Elite Ice Hockey League

[gavin_3110]

On 12/29/2017 at 16:17, Torpar said:

Wasn't sure if I should start a new thread for this or just hijack this one. Anyway, what do guys on here think about fighting in British hockey? Is it a big reason you watch ice hockey?  Would you still watch if it was taken out of the game? I ask because lately I've been watching the videos uploaded to UK Hockey Fights on youtube. The Elite League fights for the most part seem be spontaneous genuine fights caused by bad hits etc but some seem staged and unnecessary. A lot of the NIHL fights on there seem quite pathetic, lets take off our helmets and skate to centre ice to throw bad punches at each  other while our teams team mates get too close and bang their sticks on the ice, it seems to play well to the fans at that level though.

My main point though. Fighting in UK hockey, good? bad? don't care? 

I don't particularly mind it when a scuffle breaks out as a result of a dangerous hit. With the forces involved and capacity to inflict injury on your opponent, the animosity is always going to overflow on occasion. 

The staged pantomime type fights are absolutely embarrassing. Two idiots badly fighting on ice skates while both teams stand and watch is a ridiculous spectacle and my least favourite part of hockey. Well, that and the shrieking female ham planets in the stands.

[NorthernLights]

Going to my first ever ice hockey game on Saturday - Braehead v Manchester.  Any tips for a first timer?

[gavin_3110]

11 hours ago, NorthernLights said:

Going to my first ever ice hockey game on Saturday - Braehead v Manchester.  Any tips for a first timer?

That should be a decent game, the Manchester coach and some of the players were at Braehead last season.

There should be videos on the rules online, it's very simple. Main things to get an understanding of beforehand the system of penalties and the 'icing' and offside rules.  I'd watch a video on these rather than have me try and badly explain. There are typically three officials , sometimes four, on the ice and the referee is distinguished by orange bands on the arms of his shirt.

The players change throughout the match without any need for a stoppage in play. At any one time each team has six players on the ice, one goalie and five skaters. These five players are organised in lines, typically of two defencemen and three forwards. When a penalty is awarded against a team, they will play without that player for a prescribed length of time, for more "Minor" infringements this is usually two minutes. These penalties result in phases of play with odd numbers on each side, be it 5v4, 5v3 4v3. Worth noting that unlike football the clock is only running when the puck is in play and as such it's far more difficult to run down the time. 

Personally, away from the match itself I can do without the whole carry on at Braehead, but know plenty people who enjoy it and they've done a brilliant job of starting a team from scratch and bringing new fans to the sport in the area. The manufactured atmosphere is jarring coming from football but it's not the case across all rinks and some of the older rinks make for a far more familiar experience for a football fan...

Hockey is a brilliant game though, the more you watch the more you appreciate it's subtleties and see the order a bit more in what looks a bit chaotic at times.

EDIT - I see you're from Aberdeen, if you enjoy the Braehead game you should go and watch Aberdeen Lynx playing a game, they play in the Scottish National League which is a purely amateur league, but the highest level of competition in Scotland outwith the Elite League (And Solway Sharks before anyone corrects me). They draw in really good crowds though and have sold out a few games recently. 

 

Edited January 12, 2018 by gavin_3110

[tongue_tied_danny]

On 12/01/2018 at 06:28, gavin_3110 said:

That should be a decent game, the Manchester coach and some of the players were at Braehead last season.

There should be videos on the rules online, it's very simple. Main things to get an understanding of beforehand the system of penalties and the 'icing' and offside rules.  I'd watch a video on these rather than have me try and badly explain. There are typically three officials , sometimes four, on the ice and the referee is distinguished by orange bands on the arms of his shirt.

The players change throughout the match without any need for a stoppage in play. At any one time each team has six players on the ice, one goalie and five skaters. These five players are organised in lines, typically of two defencemen and three forwards. When a penalty is awarded against a team, they will play without that player for a prescribed length of time, for more "Minor" infringements this is usually two minutes. These penalties result in phases of play with odd numbers on each side, be it 5v4, 5v3 4v3. Worth noting that unlike football the clock is only running when the puck is in play and as such it's far more difficult to run down the time. 

Personally, away from the match itself I can do without the whole carry on at Braehead, but know plenty people who enjoy it and they've done a brilliant job of starting a team from scratch and bringing new fans to the sport in the area. The manufactured atmosphere is jarring coming from football but it's not the case across all rinks and some of the older rinks make for a far more familiar experience for a football fan...

Hockey is a brilliant game though, the more you watch the more you appreciate it's subtleties and see the order a bit more in what looks a bit chaotic at times.

