With George Awada now confirmed to be gone for the year and with coach Steve Thornton rumored to be playing hurt temporarily in his place, the Giants have gone out and filled the big void left by George by adding power forward Bobby Robins. The name won’t be unfamiliar to Giants fans considering just last season he scored 29 goals and 64 points in 59 games.

I didn’t see a lot of Robins, in fact I only seen two games in person and watched a further two online so most of what I hear about Robins is from word of mouth from many friends who continue to go along to games. Most of the opinions are positive with a few citing that his performances fell away every so slightly after a blistering start to the year. But given the Giants injury woos last term, including a few to Robins, and with the amount of extra ice time the top players were required to put in, fatigue might well have been the reason for the dip in his scoring.

He’ll be a welcome addition regardless to a team that is off to a poor start to the season. Going forward the Giants have failed to create enough and losing Awada was one of the reasons. Thornton brought himself back but was rumored to be still injured and so that was never going to work long term, but signing up a player that knows the city, knows the team and who can settle in instantly seems like good business to me.

Robins left the Giants to go (and rightly so) chasing the money in Denmark with the Rodovre Mighty Bulls but no longer had he arrived when his contract was cancelled due to the teams financial problems. Unlike his Giants team-mate from last season and new team-mate at Rodovre Paul Deniset, who was also released, Robins failed to grab another contract (Deniset signed with Aalborg also of Denmark), and now finds himself back where he finished last season.

With the league finally scrapping the whole ‘you must de-register a non-playing import to bring in a replacement and he cannot play again for 6-games’ rule of idiots, the Giants do not have to worry about Thornton stepping back out of the team. Should any other injuries arise he will be the first replacement and can even consider putting himself in for tactical reasons and sitting a fellow import as a ‘healthy scratch’ should the nature of an upcoming game require it.

As much as the Giants could do with Robins immediately, they will have to wait until after this weekends double header with Cardiff due to paper work going through.

On the subject: Bobby Robins | ALL SUBJECTS |

............................................................................................................................................................................