EHM The Blue Line

I smashed to Bisons only to be beaten next by Blaze 8-1

Tessier and Sutter were injured the first game vs Bisons...
Liam Greig still got a 10 in the defeat!!

Loved the time I spent in the Elite league, in my career I started after the first season with the Hull Stingrays. Hull had come bottom of the league and looked terrible. Did a clean sweep of the team keeping two British players and cutting all the back room staff. First season we won the grand slam, next season we went to the final round of the continental cup but got destroyed. Won the grand slam again and the next season won the continental cup beating the Russian, Finnish, and Hungarian champions!!! The next season I got offered the job for Russian team Ak Bars Kazan and have come third and second so far.

Will probably look to apply for the bottom of the league team in the Elite next season and give that a go again.

Krister Stromqvist just got Coach of the year award
Liam Greig got rookie of the year

three of my players (Watkins, Thomas and Philips) played with Team UK

Here's the core of my team for the next season:

Goalie:
Andrea Carpano (yup, an Italian starter )
Joe Watkins (UK) come back as a solid backup

Defense:
Ian Manzano
Regan Darby
Scott Ricci
Johnathan Bell (UK)
Paul Hendry (UK)
Sam Oakfield (UK)

Offense:
Luc Mazerolle
Jeff Ryan (whoa, my best steal so far, 8 technical attributes at 12!! Now Tessier got his LW, former USNDT player)
Phil Hill (UK)
Andrew Hemmings (UK)
Dan Tessier
Shawn Maltby
Liam Greig (UK)
Alex Butkus
Graham Newell (UK)
John Philips (UK)
Steve Thornton
Chris Wiggins (UK)

My team isn't complete yet, I'm seeking some 4k Brit backups to fill it up

Chris wiggins has an avg ratings of about 7.7 for me this season, doesn't get many points but is consistently good

Calv wrote:Chris wiggins has an avg ratings of about 7.7 for me this season, doesn't get many points but is consistently good

Whoa, Wiggins is mister Ice Breaker in person!! During the off-season he gave about a minimum of 5-6 Bobychecks each games!

If you want two great players, try to nab Luke Curtin and Sean Venedam from the ECHL. Curtin had over 70 points-in the NHL- for me. I assume that the EIHL can get both of these players. Venedam also did decently, I think he picked up about 25 points in 65 games on the third line.

titan124 wrote:If you want two great players, try to nab Luke Curtin and Sean Venedam from the ECHL. Curtin had over 70 points-in the NHL- for me. I assume that the EIHL can get both of these players. Venedam also did decently, I think he picked up about 25 points in 65 games on the third line.

Only able to get Curtin once, usually has a great first season and gets picked by an NHL side.

I've started a game with the Manchester Phoenix using my bro's updated rosters, based on the 3.0.4 rosters, with an up-to-date Phoenix roster. I started off brilliantly, having a five game undefeated streak. However, now I'm really struggling and have slipped down from 1st to 7th after 18 games.

I've brought in four UFA's:

* Michael Plenty (RD) - 18 Games / 2G + 2A / -2 / 8 PIM / 6.39 Average Rating
* J.J. McGrath (RW) - 18 GP / 1G + 4A / +1 / 11 PIM / 6.94 Av R
* Liam Greig (C) - 17 GP / 0G + 7A / +3 / 32 PIM / 6.65 Av R
* Joe Reynolds (LW) - 8 GP / 0G + 1A / -4 / 4 PIM / 6.38 Av R

Also, I've signed one player on a two-way. The only problem is that he's often playing for his EPIHL team (Sheffield Scimitars) and so he rarely gets a game for me. Here's his stats whilst playing for me in the EIHL:

* Simon Butterworth (LW/RW) - 4 GP / 2G + 0A / +2 / 2 PIM / Av R

Other than Butterworth, they all are all depth players. Butterworth is slightly better, being capable of playing on the third, and possibly the 2nd, line. I'm quite tempted to sign him at the end of the season because he seems like a promising youngster.

I think I need to bring in some stronger players to get my team back to winning ways.

On my 2nd season, I'm steady on the 2nd place. One week before the deadline, I sacked Mazerolle and signed.. *drums* Jordan LaVallée!!! Signed for the rest of the season and the next one, No NHL clause

Steve Thornton didn't liked my offical warning so he quited the team.
I put desesperately Alex Butkus on the first line with Tessier and Lavallee... and magic happened!!! I got lucky on this one! wheee..

I finished my first season as the Phoenix the other day. All did not go well. After a great start to the season, I slipped from 1st to 7th after about 10 games. Halfway through the season and I was dog-fighting with 5th and 6th placed to get further up the league but my defence just kept leaking goals. I remained in 7th place until about four games to go in the regular season when Cardiff (who had made a bit of comeback from a largely abysmal season) managed to leapfrog me and so I finished the season in 8th.

Somehow I made it to the final of the Elite League Cup to play Sheffield (iirc they won the league). I was 3-1 down after the first leg and so I decided to get my top lines to play fairly aggressively - BIG MISTAKE. I ended up losing the second leg 2-10. Eight of the goals I conceded were PPGs

I also lost to the Steelers in the first round of the playoffs. I thought I'd forced the game into OT in the second period with a late goal; however Sheffield scored in the dying seconds.

