With the departure of David Phillips, from the Excel Hull Stingrays to fellow EIHL club the Belfast Giants, began what could be a mass exodus from the East Yorkshire club and what could mean huge changes for the start of the 2008/09 EIHL season.The signing of Phillips for the Giants is a capture which marks the beggining of an era at both the Giants and Stingrays. Belfast and their new coach, former Basingstoke Bison assistant coach Steve Thornton, have begun their pre-season by signing a Great Britain defenceman marked as one of the best in the country behind Coventry's Jonathon Weaver, whilst Hull have been cursing their luck as their key British defenceman and one of the players of the season has left a gaping hole in next seasons defence.
Thornton was naturally delighted with signing one of Britains best defensive players saying to the Belfast Giants website:
"I saw a lot of Phillips this season and I would rate him as the second best British Defenceman in the league behind Jonathan Weaver. He has size and strength and a ton of skill. Every guy I asked about him said he was a superb player and a great guy to have in the locker room. You don't see many 20 year olds in this league wearing an 'A' (assistant captain) on their jersey."And he is spot on with every single one of those points. Put simply, losing one of your best players is a worrying beggining to the pre season for any side, let alone a team that finished rock bottom of the league."
It is widely thought that many of this seasons imports will not return through either poor performance or looking for deals elsewhere. Rob Rankin, the clubs top point scorer with 24 goals and 33 assists, is thought to be long gone, perhaps to Europe, whilst Jake Riddle, one of the biggest impact Stingrays after Christmas, is rumoured to be moving North to the Newcastle Vipers. Finally the stand out imports on the Stingrays D, Bryce Thoma and Troy Neumeier, are both contemplating retirement at the age of 25 and 38 respectively.
With respect to the other Stingrays imports, this season those 4 players were head and shoulders above the others in terms of performance and it would be suprising if more than 2 or 3 of those other players returned.
Import turnover is an interesting issue in the EIHL. Compairing the opening nights of 06/07 and 07/08 the Stingrays kept on just 9 players from an 18 man squad, with just Jeff Glowa, Nikolai Ladygin and Cole Byers making the summer cuts with Byers being cut mid season due to a recurring knee injury which required surgery.
Expect to see the same this summer as imports choose to leave and are not re-signed.
The latest rumour involving the Stingrays (other than the annual Stingrays to the EPL rumour; and thats all it is) is that they are set to be rocked by another valuable Brit leaving. Lee Mitchell is the Brit in question and Newcastle Vipers or Edinburgh Capitals are the teams looking to sign the up and coming forward who registered 10 goals and 10 assists in 46 games.If Mitchell does up sticks and leave then it will be a devastating blow to the team with good Brits very difficult to come by. Again if he does choose to leave then the re-signings of particularly Slava Koulikov (4 goals and 13 assists since Christmas) and James Knight (9 goals and 9 assists this season) will be as huge as will the signing of a good Brit to replace him.
Last seasons success story Lee Esders who was signed from Newcastle Vipers B after being in the Hull junior development system may also be quitting the Stingrays.
Finally I would like to pay my respects to Ian Defty, the former Hull, Newcastle and Guildford defenceman, who died last week at the age of just 29. It would be good to see the Stingrays pay tribute to him by playing a two legged challenge game against Newcastle for the Ian Defty Memorial Trophy or by retiring his #22 jersey for a season and having a #22 emblem on their shirts for a season.
