Pictures and video: Telford Tigers win ugly

A dramatic Sunday evening at Telford Ice Rink saw Watkins' men snatch a late winner against their Red Hockey stablemates Bracknell Bees to triumph 3-2.

It was Telford's first league success since September 19, and constitutes a stern warning to the rest of the English Premier League from the title holders.

But Watkins believes his side could – and should – have shown more confidence, declaring: "I told the guys during the second period break that we needed to win ugly and that is what we did.

"But as a whole, I thought our performance was poor. We conceded a lot of turnovers, made some errors, and that comes down to players feeling nervous.

"They're still making nervous mistakes. I would expect us to be better as a group. I think our fitness needs to be a lot stronger."

Returning skipper Jason Silverthorn was on target for Telford after just three minutes on Sunday. The visitors hit back on 13 minutes, but the hosts went in front again through Max Birbraer.

Bracknell drew level at the end of the period but, with overtime looming, Joe Miller bagged the winner with 90 seconds to go.

Watkins added: "It was nice to get two points at home and it has been a long time coming. Bracknell work hard and play a physical game, but also keep it simple.

"They get the puck into the corners well and have a few imports who can win games for them. It was great to see Sam Gospel win us the game.

"That is what we need our goalies to do, when we're having a tough time in front of the net."

The victory followed a 6-4 defeat at Basingstoke the previous night with Telford's goals coming from Phil Hill, Peter Szabo, Dan Davies and Macauley Heywood.

Tigers leaked five goals in a terrible second period, with Watkins adding: "I was pretty direct with the guys at the end of the first period and I expected a response.

"I got the complete opposite. The biggest issue is that we didn't convert our five on three chances."

Telford travel to face Guildford Flames on Saturday, before hosting Swindon Wildcats on Sunday.

Tigers' NIHL coach Jason Parry hailed the performance of his youngsters in Sunday's 3-2 win over Moralee Conference high-fliers Billingham Stars.

Telford took an early lead on Teesside but were pegged back in the second session. However, they did enough to secure their second win of the current league campaign.

Parry, whose pre-game plans were hit by the absences of key players Karol Jets and Daniel Croft, was delighted with the reaction from his squad.

He said: "I'm really pleased with how we played against Billingham, especially after losing Karol and Daniel. The younger guys stepped up and played with experience.

"Our best players really shone. Denis Bell was great in goal and Adam Taylor chipped in to score twice. Callum Bowley was our captain and had a really solid game.

"We've got a really good set of guys here. The most pleasing thing was to see our fringe guys come in and do a great job.

"Billingham is a hard place to go to, but the guys stood up for each other and played with a lot of confidence. We've always stated we will worry about ourselves, and not about the other team."

The Tigers NIHL are back in action next weekend, when they travel to face Sutton Sting on Saturday night.