Leeds Knights: Early-season adversity good test for NIHL National champions, says coach Ryan Aldridge
DESPITE the disappointment of not picking up any points on the opening weekend of the 2025-26 NIHL National season, Leeds Knights’ head coach Ryan Aldridge believes it may not be a bad thing for his team to face a bit of early adversity.
Almost a week on from the 7-4 home defeat to Telford Tigers on opening night and Aldridge has not differed in terms of his feelings on how poor the three-time champions were.
Four times the Knights got their noses in front, four times they were pegged back and then well-beaten when shipping four unanswered goals in a nightmare third period.
A 4-3 defeat followed on the road in Peterborough Phantoms 24 hours later leading some to write off the Knights’ chances of enjoying any further success this season.
But Aldridge saw enough encouraging signs in the Peterborough defeat to give him hope going into this weekend’s double-header against Bristol Pitbulls – a team they have yet to lose against in 16 games across three seasons.
“It’s not the end of the world to face a bit of adversity at the start (of a season),” said Alridge. “But we’ve just got to try and find a way through.
“I stand by what I said on Saturday night after that game – I was very unhappy with lots of things. Every time we went up, we conceded a goal and then we just fell apart in the third.
“On Sunday, we had a poor start but for those last two periods we were good and I think we had lots of chances to tie the game or go on and win the game – but we just ran out of time. That start cost us.”
Aldridge admitted he was puzzled at the Telford performance, especially given the positives he had felt going into the opening weekend.
“I was a little bit surprised on Saturday,” he added. “From the very first practice we had to how we were against Telford, it was like ‘this can’t be the same team’.
“We’ve had three years of success – have we still got a team that can be successful? Yes, of course we have – we’ve just got to find a way of getting that out.
“Some of that is on me, some of that is on them – it’s on all of us together as a group to find a way to be better.
"The boys that aren’t going yet, know they aren’t going yet. But we were the same last year.
"We might have been winning games, but we were in a rocky place at the start of last year. We’re exactly the same now – we just didn’t get the wins last week, only losses.”