Bracknell arrived late for the match, due to roadworks (they still weren't there when I went into the rink, at 6!). Sheffield iced missing Ron Shudra, and with Grant Sjerven in nets. Bracknell had the 16 year old Craig Astill on the bench to replace the injured Mark Bernard, and so Brian Greer started for Bracknell. This was the first chance I've had to see the new Bracknell kit, and it's awful. Whoever thought that honeycomb effect looked nice was obviously a complete tit. Why did they change it anyway? Surely they don't expect to increase their sales with that effort?!
The game started at a quick pace, with the action end to end. Ferras burst into Sheffield's zone, and crossed to Brant in a shooting position, but his snapshot went just wide. Steelers then took the puck towards Bracknell, and after some sustained pressure, Greer had to make a good stacked save from a van der Horst blueline shot. Dennis Burke picked up the rebound and charged down the ice, went past two d-men and was only denied by Sjerven's pads. Courtney and Brant became entangled in Steelers zone, kept tussling as they skated back towards Bracknell's zone, and Chief eventually lost his stick. Courtney carried on, and ended up pushing Brian inside the net. Chief wasn't happy, and they squared up, resulting with Chief getting a 2 minute call, but no call for Courtney's push on Greer. On the resulting powerplay, despit a great deal of pressure and several chances for Sheffield, Bracknell seemed to scramble the puck away just in time. The defence looked totally unorganised, and Brian had to make some key saves, coming well out of his crease to make blocks several times.
Seconds after surviving their first bout of penalty killing, Bracknell again found themselves a man down. However, they came close to scoring despite this. Malo missed a clearance at the blue-line, Norm pushed past him, and was clear to skate down the ice on goal. He skated along the boards, and cut in on goal, being trailed by Chasse and a covering defender. Norm decided on the pass, but Denis was unable to control it properly and the chance was wasted. Bracknell went close a couple of other times, - notably when Denis Burke again broke out of the Bracknell zone and was only denbied by a good glove save. However, neither team could break the deadlock, and a thoroughly boring period was brought to a close. Both teams were totally underperforming, and poor defence was only saved by the forwards being unable to shoot.
Bracknell again found themselves a man down soon into the second. Bee fans were given reason to panic when Brian Greer lost sight of a rebound. A shot bounced off his padding and up into the air. He turned away from net, looking for it, but it fell behind him and into the crease. It seemed a simple enough task for Hand to tap home, but somehow Matt Cote and Greer were able to fall on the puck and save the day. Overall, however, after the poor first period, the second deteriorated into even deeper depths. The only other real chance of the period again fell to Sheffield. Allison intercepted a pass on the Steelers blue-line, and was able to skate 1-on-1 with Greer. Brian came out to meet him, but it seemed a simple enough task for Allison to score. In keeping with the rest of the match,though, he shot it straight into Brian's pads.
The match seemed to be heading for a nil-nil bore draw. It had to be the most unintense 0-0 I've ever seen. Fortunatley, Bracknell broke the deadlock and introduced a little atmoosphere into the proceedings. It took until the 49th mninute, though. Dale Junkin picked up a loose puck near the boards and sent it across to wear Sal Manganaro was alone in front of the net. He snatched at the chance, loosing his balance in the process, and Sjerven was able to easily block his poor effort. However, no body challenged Sal, so he was able to stand up, pick up the rebound, side-step Sjerven and put Bracknell in the lead. Falkenhall and Chasse both squared up to each other, and both sat for two minutes. With both teams down to four men, Bracknell were able to make use of the extra space and nothc their second. PC Drouin latched onto Todd Kelman's clearance, skated down the ice and flicked the puck over the trailing defender's stick to Colin Ward, who one-timed the puck past the wrong-footed Sjerven. Sheffield by now were frantic, and Sjerven skated off the ice with just under 3 minutes to go. They put pressure on Bracknell, but a misplaced pass fell to Jeff Johnstone behind the centre line, and he calmly back-handed the puck down the ice for the insurance marker.
Overall, this was a terrible match. No-one really stood out for either team. Dennis Burke worked hard and did a lot of chasing and fore-checking, while MAtty was tidy at the back and made some crucial blocks and clearances. Brian deserved his shut-out, although he was playing a below-par Sheffield. He threw himself all over the ice to keep the puck out of the net, and gave me a fair few heart palpatations by constantly skating well out of the crease to block the puck. Far too many players were under-achieving though. Joe Ferraccioli couldn't make the final pass, unlike usual, Schulte again was really just looking for a fight and Rob Stewart, for a captain, was totally anonymous.