WEEK 14 of the 2024/25 Elite Ice Hockey League season and the Flyers make their first visit of the season to the Storm Shelter to meet the Manchester Storm before hosting the Guildford Flames the next night.
SATURDAY DECEMBER 7th MANCHESTER STORM v FIFE FLYERS @ PLANET ICE ALTRINCHAM – FACE OFF 7.00pm
Recent Form Guide
The previous two meetings with the Storm which have both been at Fife Ice Arena came in the opening few weekends of the season with the last being in the first weekend of October. Following this the Storm concluded their Challenge Cup campaign with a home shootout win against the Sheffield Steelers and another two points on the road against the Nottingham Panthers. They finished with two more on the road going down 5-3 in Sheffield which effectively ended their chances of progression in the competition and last weekend they lost 6-4 in Coventry who kept their hopes alive of a play in spot. In league play the Storm had a big 7-3 win at home against Glasgow which preceded a four game losing run as they went down narrowly in a five goal game in Cardiff before losing the next three at home against the Coventry Blaze, Guildford Flames and 7-2 against the Belfast Giants. Dundee Stars were defeated 6-3 in Altrincham to stop the losing streak but the Storm then slumped again in their next four with a 4-1 loss in Guildford followed by another heavy home loss this time to the Sheffield Steelers. Panthers beat Manchester 4-1 in Nottingham before the Storm were shutout on home ice 6-0 by the Cardiff Devils last weekend. It means the Storm have won only one of their last six home games and have been outscored 15-31 during that time. At the stat of the week the Storm announced that they had parted company with Head Coach Mike Flanagan by mutual agreement and ahead of hosting the Flyers this weekend the Storm had a meeting with the Glasgow Clan on Friday night in Braehead.
Last League Visit to Storm
Overall Away League Record Against Storm
P 25 W 9 L 16 F 73 A 92
Number Crunching
The Flyers have lost on their last 4 visits to Altrincham which is their longest winless run on Storm ice in all EIHL competitions.
Flyers last win on the road to Storm was 26th November 2022 when they had goals from Lucas Sandstrom, Jonas Emmerdahl, Zack Phillips, Janne Kivilahti and Janne Laakkonen in a 5-1 win.
Storm’s top scorer against the Flyers in all EIHL competitions is Paul Phillips with 8 goals, just one behind are current players Dallas Ehrhardt and Loren Ulett.
Top scorers for Flyers against the Storm are Ryan Dingle and Danick Gauthier who also have 8 goals.
Storm come into the weekend on a 5 game losing streak which is their longest of the season.
The Storm have given up an average of 4.5 goals per game with only the Flyers having conceded more at an average of 4.81 per game.
The Storm and Flyers are bottom three for shots on goal across all EIHL games this season with Flyers at 29.19 and Storm 30.67 – they are also the top two teams for shots conceded with 35.88 against Storm and 42.07 against the Flyers.
SUNDAY DECEMBER 8th FIFE FLYERS v GUILDFORD FLAMES @ FIFE ICE ARENA – FACE OFF 5.15pm
Recent Form Guide
It was mid-October that the two teams last met. The Guildford Flames similarly to the Flyers finished bottom of their Challenge Cup group as they became the first team to complete all their fixtures with a 3-1 home loss following their win in Fife against the Sheffield Steelers and a 4-1 reverse the next weekend in Cardiff. In the league the Belfast Giants won 3-1 at the Spectrum before the Flames put together a three game winning sequence defeating the Panthers in Surrey followed by a win in Altrincham, both by 4-2 scorelines. The Glasgow Clan were next to leave the Spectrum without points before Guildford lost 3-1 to the Devils in Wales. Another three game winning stretch saw the Blaze beaten 2-1 on home ice by the Flames with a four point weekend following after a 3-1 road win against the Stars and a 4-1 home win against the Manchester Storm. The Flames were then shutout in Belfast by the Giants before they took both points against the Glasgow Clan at home. Their two outings last weekend saw them drop points to the Coventry Blaze by the odd goal in seven at the Spectrum and the next night they went down 4-1 to the Devils in Cardiff. Ther Flames have had something of an injury crisis in the last couple of weeks and recently added Sam Jones to their roster. The 27 Year-old Great Britain national team Defenceman spent the early part of the current season with Romanian side Corona Brasov. In 20 starts, he had 2 goals and 13 points. The native of Walsall has four seasons of EIHL experience, having iced 166 games while producing 8 goals and 34 assists. The bulk of his time has been with Sheffield Steelers with whom he iced three full seasons not including another in the EIHL Series. Last season at his Yorkshire base, Jones played 52 games in all competitions while helping deliver their League, Cup and Playoff titles. He made his EIHL debut in 2019-2020 with the Flyers. Before making the trip north to meet the Flyers the Flames host the Nottingham Panthers on Saturday night.
Last League Visit from Flames
Overall League Home Record Against Flames
P 18 W 8 L 10 F 55 A 57
Number Crunching
The Flames have won both meetings so far this season between the teams.
The Flames remain the only active team to not have a hat trick scorer against the Flyers.
Flames Brett Ferguson requires 1 goal, to tie Ian Watters as their top scorer in EIHL games against the Flyers.
Chase Schaber, Mike Cazzola and Paul Crowder each have six goals against Guildford which leads the Flyers against the Flames in all EIHL competitions.
Michael Cichy has four goals against Flames this term whilst Ethan Strang with three goals is top scorer this term for Flames against the Flyers.
The Flames have the second fewest goals per game average at 2.67 in all EIHL competitions this season. Flyers have fewest at 2.48.
The Flames with an average of 30.63 shots per game have the second fewest across all competitions this season.
