Old foes Peterborough Phantoms were banished as Lightning gained their second league win of the season against their closest rivals.
With new signing Blaz Emersic making his debut and the lines reverting to their usual formation Lightning looked lethal from the first buzzer – the ex-Slough Slovenian could have even scored on his first shift.

It took until 13mins 58secs for the first goal when Emersic started the move which saw Adam Brittle provide the pass for Andre Smulter to feign a shot before firing past Stephen Wall.

Phantoms had hardly had time to recover before Wall was picking the puck out of the net again 23secs later – this time Nick Poole netting unassisted.

The first half of the second period ended up goal-less but that did not mean there was a lack of action with goalie Barry Hollyhead doing well to save from Phantoms’ Tom Carlon early on and Thomas Jeffery almost caught the netminder out a little later.
Lightning’s best chances came from Matt Towalski whose one on one effort was saved and Grant McPherson who had Wall at full stretch.

Phantoms slack defence was punished when Smulter collected a loose puck in their defensive zone and was able to skate in to beat the keeper at 33mins 53secs to make it 3-0.

There was a minor scare for Lightning when James Morgan came straight out of the penalty box and his effort hit the far pipe with Hollyhead beaten.

Lukas Zatopek dived to block a Maris Ziedins long range slapshot early in the third period while Shaun Yardley’s shot was well blocked by the goalie.

With 1min 39secs to go Towalski was given a slashing penalty. That prompted a puzzling timeout by Phantoms who immediately withdrew Wall for the extra skater – with disastrous consequences.

Just 53 seconds later Adam Carr was able to put a well aimed shot into the back of the Phantoms’ goal from his own zone to make it 4-0.

MKL Goals

13.58 Smulter, Brittle, Emersic E
14.21 Poole E
33.53 Smulter, Clarke, Green E
58.54
58.54 Carr EN

MKL Penalties

2.35 McPherson, 2 mins, charging
26.40 Green, 2 mins, holding
52.18 Zatopek, 2 mins, hooking
58.21 Towalski, 2 mins, slashing

Peterborough

10.30 Morgan, 2 mins, delaying the game
34.08 Morgan. 2 mins, roughing

Shots on Goal

MKL – Hollyhead = 9, 13, 12 = 34
Peterborough – Wall – 14, 13, 7 = 34
Peterborough EN – 1

Referee – Matt Thompson
Linesmen – Jason Earl, Nathan Carmichael