Everyone Active Raiders defenceman John Connolly says it was disappointing to suffer a narrow 4-2 defeat to Bracknell Bees last weekend, writes Jacob Ranson.

Raiders were made to pay the penalty after conceding three power play goals in their loss to Bracknell on Sunday night.

Having seen their eight-game winning run in the National League ended by Peterborough a week earlier, they travelled to Berkshire with only Ollie Baldock missing and youngsters Brandon Webster, Tommy Huggett and Callum Burnett called up.

“With how we finished the first half of the season, and knowing we can beat Bracknell, it was disappointing,” the 27-year-old said.

“We didn’t play for a whole 60 minutes, but when we did play there was plenty of positives to take out of the game.”

The Raiders managed to claw two goals back thanks to defenceman Dan Scott and utility man Liam Chong after conceding three early goals.

It wasn’t enough as they pulled Michael Gray for an extra skater late on and conceded a fourth goal as Shaun Thompson found Josh Smith to fire into the empty net.

And the Scottish man feels silly penalties cost them in the match and they paid the price with Thompson, Aidan Doughty and Roman Malinik all netting with the man advantage.

“Silly penalties cost us; I think they scored three power play goals on us from penalties that we could have avoided.”

The former Chelmsford Chieftains and Braehead Clan player returned from a three-game suspension for the fixture.

And he was delighted to be back out on the ice especially as he has not featured since their 5-2 win over Basingstoke Bison in their final match before Christmas on Sunday, December, 23.

“It was good to be back after the break, good to be back out there with boys, having some fun.”

They’ll now be hoping to bounce back to winning ways when they take on strugglers Invicta Dynamos back-to-back this weekend.