Cardiff Devils: Coach Paul Thompson fuming before Elite League start

With a somewhat ironic twist, the Devils’ opening EIHL opponents are the same two sides that beat them weekend – Coventry and Nottingham.

What might have been a routine start to a league season has now become a hugely important pair of fixtures.

“We want to get off to a good start in the league and get to playing Devils hockey,” said Thompson.

“The last time we won the Elite League here was 2017-18 and that’s not good enough for a club like this.

“This is the hardest league to play in because the league championship is the number one thing to win and in the rest of the world it’s not – it’s about the play-offs.”

Cardiff were beaten in overtime by Nottingham in last season’s Play-Off final but – despite also winning a first European trophy – previous head coach Pete Russell left the club having finished fourth in EIHL

“I was brought in to change the culture and bring the every day effect,” added former Coventry and Sheffield coach Thompson.

“You’re not going to win every night, it’s impossible, there’s too many good teams.

“So that focus of being an every-dayer, that focus on us being the team that is going be right up there, staying within the top three, four teams and having a real opportunity to win a league means that we have to push these guys on a daily basis and they have to push us and they have to push each other.”

And Thompson, who last season won the Danish League with Odense Bulldogs, is reassured by this week’s training session that everything will be alright on Elite League opening night.

“We didn’t fulfil our potential last weekend, but the key to it all is recognising that we didn’t and try and put it right next time,” he said.

“They went on the ice today and proved to me the good bunch that they are.

“The players have reacted in exactly the way I’d hoped, and to be honest with you, in the way I knew they would.”