Invicta Dynamos lose 5-3 away to Solent Devils but hit back with a 7-3 victory over Romford Buccaneers in NIHL South Division 1; Reaction from head coach Karl Lennon
12:00, 18 September 2023
updated: 12:44, 18 September 2023
Invicta Dynamos responded to an opening-day defeat by treating their home crowd to some special goals on Sunday.
Head coach Karl Lennon wasn’t pleased with how his side applied themselves in a 5-3 loss away to Solent Devils on Saturday, in their first NIHL South Division 1 game of the season, but they produced a great offensive display to see off the Romford Buccaneers 7-3 in Gillingham on Sunday.
Brandon Chard’s quality early opener on the break set them on their way against Romford but a goal from James Laming, at the end of a to and fro first period was the pick of the bunch.
“Some of the goals we scored on Sunday were absolutely superb,” said the coach.
“The goal James Laming scored, I don’t think I have seen a better goal in that building in all of my 30 years of being in there, it was just exceptional. I was really happy for him.
“He was carrying the puck, over and across one of the defenders and as he was full speed, almost falling to the back post of the goal, he managed to put the puck into the top corner on the other side, something I could only dream of doing myself.
“There was no way I had the technical ability to do anything like that. It was a special moment and a great goal but it wasn’t the only one.
“We had an absolute cannon of a shot from Tommy Huggett to score a goal, we had Mads Thune scoring his first two goals for the team, both were really impressive finishes and young Brandon Chard scored from a beautiful breakaway, right in the first few minutes of the game.
“The offensive threat was fantastic and defensively we were pretty sound, it was just those little mistakes that invited pressure on and it was unnecessary because we were relatively comfortable throughout the majority of the game.
“Once we can eradicate those errors from what we are doing then I think we will be far more comprehensive in our performance, but it is only the first weekend, I have to be patient on that, we will be better for those experiences.”
Romford had responded to Chard’s opener with a quickfire double but Thune and Laming fired home for a 3-2 lead at the end of the first.
Buccs hit the frame of the goal early in the second. Ruskin Springer-Hughes put the Mos 4-2 up, Romford got one back, but the Lennon’s men sealed it with a dominant third period, with Thune’s second of the night, Owen Dell making it six and Huggett firing home to complete the scoring.
The players had gone into that game with some strong words from the coach ringing in their ears from the night before, having lost to Solent.
A slow start left them two-down in the first period. Goals from Josh Condren, Dell and Michael Stokes got them back in it, but the home side struck twice more to take the points.
Lennon said: “There was a lot of chaos and disruption around us, in terms of getting to the game, which I don’t think helped any of us, none the less that’s not an excuse, we still arrived in good time and we started very flat, we didn’t have the right intensity in terms of the performance itself.
“We got caught out in the same way a couple of times, they managed to score early on and that put us right on the back foot.
“I was not happy at the end of the first period, as the boys found out. Thankfully, we were composed enough to put that right in the second. I thought we were extremely dominant in that period, we were on the front foot, we chased things down well, turned them over in their defensive zone and scored two goals.
“I was very happy with the output and going into the third period I was confident, I felt we had more energy to give.
“It was pretty back and forth in the first 10 minutes and a close contest, they scored, we scored, then the last 10 minutes of the game they scored a couple of goals, one with 10 minutes left and it was one of those energy-sapping goals, it came against the run of play and it was not a great goal, we were poor on that.
“I think our heads dropped and that for me was not good, it’s a poor sign and we need to have more resolve in those situations, we can’t be so emotional. It was almost like we couldn’t get scored upon, but in sport that happens regularly, you have to deal with it.
“We didn’t deal with it well, we pushed on in the final five minutes to try and get a goal but they scored again on the break and that was that.
“For me, it was a what if? We could have walked away with four points this weekend if we had applied ourselves properly, but the reality was Solent were the better team across the game, they deserved the win, the way they applied themselves was impressive and the way we played was not.
“I wasn’t happy on Saturday and the boys knew it, we lived to fight another day on the Sunday.
“It was more of a systematic error on Saturday, I took responsibility in that too, they play a certain way in their small rink and we didn’t adapt well to that live.
“On Sunday it was different. The goals they scored came from our errors, and they were just small errors, where either experience or quality failed us at a point in time, it put us in difficult situations we didn’t need to be in.
“We were very comfortable throughout the game, we played really well offensively, but those little defensive lapses were a challenge. I felt that as the game went on there was only going to be one winner and we took our chances well.”
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