SWINDON Wildcats head coach Aaron Nell admits his team are having to rebuild midway through the season but is confident one win will turn the whole club’s mood around.
Consecutive defeats last weekend left Swindon with just one win over the past fortnight, leading into a tricky set of fixtures against Sheffield Steeldogs and the Bees on Saturday and Sunday, respectively.
Nell’s team is currently seventh in the 11-team National Ice Hockey League but could move up two spots with a first four-point weekend since early October in the next few days.
The Wildcats’ player-coach believes it is not unrealistic to think Swindon can do just that this weekend, especially with the character he saw in the second and third periods of a 10-5 reverse against Leeds Knights last Saturday.
Nell said: “When you’re in our situation, I think you have to start somewhere. Sometimes, you don’t start by getting the results.
“Our processes throughout the whole year have been fairly decent, but we haven’t been getting the results. But on Saturday night, I thought we played a really good game.
“The lack of execution in the key areas was the thing that got us beaten. Their goalie played really well, we made a lot of chances, and it was just that first period which let us down.
“To come back from that situation in the way we did showed we really have something about us.”
Despite winning just one of the past four games, Nell believes there are a lot of positives to take and build upon as Swindon go hunting revenge against the Bees at the Link Centre on Saturday night.
He said: “Results are still important to us, even though we’re trying to re-build.
“Over the last four games, Peterborough is a really tough rink to go into – you can never really dominate there.
“But the three other games before that, although we’ve only won one out of three, we dominated possession and shots. We’ve got to convert that into goals and wins now.
“We’ve all got to really come together and get a big win on Saturday night. Our club needs it, our fans need it, and our players need it. It will make us feel a lot better about ourselves.
“Although it might not look like we’re going in the right direction, I still see a lot of potential in this team.”
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