Kyle Carruth scored the Wild's only goal against Whitley (Photo by Keith & Jenny Davies)
Saturday 9th December – Moralee Division: Widnes Wild 1 – Whitley Warriors 5
The Widnes Wild NIHL team had a mixed weekend losing 1-5 at home to Whitley Warriors at Planet Ice Widnes on Saturday and then winning 2-5 on the road away to Nottingham Lions on Sunday.
The home game on Saturday went very much to league form with the Wild team – languishing in the bottom half of the Moralee Division table – failing to make much headway against the Warriors team, who were third at the time of this visit.
To be fair, Widnes actually outshot Whitley by 28 to 23 over the course of the 60 minutes, but it was the Warriors who were able to make more of their chances when they came.
Whitley took the lead just 90 seconds into the game and then went 0-2 up 3 minutes later. They were leading 0-3 by the time Kyle Carruth found the back of the net for the Wild on 10 minutes, with a powerplay goal punishing a Warriors fighting penalty, and the score remained 1-3 at the first period break.
The second period saw just one goal, falling to the Warriors on 35 minutes, leaving Widnes with much to do in the final 20 minutes of play.
The third period was as tight as the second with very few chances coming for either side. It remained goal-less until the very last minute when Wild netminder Luca Tessadri was withdrawn in favour of an extra attacker and Whitley scored an empty net goal, make the final result seem slightly more one sided than the game deserved.
Saturday night’s home game saw the Wild’s annual Teddy Toss event where spectators were invited to throw soft toys onto the ice to be given away to good causes over the Christmas period.
This year’s beneficiaries will be Alder Hey Children’s Hospital and Carla Lane Animals In Need.
