Perth road trip next for Mustangs

The Kodiak Melbourne Mustangs will this weekend, look to add their first away wins of the season after a strong first up performance at home against Adelaide.

The Mustangs head to Perth for another two early season encounters against the Thunder, with last year’s Goodall Cup semi-finalists set to face off on Saturday and Sunday afternoon.

While the Mustangs got their campaign underway with a 6-2 victory over Adelaide at the O’Brien Icehouse last weekend, Perth will take to the ice for the first time on Saturday.

“It’s going to be a different challenge (to Adelaide),” Mustangs coach Max Parent said.

“It was a good result against Adelaide, they’re struggling a little and are still trying to find their feet with a young team, so we expect Perth to be a very different game.”

The Thunder finished last year’s regular season in third, one place above the Mustangs, before exiting the playoffs with a 3-0 loss to Sydney Bears.

Parent said the Mustangs were happy to again be travelling to Perth during the opening rounds of the season.

“The good thing about going to Perth is that that team is away together for a few days, a bit of team bonding occurs and for the imports it’s a perfect opportunity to meet everyone,” he said. 

“We had something similar last year where we went to Perth early in the season and I think it was good for the group, so hopefully we have another good weekend.”

The Mustangs collected a win and a loss when they headed across the Nullarbor last May, but this time they’ll hope to leave with all six points and no injuries or suspensions.

Parent said his team showed some encouraging signs against Adelaide and would try and reproduce the type of play that saw them net four first-period goals. 

“Against Adelaide we started really strong, but we then slowed down to their pace while trying some things that we hadn’t really discussed,” he said.

“We generally want to play very structured games, fast paced and with quick puck movement, so that’s our focus.

“We’re going to keep working on that in training and getting that consistency on gameday, where we play the way we want for the entire game, not just a period and a bit.”