Streatham endured a tough weekend on the road as they lost two games in as many days. On Saturday the Redskins travelled to Cardiff to take on a Devils side that are difficult to beat on their own ice.
Still missing Tyrone Miller through injury the Redskins started former Cardiff junior Stefan Nubert between the pipes against a Devils side in good form this season.
It took just 52 seconds for Cardiff to open the scoring as a loose puck at the top of the circle was picked up by Steve Osman and his quick snapshot flew into the top corner of the net.
Despite the long coach journey the Redskins hit back virtually straight away when Russ Stevens converted a pass from Jakub Klima on the powerplay.
Streatham then settled into the game and began to cause the home side all sorts of problems. Jakub Klima and Joe Johnston both had good efforts that were saved by Devils goalie Luke Takel but with three minutes to go Klima finally got on the scoresheet as he fired a rebound past Takel to make it 2-1 to Streatham.
After an excellent first period display Streatham came out hard again with Dominic Hopkins hitting the post and then Klima getting two breakaways one on one with the goalie in quick succession. It took a powerplay for the Skins to finally get a deserved goal as Hopkins slapshot squeezed past Takel to give the Redskins a two goal cushion.
Cardiff hit back a minute later with a fortuitous goal as Chris Harts looping wrist shot from the blue line sailed through a number of bodies before dipping perfectly into the top of the Streatham net past an unsighted Nubert.
This goal gave Cardiff some much needed confidence and suddenly they clicked into gear. Top scorer Sean Scarbrough levelled just a minute later with a well taken goal and then former Redskin Rupe Quiney finished his own rebound after skating down the right wing and initially firing his wrist shot at Nubert’s pads.
With Cardiff now in the ascendency Streatham were still carving out chances on the break and both Russ Stevens and Stevie Balmer both found themselves denied by Takel whose confidence was clearly building.
The third period should have been a close affair befitting the rest of the game but sadly for the Londoners and their travelling fans it turned into a disaster. Robert Sedlaks seemingly innocuous wrist shot somehow squeezed in to the bottom left hand corner of the Streatham goal and then the floodgates well and truly opened as the home side ran riot.
Seven unanswered goals in ten minutes left Streatham facing a heavy defeat that was unthinkable as the two sides entered the ice at the start of the final period. Alan Armour and Ross Wilkinson scored two each with the other goals coming from Ricky Deacon, Joe Morris and Steven Fisher.
On Sunday a weary Streatham side travelled down to the South coast to play Solent & Gosport Devils on their reduced sized ice pad in the Gosport Arena.
Still missing Tyrone Miller but adding Adam Mahoney to the line-up and replacing Nubert with Will Sanderson in goal, Streatham started slowly as they struggled to adapt to the peculiarities of the rink.
An early powerplay gave the home side the chance to open the scoring and Mitchell Murray made no mistake from a Kent Johnson pass.
It took Streatham fifteen minutes to reply as a shot by Gennadi Yufit was let loose by goalie Chico Cole and Liam Rasmussen tapped home the puck from close range.
It was a rare error from Cole who had looked unbeatable for most of the opening stages but Streatham scored another timely goal just before the end of the period as Jakub Klima skated clear and finished his breakaway to make it 2-1.
Streatham looked like they had mastered the rink size at the end of the first but they started the second sloppily and Murray got his second of the night finishing another Johnson pass in the slot. It was the motivation the home side needed and seven minutes later Johnson scored the equaliser as he capitalised on the Redskins failure to clear their zone and somehow managed to shoot the puck past Sanderson whilst shrugging off a challenge by the Redskins defence.
It was 4-2 to the Devils eight minutes later as Greg Wyatt managed to squeeze a wraparound shot into the corner of Sanderson’s goal despite protestations from the Skins stopper that the goal was dislodged at the time.
The referee subsequently gave Sanderson a ten minute misconduct penalty for his troubles.
Streatham needed to make an impact in the third and they came out hard in the opening stages with face off after face off being taken in the Devils zone. Just as it seemed like nobody would get the puck past the Solent goalie Cole, and awful pass across his own slot by a Devils defender was intercepted by Klima and he dropped his shoulder before firing hard into the top corner of Cole’s net.
Streatham were clearly buoyed and a minute later the hard working Joe Allen got a reward for his industry as he poked home a loose puck in front of goal to tie things up at 4-4.
Four minutes later, the well drilled Devils powerplay hit Streatham with a real sucker punch goal as Johnson finished smartly from close range from a Kev Tanner pass.
Streatham continued to press for the remainder of the game with Cole making big saves from Hopkins, Klima and Stevens but despite pulling the goalie in the final minute the visitors just could not get that desperately needed equaliser.
