By Kris Smith
The Stars and Fife Flyers will be hosting the Wolves from Brasov and Tilburg Trappers this weekend as both clubs take turn playing host to the European opponents over Saturday and Sunday.
Last weekend saw Dundee and Fife battle it out in two friendly contests that were not so friendly as the tensions were high between the sides on both evenings.
On Saturday night in Kirkcaldy, the Stars would take a 2-0 lead in the first period through goals from Johnny Walker and James Phelan before the Flyers would tie it up in the second, thanks to goals from former Star, Johan Eriksson and Max Humitz.
After a scoreless third period, Jake Elmer would bag the overtime winner to get Dundee off to a winning start, however 24 hours later, when they met again on the north banks of the River Tay, Fife would be 4-0 winners on the road.
Johan Eriksson again got the Flyers goals flowing before Anthon Eriksson, Ben Hawerchuk and Fynn Page also got onto the scoresheet but in that match each side would lose one player through injury.
Johan Eriksson will miss this weekend through an upper body injury whilst, Dundee’s Walker also left Sunday’s match with an injury but it is unknown yet if he will take to the ice this weekend against Brasov and Tilburg.
Tonight’s opposition, Corona Brasov play in the Romanian League and also the Hungarian-Romanian league, known now as the Erste Liga but originally as MOL Liga, where Marc LeFebvre coached with Dunaujvarosi in 2014/2015.
Led by Head Coach, Dave MacQueen, the Wolves have won five Romanian national titles and last season had former Star, Connor Sills on their roster for 49 games, where he scored 26 goals and 16 assists.
Brasov’s three most productive players last season who have signed extensions with the club were; former Flyer, Chase Schaber with 84 points in 68 games, Romanian forward, Radim Valchar recorded 83 points in 59 matches and former Manchester Storm player, Jared VanWormer scored 79 points in 66 appearances.
Discussing what he hopes to see in his side’s final two exhibition games, Stars Head Coach, Marc LeFebvre said: “I just want to see us continually improving each day, getting more of our structure in place, compete for a full 60 minutes and obviously be more clinical around the net front.
“Well they have a lot of imports that have played in this league before, so I am sure they will want to put a good shift in, but it is also their first weekend of playing games and their coaching staff will want to see how they develop as well.
“It is going to be a good competition, something a bit different for everybody and I am sure it will be a competitive game.”
“They are a team that should really be in the second league in Germany but for whatever reason they are not allowed to play in that league, being a Dutch team but they have had success in German third league over the last few years, so I think it is going to be a competitive weekend all around.”
Canadian forward, Jake Elmer then shared how the players are feeling ahead of tonight’s international friendly, he said: “We are all excited.
“It is not every day you get to play a team from a different league and a different country, so we are focusing on what we have been working on over the last few weeks of practices.
“I think we have come a long way since the first day and we will only get better as we go onwards and upwards from here.”
Face-off for tonight’s game is at 7pm and you can get your tickets HERE!
