Excel Hull Stingrays 3-6 Sheffield Steelers
The Excel Hull Stingrays tonight went down to their second 6-3 Challenge Cup loss of the season against Yorkshire rivals the Sheffield Steelers.
Rarely this season have the Rays gotten off to a flying start, in fact quite the opposite has regularly been the case, and a goal from Steelers player-coach Ben Simon after just 78 seconds continued that bad habit.
They did however briefly respond, in a first period that would prove to be their best, Kurtis Dulle scoring his second of the year as the game neared just four minutes.
Simon responded with his second of the game for the Steelers to retake the lead eight minutes in but the Rays would go on to take the lead for the first and only time in the game with goals from Jereme Tendler and Matty Davies before the break.
That was as good as it would get for the home side as the Steelers would shut out the Rays in the final two periods as Sylvain Cloutier's side began to run out of ideas.
The Steelers would eventually stroll to a 6-3 victory thanks to further goals from Jeff Legue, Steve Munn, Rod Sarich and Jermaine Domish.
First period aside, perhaps one of the few positives from this performance is that it was a Challenge Cup fixture and, with the club already out, the result was pretty meaningless, even if local pride was at stake.
The Rays travel to in improving Dundee side tomorrow in what is undoubtedly a massive fixture for both sides with Dundee up and running having recorded their first win of the year against Cardiff.
