Sheffield Steelers 2-1 Edinburgh Capitals

Sheffield missing Simon Butterworth and Les Millie.

Sheffield dominated this game but struggled to put the puck in the net thanks to a Man of the Match performance from Dave Trofimenkoff and tireless back-checking by his defence.

In the end, Joe Ciccarello was on hand to pot a rebound (49:38) and clinch the points for the home side. Dino Bauba went on an end-to-end skate with just over 2 minutes left and after skating round the back of the net was only denied by a timely challange by the home defence. Daryl Andrews took a holding penalty on the play and Capitals called a timeout, but Platt only had two saves to make and the 2918 crowd went home happy and somewhat relieved.

Earlier Erik Anderson had opened the scoring, looping the puck beyond Trofimenkoff from the left (15:56) with Ratislav Bohme sitting a Tripping penalty. The only surprise was that Sheffield didn't score more, with Edinburgh's only real spell of pressure coming when Marc LeFebvre took the opening penalty of the game after 6 minutes. Jayme Platt turned aside shots from Bauba and Miroslav Droppa on that penalty kill.

Brent Bobyck blasted the first of several chances wide after three minutes, with Mike Peron blanked from 6 feet 90 seconds later and that set the tone for the game.

Sheffield were shocked when Martin Cingel tied the game with the sides skating 4-on-4. Jeff Christian was hauled back by Capitals' captain Steven Lynch, but was penalised for Diving at the same time. Capitals won the face-off, went down the other end and Cingel arrived at the back post to ram the puck home from Bauba's pass across the front (26:54).

Somehow Capitals never looked capable of striking a winner, but then Sheffield didn't look like scoring either until Ciccarello was allowed time and space to score.

The sides meet again in Edinburgh this Tuesday and Edinburgh can face that game with confidence.