Telford Tigers' travel issues continue as they are beaten at Swindon

The hosts overcame an early two-goal deficit to claim a resounding 8-3 success, a result which made it five defeats on the spin for Tigers away from home.

Tigers head coach Tom Watkins pinpointed a lacklustre second period as the reason for the loss.

“We started the game very well and played disciplined, smart hockey,” he said, “We won our battles and moved the puck well, putting ourselves in a good position, but we made an unfortunate handling error that led to the first Swindon goal.

“In the second period the level dropped, we took several offensive zone penalties giving the league’s best power play unit significant opportunities which they took.

“We let the game slip, not enough of our players played hard enough, they didn’t compete hard with more playing like passengers or invisible than the handful of players that play hard every night.

"Right now we are struggling to put in a performance on the road, we must be more competitive than we have been of late to get anything from an away game.”

Telford made the perfect start to the game with a goal in the opening minute.

Louie Newell sent a shot towards goal and a deflection from Eric Henderson caught out Swindon net minder Renny Marr as the puck hit his glove and went behind him into the net.

In the eighth minute, the visitors doubled their lead. Taylor Stanton’s shot was saved by Marr, but Josh Crawley was able to get to the puck first and slam it into the net.

Late in the first period, disaster struck for Telford as Adam Harding mishandled the puck in front of Brad Day’s goal allowing Reed Sayers to score.

Five minutes into the second period, the hosts were level when Jake Bricknell scored. Within a minute, Swindon had their first lead of the night when Tomaz Malasinski netted while the Wildcats were on the power play.

The home side dominated much of the second period and added a fourth through Josh Shaw and a fifth as Bricknell scored his second of the game.

Swindon ended the period with a sixth goal while shorthanded. Glenn Billing broke away and squeezed the puck past Day.

The third period started with another Swindon goal as Sayers added his second. Telford responded when Newell intercepted a Swindon pass and sent a low shot past Marr.

The final goal of the game was netted by Swindon captain Sam Bullas, who led a two-on-one breakaway and sent Day the wrong way to seal a comfortable victory.