EDIT - I see you're from Aberdeen, if you enjoy the Braehead game you should go and watch Aberdeen Lynx playing a game, they play in the Scottish National League which is a purely amateur league, but the highest level of competition in Scotland outwith the Elite League (And Solway Sharks before anyone corrects me). They draw in really good crowds though and have sold out a few games recently. 

 

Good post.

I've been to see Dundee Stars twice this season and as much as I've enjoyed it I still don't fully understand the rules. The game is so fast and with all the substitutions and penalties etc it's difficult to keep track of everything that's going on.

I take it by "carry on" you mean all the pre match entertainment? The atmosphere at Dundee is Americanised but I can't say it bothered me. Is it more in your face American at Braehead?

If the Aberdeen team get decent crowds then why don't they take the step up into the Elite League? Surely they would compliment the other Scottish teams and possibly improve crowds or are the costs just too prohibitive?

Edited January 13, 2018 by tongue_tied_danny

[gavin_3110]

Good post.
I've been to see Dundee Stars twice this season and as much as I've enjoyed it I still don't fully understand the rules. The game is so fast and with all the substitutions and penalties etc it's difficult to keep track of everything that's going on.
I take it by "carry on" you mean all the pre match entertainment? The atmosphere at Dundee is Americanised but I can't say it bothered me. Is it more in your face American at Braehead?
If the Aberdeen team get decent crowds then why don't they take the step up into the Elite League? Surely they would compliment the other Scottish teams and possibly improve crowds or are the costs just too prohibitive?

Aye I can't really be doing with the entertainment and find the breaks too long because of it.

I think the rink would be one limiting factor, it only holds around 1700. I can't imagine the other teams outside Scotland would be too happy with the travel as they'd be happy to see the back of three of the Scottish team as it is. With 14 imports it would be a difficult thing to finance and who knows if they'd have the same fan base with ticket prices doubled. Don't think it's a total non starter although I'd be very very surprised to see it actually happen.

Edinburghs future is up in the air and Dundee and Fife also took a long time to commit to the EIHL this season so I can see some change of format next year.

It does take a wee while to get a handle on what's going on, there's certainly always something happening. I'm always peddling the SNL but you should get along to a game in Dundee. Two teams in the league, Tigers and Comets. Comets are league challengers and won the Scottish cup and playoffs last season.

[Replays]

I attended Braehead Clan vs Manchester Storms tonight (my first game of Ice Hockey) and have a few brief thoughts.

Whilst not being an expert on the sport by any means, I feel Manchester Storms were the better team and deserved their win and Braehead Clan were also fighting to stay level (they seemed to lack a cutting edge going forward). Whilst I really enjoyed the actual game, the constant stoppages and 20 minute breaks really started to great (especially when conbined with the faux-Americanism of it all).

In saying that, I would not be surprised if I went along again sometime in the future, for something a bit different than watching Clyde being humilated every week if nothing else.

[NorthernLights]

On 1/12/2018 at 06:28, gavin_3110 said:

That should be a decent game, the Manchester coach and some of the players were at Braehead last season.

There should be videos on the rules online, it's very simple. Main things to get an understanding of beforehand the system of penalties and the 'icing' and offside rules.  I'd watch a video on these rather than have me try and badly explain. There are typically three officials , sometimes four, on the ice and the referee is distinguished by orange bands on the arms of his shirt.

The players change throughout the match without any need for a stoppage in play. At any one time each team has six players on the ice, one goalie and five skaters. These five players are organised in lines, typically of two defencemen and three forwards. When a penalty is awarded against a team, they will play without that player for a prescribed length of time, for more "Minor" infringements this is usually two minutes. These penalties result in phases of play with odd numbers on each side, be it 5v4, 5v3 4v3. Worth noting that unlike football the clock is only running when the puck is in play and as such it's far more difficult to run down the time. 

Personally, away from the match itself I can do without the whole carry on at Braehead, but know plenty people who enjoy it and they've done a brilliant job of starting a team from scratch and bringing new fans to the sport in the area. The manufactured atmosphere is jarring coming from football but it's not the case across all rinks and some of the older rinks make for a far more familiar experience for a football fan...

Hockey is a brilliant game though, the more you watch the more you appreciate it's subtleties and see the order a bit more in what looks a bit chaotic at times.

EDIT - I see you're from Aberdeen, if you enjoy the Braehead game you should go and watch Aberdeen Lynx playing a game, they play in the Scottish National League which is a purely amateur league, but the highest level of competition in Scotland outwith the Elite League (And Solway Sharks before anyone corrects me). They draw in really good crowds though and have sold out a few games recently. 

 

We had a good time on Saturday.  Both myself and the girlfriend really enjoyed the game and despite our limited knowledge we were able to follow the action without too much confusion.

