By Frankie Notaro
After a double header against the Swindon Wildcats and securing 2 points in an impressive 6-1 victory, the Bristol Pitbulls now face another double-header weekend This time against the Raiders IHC as the two sides face each other for the first time this season.
Raiders IHC will take the trip to The Pound on Saturday for the Pitbulls’ home fixture of the weekend, then on the Sunday the Raiders will welcome the Pitbulls to the Sapphire in Romford on Sunday.
The Raiders currently find themselves sat at 9th place in league standings with 6 points after 2 wins, 6 losses and 2 overtime losses. Going into the upcoming weekend, the Raiders are experiencing a points drought as after last weekend they are now on a 5 game losing streak after their most recent 7-5 loss against the Peterborough Phantoms.
Raiders are currently averaging roughly 33 shots on goal a game while on the other side, they are also averaging roughly 35 shots on goal against in a game. The power play chances at Raiders have been successfully executed 7 times out of a possible 37 chances but when it comes to penalty kills, the Raiders have successfully killed 32 out of 46. So far this season the Pitbulls have scored 12 power play goals but this will be a statistic that they will look to improve on during their games against the Raiders this weekend.
The Pitbulls will need to be cautious of Adam Laishram as he is a big part of the Raiders’ offensive chances as he will constantly push the Pitbulls into a defensive game to try and stop the Raiders taking a lead in the game. So far this season Laishram has collected a total of 15 points in 10 games with 8 goals and 7 assists.
In defence for the Raiders, the Pitbulls will need to keep a close eye on alternate captain Tom Relf as he may not be collecting a lot of points so far this season but he makes a big impact on how often the opposing team manages to get close enough to the Raiders goal to try and get ahead in the game and test the goalie.
