Coventry Blaze 9 Fife Flyes 0

It has certainly been a baptism of fire for Fife Flyers as their debut weekend in the Elite League ended with a second successive blanking by Coventry Blaze, this one a heavy loss at the Skydome, with Blaze running riot and young Brit Robert farmer helping himself to a hat trick.

As they did on Saturday night, Blaze took early control and Greg Owen fired them ahead after only 57 seconds on the powerplay. The pressure the home side extended on their visitors saw a succession of minor penalty calls and at 11.04 Farmer scored his first of the night, again on the powerplay. It was Farmer again on target at 17.41 as Blaze went in 3-0 ahead, having outshot Flyers 23 to 5.

It was little different in the second session as Blaze hit four more without reply to kill the game stone dead. Only 25 seconds in and Shea Guthrie was on the mark and he was followed by Farmer’s hat trick strike at 25.26 on a delayed penalty call, Owen Fussey on the powerplay at 32.38 and Luke Fulghum at 33.12.

Blaze eased off in the third period but still won it 2-0 with counters by David Phillips at 54.08 and Matic Kralj at 56.50 to ensure the long coach journey back to Fife for the Flyers was an unhappy one indeed.

Period Scores: 3-0, 4-0, 2-0
Penalty Mins: Cov 2 – Fif 16
Powerplay: Cov 3/8 – Fif 0/1
Shots On: Peter Hirsch 14 – Garret Zemlak 53

Referee: Michael Hicks