Glasgow performance is the one to emulate says Speer
Oct 14 2010 by Matthew Leslie, The Journal
VIPERS forward Dan Speer is urging team-mates to fall back on the Braehead spirit ahead of this weekend’s double-header against Hull and Edinburgh.
The Hillheads side host the Stingrays on Saturday before travelling up the A1 for a showdown with the Capitals hoping to erase the Coventry double-whammy out of their system.
Last Sunday they lost 3-0 at the Midlands side but 24 hours before that, Coventry tore the Vipers apart at Hillheads in a humiliating 7-2 drubbing.
However, it has not all been doom and gloom for Vipers this season having racked up an impressive 4-3 win over Braehead Clan earlier this month and Speer is hoping his team-mates can fall back on the qualities which ground out that victory to get back to winning ways this weekend.
He said: “It’s certainly frustrating, you always want to be improving – especially as we haven’t had the best of starts to the season.
“You can’t be going up and down each weekend, you have to be on a gradual climb – that’s what you would like to happen.
“It will come in time I’m sure – we need to work harder in the week and remain focused. This weekend we build off the positives from Sunday and play better and repeat what we did against Braehead.
“The team is still growing together, there’s a lot of guys in their first and second year as pro and there's been a big adjustment to the League.
“We’ve been together a month now and I think we’re going to continue to get better.” Meanwhile coach Danny Stewart is demanding his players rise to the occasion following the Coventry debacle. He added: “Two weeks ago against Belfast we were awful. We were then excellent against Braehead and now we reverted back to being awful against Coventry.
“Some guys were on their own agendas and not sticking to the plans and systems. Everyone – myself included – wasn’t physical enough, and Coventry took full advantage.
“I never like losing, but it’s slightly easier to handle if I know we did everything we could to win the game – that was not the case last Saturday. Sunday was 100% better.
“We competed all night, and we played physical.
“We had a couple of five on threes which we didn’t capitalise on and that made a difference. If we had taken those chances – it was only 1-0 at the time – then it could have been a different game.
“Overall, we were better but we need to do that game in game out.
"Although we were better, we still have to find that consistency I talked about on Saturday night.
“But players can't have nights off, they need to show up every game.
“That’s what we will be working on this week when we get back on the ice in practice.
“It’s a case of repetition, repetition, repetition until it becomes second nature for the players.”
