Captain Robert Dowd on the recruitment process making Sheffield Steelers an Elite League contender
DURING the tough times that Sheffield Steelers endured from the end of 2025 through to the middle of January, captain Robert Dowd knew he would find out what the players around him were made of.
He liked what he saw.
Make no mistake, the Steelers still have work to do in order to repair the damage that was done during a run of seven defeats in nine games and which culminated in two heavy defeats against current Elite League leaders and defending regular season champions, Belfast Giants.
The Giants remain seven points ahead of fourth-placed Steelers with a game in hand but, crucially, there are still three more meetings to come between the two.
Sat in between are Nottingham Panthers and second-placed Cardiff Devils, who host the Steelers tonight.
Not surprisingly there were some tough moments to deal with between December 27 and January 17 when the Steelers headed home on the back of a chastening 7-1 defeat in Northern Ireland.
But Dowd was always confident he had the right people in the room around him to help lift the team out of their slump, something which they have duly done, winning five out of their last six league games, the only defeat being a 4-3 shoot-out loss at Manchester Storm.
“Obviously it was a tough run we went through, but we stuck with it and with each other,” said Dowd, who during last Sunday’s 9-0 thrashing of Dundee Stars, became the first player to score 400 Elite League goals. “And we’ve hopefully turned the ship round a bit now and we’re starting to string some wins together.
“Now we just need to focus on what is ahead of us. We can’t do anything about the games we’ve lost, only the games we have coming up.
“You learn a lot about people through adversity and we had some a bit earlier this year - a few bad results on the bounce and the puck just wasn’t going our way a little while. Even when we were playing some good hockey, it just didn’t seem to go right for us.”
While there is still plenty of work to do in order to reclaim the coveted regular season crown they won as part of a memorable treble in 2023-24, Dowd had confidence in head coach Aaron Fox bringing in the right people to give the team the best chance to be successful.
“Being a tight unit is vital to any team's success,” added Dowd. “And it’s a great group of guys off the ice. Sometimes it doesn’t click on the ice but off the ice, it’s a great group of guys.
“That is one thing Aaron always does and always has done well - he recruits good people as well as good hockey players.
“He focuses on whether they are good people and that is one thing he has always got right since he came in, we’ve always had good people in the room.”