Well by goodness it’s been a while!

I haven’t gone away you know, as Sinn Fein would put it, but just been busy in the off-season enjoying off-season sports. Why beat a dead dog as they say, and I wasn’t going to write each day about something just for the sake of it while the Giants were making their one-per-fortnight signings. With the British hockey season ending so early in the year (early April), the British off-season seems to last a life-time and with rosters being so small as it is, the signings come few and far between. The Giants naturally try to spread out the signings in order to keep in the media throughout the summer, it wouldn’t be a good advertising move to announce the entire line-up a week after the old season ended and then hear nothing until the end of the year.

But today there was some news to break. Young Davy Phillips who played an outstanding season for the Giants last year and who signed on again for the 09/10 season went a few weeks ago to a Chicago Blackhawks tryout camp. He impressed enough to earn a contract with their top AHL affiliate the Rockford IceHogs and accepted. Nobody could blame the young man as this is a huge step up in his career but in terms of playing level and finance. This puts Phillips without shouting distance of playing in the big time, in the NHL.

Whether he makes it that far remains to be seen but the Giants have not stepped in his way and he leaves with their blessing and their best wishes. The only problem for the Giants is filling the spot taken up by a British player and a dam good one at that. That will be Steven Thornton’s job in the coming weeks and I wouldn’t want to be doing it. Goodluck to Phillips though it’ll be fun to follow his progress and the next time the IceHogs are in Toronto playing the Marlies, I’ll have to go down check it out with a Giants jersey on.

On the subject: Chicago Blackhawks, Dave Phillips | ALL SUBJECTS |

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