Poor start proves costly for GB against favourites

GREAT Britain will use Tuesday’s rest day to regroup and come up with a plan of how to secure their first win of the World Championships when they take on Ukraine the following day.

Tony Hand’s team slipped to a second successive defeat in the Division 1A tournament in Lljubljana, Slovenia, when they went down 7-3 to favourites Austria.

It was always going to be difficult against opponents who last year were playing against the world’s leading nations before being relegated. That task was made virtually impossible when they found themselves 3-0 down inside 10 minutes through goals from Thomas Hundertpfund, Gregor Baumgartner and Manuel Latusa.

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The ruthless Austrians extended their lead early in the second period through Baumgartner on the powerplay before Sheffield Steelers’ Colin Shields got his second goal of the tournament to make it 4-1 at 33.03.

The four-goal difference was soon restored thanks to Austria’s Matthias Trattnig before Shields struck again to make it 5-2 at 38.23.

Latusa scored Austria’s sixth with a powerplay goal at 43.34, while Nottingham Panthers’ player-coach, Corey Neilson, cut the deficit with the man advantage at 50.27, with assists going to Shields and his club team-mate David Clarke.

Austria then completed a comfortable victory through Raphael Herburger at 52.56.