the Howling Man also gave voice to his considered opinion as he pulsated petulantly, purple with passion, protestation and pique.

The game ended with a confusing flurry of penalties given and not given to round off a poor night of officiating and with a chant of “Bring on Bennett” from the Bison crowd. With a 5-2 victory in the bag, the Bison backers could be well satisfied. Although not quite a caviar and smoked salmon performance by Bison, the Tigers’ performance was more like pie and mash. As for Bennett? Well they say every dog has his day, but not last night for the Telford terrier. We shall have to wait to witness his brand of Doug Glatt style arch goonery. Maybe next time.