Valentines Weekend Preview: Sheffield Steelers vs Cardiff Devils (A), Coventry Blaze (H)
Happy love weekend! Lets hope this is a weekend to love!
Lets address the elephant in the room here - Cardiff have had our number in the Vindico quite heavily the last season and a bit. This year alone, in competitive fixtures, Cardiff v Sheffield in the Vindico has been has followed:
3-2W, 3-4OTL. I dont think it's massively important here with to brind up games from last year against Cardiff - Cardiff have a radically different coach, going from Pete Russell to Paul Thompson, and with largely a different squad. Add to that their erratic form - and that's from a Steelers fan - I'm not entirely sure what to expect from this Cardiff team.
Their second place in the table, over the last 5 games, has looked rocky
Granted, third place is Nottingham, so they've actually gained a points worth of ground in 5 games over Nottingham, but lost 3 points to us, whilst falling back 2 more points of Belfast.
I dont know what the key to winning this game is - every time I've seen Cardiff this year they've been radically different. We've seen them 3 times in the Utilita this year, which, in date order, were: 4:1W, 4:0L, 6:3W. At this point, I just hope form can carry us through. Get out to an early lead, set the pace and make Cardiff come to us. Similar to Manchester, they're not afraid to get into it around the whistles, and they're more than happy to tell Caponi to finish a hit and drop the gloves, along with Brandt, if they need to. Don't get involved.
Coventry Blaze (H)
Again, another weird one. Coventry were on a pretty torrid stretch to end 2025 and start 2026
These results saw them get 14 points from a possible 42 (if my counting is correct...). That included a 3-1 win against Sheffield, in Sheffield...
In recent weeks though, their form has turned for the better. Since the Nottingham game on New Years Day, they've taken points in every single game they've played, dropping just 2 points out of a possible 24 (not counting Wednesday's game against Belfast). Kevin Moore has clearly made an adjustment, and it's very much worked, so kudos to him - but again, it makes it quite hard to guess what's going to happen in this game. He did coach that team last year, so we can bring up the 6-0 pumping we received in the Utilita, and the 3-1 game they've had with us this season too. So, 2 teams in great form, one trying to storm up the league table, and the other trying to make incremental steps to topple 3 teams above them who seem to not want to let that happen? Lets just hope there's a rate loads of goals and good hockey.
Our saving grace here is that whilst Coventry have picked up the same amount of points as us over the last 5 games, the way they've done it has been difficult - one win in regulation, 3 in OT and an OTL, added to the fact their goal difference is 20:14, im not entirely sure this is as unassailable as it looks. Granted, our goal difference over the same time at 30:8 is heavily padded by the likes of Fife and Dundee (16:0 added to that record by both of those teams), but im quietly confident we can get this done.
No special mentions this weekend I'm afraid. Everyone except Dougherty and Kelly got a point against Dundee on Sunday. Thats good enough. Maybe Dougherty for quietly being a load better than he has been.