My weakness for most of the season was my defence. I managed to sure things up a bit by bringing in a few British UFA's but what I really needed was a big North American or two. However, I was at my limit for foreigners so I choose to leave it until some of my players' contracts expire at the end of the season to free up some space for some better D-men. Sadly Hecl refused to sign a new contract (he doesn't like me because I refused to accept a transfer offer for him) and as will KC Timmons. Iirc, there's a couple of other foreigners that'll be leaving my team this summer. I'm not sure whether to retain Campbell or not - he's been very hit and miss all season

Anyway, I think with a couple of decent defencemen, and maybe one new forward, I'll do a heck of a lot better in my second season.

The season just ended, finished 2nd, one point behind Devils. (31-13-3-7)
Here's some various stats:

188 GF (4th)
137 GA (1st)
86.1% PK (1st!)

Carpano #1 goalie with 7 SO and 0.912 eff.

Alex Butkus first goalie scorer with 18-27-48
Jeff Ryan (a deception) second best rookie with 15-20-35
Lavallee got 15 pts on 11 games ^^

Ian Manzano 2nd best +/- with 31
Ricci second best goalie snipe with 19 goals
Liam Greig #1 with 256 bodychecks!
Tessier 3rd best overall on faceoff 72%

Here's my line-up for season 3:

GB- The same efficient duo
Andrea Carpano
Joe Watkins

D-Men- Half my squad are new comers

Mitch Love-Paul Hendry
Ian Manzano-Regan Darby
Johnathan Bell-Sam Oakfield

Yousif Abou Saada backup (yup I signed him for the name! )

O-Man- mostly the same

Jordan LaVallee-Dan Tessier-Alex Butkus (hopes the magic will still operate)
Philip Hill-Martin Weiss-Steve Thornton, yeah he's back again
Jeff Ryan-Liam Greig-Yannick Charette
Andrew Hemmings-Lee Mitchell-Chris Wiggins

Garry Wishart back up

I'll surely shuffle a bit my 2nd and 3rd lines trying to get them working. I got the potential for 3 offensively capables lines!

How is Wiggins doing on yours? I've just signed him as a cheap prospect on the recommendation of my bro. I think this season (I'm about to start my second season) he will be playing on the fourth line to get some experience.

archibalduk wrote:How is Wiggins doing on yours? I've just signed him as a cheap prospect on the recommendation of my bro. I think this season (I'm about to start my second season) he will be playing on the fourth line to get some experience.

Well, he is so so, having mostly 6 in his rating. Not a big offensive production too. He got some time on the 2nd and 3rd line, after "bad temper crumpets" Thornton have quitted.

Mainly an energy and big guy.. for now

Wiggins got an average of over 7.5 in my third season, I was quite happy with him
In real life Tessier has left Sheffield for Duisburg

Actually it's Duisburg! Apparently he got offered between 20 and 40 thousand pounds more than Steelers could afford. Be interesting to see how he does in DEL, and who replaces him - he has freed up a lot of wages for someone else.

Going into the second season with my Manchester Phoenix, here's how it looks:

Damian Surma - Josh Reid - Brett Clouthier
Gregor Slak - Nathaneal Williams - Johan Molin
Simon Butterworth - Chris Wiggins - Adam Walker
Joe Miller - Liam Greig - J.J. McGrath

Mark DeSantis - Simon Mangos
David Vychodil - Paul Hendry
Scott Basiuk - Danny Meyers

Jason Wolfe
Matt Compton


I think my defence is a heck of a lot better than last season. However, my forward centres aren't as strong as last year. Tony Hand retired just before the season and so I brought in Josh Reid (he looks to have good stats and is only 27). My remaining three centres are very average and are only young. My wings look good, though.

I've had a very indifferent start to the season going 1-1-2-0. The game I lost was against the Devils 1-7 I don't like how I still seem to be leaking goals. I think I'll be switching from having general team tactics to having individual unit tactics.

So how you're doing? Still playing in Brit leagues?
On my side, it's been like over a month I didn't touched EHM at all.
I was 2 weeks out in Italia and when I came back I got a Kessen 2 rampage and I'm currently doing a Sim City 4 rampage

Maybe I continue my Steelers enventually. I liked that game.

I've not played in the EIHL or EPIHL for a while now, as I've moved on to managing NHL teams. I find it more challenging as it's more of an unknown quality and I am less familiar with the North American side of things. I'm sure hometown pride will see me GM the Steelers and Scimitars sooner rather than later though!

laskey 16 wrote:I've not played in the EIHL or EPIHL for a while now, as I've moved on to managing NHL teams. I find it more challenging as it's more of an unknown quality and I am less familiar with the North American side of things. I'm sure hometown pride will see me GM the Steelers and Scimitars sooner rather than later though!

On my side, it's the European hockey who's the brave new world.
NHL, AHL, Canadian juniors, not prob here!!

Frankly, I think if I travel in Britain one day, I want to see a Steelers games!!
I'm not really at ease with UK geography and cities distance but there is some londonian teams??

There are no London teams as the Racers went bust a few years back, however if they ever get a team back they can automatically get into the EIHL straight away. I think the nearest team to London is the Romford Raiders

According to a quick google search, the distance from London going north to Sheffield is about 232km (144 miles). Think that's pretty accurate . EDIT- apparently thats the direct distance, by road its 167. I'm betting that by North American standards that's not far to watch a hockey game!

Any general british hockey questions should be kept in the official British Hockey thread(which is basically the Manchester Phoenix thread but they do deserve their own thread, even if they only have 4 players currently).