Lugano back on track

Lugano fight for possession against Davos Keystone

Lugano have put their Swiss ice hockey league campaign firmly back on track after they won against leaders Davos on Saturday.

Lugano wowed a home crowed when they convincingly beat Davos 4-2, climbing to second spot in the overall league table.

The first period saw neither side score a goal, but Patrick Sutter put Lugano in the lead in the second period.

Josef Marha equalised but soon after a goal from André Rötheli and Christian Dubé put paid to Davos’ hopes of yet another victory this season.

Lugano and Davos each scored a goal in the third period.

Davos maintain their position at the top of the league table with 46 points. Lugano are now lying second with 38 points.

Bern vs Langnau

Tenth-placed Langnau held seventh-placed Bern to ransom with a surprising 4-1 win.

The boys from Emmen dominated the match playing consistently and scoring goals in all three periods.

Bern’s hopes started to fade when Langnau got off to an early lead with two goals in the first period first from Stoller and then from Bonin.

The team from the capital was left reeling but they were determined to go down fighting with a goal in the third period from Leuenberger.

Kloten vs Ambri

Kloten thrashed Ambri 5-1 in front of a 6,000 strong crowd.

The first period was fairly sedate with Ambri scoring first with a goal in the fourth minute from Burkhalter, but Kloten were quick to equalise with a goal from Rufener in the thirteen minutes later.

The rest of the match was a different story though with Ambri’s early goal proving of little help faced with the high scoring talents of Ambri.

Ambri were valiant in the second period with another goal form Rufener, but it wasn’t until the third period that the canton Zuirch side really came into their own. Ambri had a bitter pill to swallow as Kloten’s players slammed three more goals into the back of the net clinching their decisive victory.

Saturday’s action puts Kloten in third place in the overall league with Ambri just behind in fourth

Rapperswil-Jona vs Fribourg

It was a similar story when Rapperswil-Jona went head-to-head with Fribourg in Lido. The French-speaking side clocked an unequivocal 5-2 win against their German-speaking opponents.

Rapperswil-Jona were first off the mark with an early goal from McTavish in the second minute of play but they then had to wait until the third period for their second goal, which Giger scored in the 49th minute

Fribourg got off to a slow start but made up for it with two goals in the second period and three in the third with Howald scoring two of the winning five.

Fribourg are now placed sixth in the overall league with Rapperswil-Jona languishing second from bottom in eleventh place.

Other fixtures

In other matches Lausanne lost to the Zurich Lions 2-5 and bottom-placed Chur put up a brave fight against middle of the league Zug narrowly losing 4-5.

Lausanne are now in ninth place trailing the Zurich Lions in eight position. Zug are in the thick of things holding fifth place with Chur unable to pull itself off bottom spot.

swissinfo with agencies