The only real "WTF" moment was when they did Flower of Scotland before the game.  That felt a bit weird. 

I know a few folk who have been to see the Lynx play and they're all really positive about it so it is on my to do list.

[SilverWolfe]

I'll be going along to see Braehead in a few weeks when they play Fife. This will be a first for me and the wife, looking forward to it.

I used to be a fan of the NHL until the lockout in the mid 2000s and never got back into afterwards for some reason.

[Caro-Kann]

On 14/01/2018 at 00:20, Scott-Replay said:

I attended Braehead Clan vs Manchester Storms tonight (my first game of Ice Hockey) and have a few brief thoughts.

Whilst not being an expert on the sport by any means, I feel Manchester Storms were the better team and deserved their win and Braehead Clan were also fighting to stay level (they seemed to lack a cutting edge going forward). Whilst I really enjoyed the actual game, the constant stoppages and 20 minute breaks really started to great (especially when conbined with the faux-Americanism of it all).

In saying that, I would not be surprised if I went along again sometime in the future, for something a bit different than watching Clyde being humilated every week if nothing else.

Completely different type of atmosphere at Murrayfield Ice Rink compared to Braehead Arena so you should try and take in a Caps game. Also the run of results the caps are on you should feel right at home as a Clyde fan although amazingly they beat Manchester 4-3 on Sunday for their first win in 15. I decided to stay home to watch the Calgary Flames game as it was live on Freesports so missed the rare caps win. Drive through to MIR from Cumbernauld takes about 45mins as home games are mostly on a Sunday.

[DiegoDiego]

although amazingly they beat Manchester 4-3 on Sunday for their first win in 15.

I'm not sure it was that amazing. Caps' home form has been far better than their away and most games have only been decided by one or two goals and an empty net. Couple that with a competent goalie and many players returning from injury and 8.8 with Bet365 always looked an absolute bargain.

[Replays]

2 hours ago, Caro-Kann said:

Completely different type of atmosphere at Murrayfield Ice Rink compared to Braehead Arena so you should try and take in a Caps game. Also the run of results the caps are on you should feel right at home as a Clyde fan although amazingly they beat Manchester 4-3 on Sunday for their first win in 15. I decided to stay home to watch the Calgary Flames game as it was live on Freesports so missed the rare caps win. Drive through to MIR from Cumbernauld takes about 45mins as home games are mostly on a Sunday.

Sounds good, I may head along sometime. Thanks.

[#Gary]

Be careful not to confuse murrayfield ice rink for the 1920s.

[Torpar]

Aye and you might  shocked to learn that Murrayfield ICE RINK, is cold. Who would of thought it!

[Caro-Kann]

13 hours ago, Torpar said:

Aye and you might  shocked to learn that Murrayfield ICE RINK, is cold. Who would of thought it!

Aye but as OP is someone that watches football at Broadwood the Lions Den will be positively toasty!

Steak pies are also better than any I've ever had at the football.

[#Gary]

6 hours ago, Caro-Kann said:

Aye but as OP is someone that watches football at Broadwood the Lions Den will be positively toasty!

Steak pies are also better than any I've ever had at the football.

 

I'm usually enjoying a chicken curry pie when I'm through at MIR. One of the best. 

[invergowrie arab]

POFW blocks announced.

Fife (who might get there) sharing a block with Dundee and Edinburgh.

MK, who likely aren't going and get less fans than Fife, a full block.

Usual 4 blocks each for Panthers and Steelers.

[#Gary]

Felix Antoin Poulin to the Clan. Great stuff. 

[Craig fae the Vale]

Think I'm gonna head along to Paisley Pirates v North Ayrshire Wild on Sunday at Braehead, as the wife and I have been missing the hockey, but can't justify Clan prices for the quality on show this season.

Anyone been to a Pirates game? Is it weird with the arena being mostly empty?

[invergowrie arab]

7 hours ago, #Gary said:

Felix Antoin Poulin to the Clan. Great stuff. 

He will score goals and help on PP but gets caught up the ice a lot. Will need to pair him with a stay at home D 

[Torpar]

On 1/18/2018 at 13:21, Craig the Hunter said:

Think I'm gonna head along to Paisley Pirates v North Ayrshire Wild on Sunday at Braehead, as the wife and I have been missing the hockey, but can't justify Clan prices for the quality on show this season.

Anyone been to a Pirates game? Is it weird with the arena being mostly empty?

No different to an Edinburgh Capitals game I'd imagine.

Paisley Pirates seem to be one of the better SNL teams at least and have a few players worth watching, Adam Walker is now playing with them

Edited January 19, 2018 by Torpar