A NERVY and slow start ultimately cost Swindon a place in the final four of the Elite League play-offs as they suffered a 6-4 aggregate loss to the Peterborough Phantoms over two legs at the weekend, writes George Royle.

There was a big Link Centre crowd to see Ryan Aldridge take control of his final home game as head coach of the Swindon Wildcats, but his team were very slow out of the blocks.

A very rare minor penalty before the game had started was handed to Cats import Tomas Kana and the visitors took no hesitation in cashing in for an early lead.

That lead was soon doubled as the Phantoms, working from a solid base provided by Latvian goalie Janis Auzins, got off to the dream start.

Swindon, without the services of key man Aaron Nell, were given a massive chance to get back into the game in the second period with a five-minute powerplay. A lack of intensity and chances meant no goals and a tense atmosphere around the Swindon Ice Arena.

The Phantoms surged to a 4-0 lead in the second period, but some sublime skill from Kana put his fellow Czech forward Jan Kostal in for a much-needed Wildcats goal.

In the 47th minute of the game the crowd showed their appreciation for Aldridge, who wore jersey number 47 during his playing days. That injected some much-needed energy with the Cats bagging two goals in quick succession courtesy of Jonas Hoog and Kana and the Link Centre became as loud as it has been all season.

With momentum firmly in their favour, Swindon created several chances to try and tie the game up but went into the second leg 4-3 down.

The second leg in Cambridgeshire lacked a lot of what the first game offered as both sides seemed undecided about whether to attack or sit back and defend.

It was clear that there was some fatigue in the legs of the Swindon players and they slipped behind in the first period as Stevie Lyle pulled off an incredible save but couldn’t prevent the rebound from going in.

Swindon had to score next and they managed that through a speculative effort from Swedish forward Hoog.

After a scoreless middle frame, it all boiled down to the final 20 minutes of action.

The crucial moment came in the 51st minute when Kana rifled a shot off the crossbar and Peterborough countered to make the score 2-1 on the night and 6-4 on aggregate in their favour.

Kana was then given a 10-minute personal misconduct penalty and snapped his stick on his way out, which summed up a frustrating evening for the Cats.

So Swindon could not repeat their feat of last year in reaching finals weekend in Coventry, but Aldridge signs off with the club in a much better state then when he started.

The organisation is arguably the most stable in the EPL, with things both on and off the ice improving rapidly over the last few years.

With the vast number of contacts Stevie Lyle has in British hockey he can be expected to build an exciting squad over the off season that will have a very good shot at winning some silverware.