The Invicta Dynamos slumped to their most emphatic home defeat since December 2007 on Sunday evening.

A rampant Romford Raiders side inflicted a 10-5 loss on the Gillingham outfit in the ENIHL Southern Cup.

Following the puck drop it took until the eighth minute for the deadlock to be broken and it was Romford player/coach Danny Marshall who split the teams as he fired beyond Andy Moffat from close range to make it 1-0.

Canadian Ryan Ellis levelled the scores with a low drive from an acute angle on the left wing but the visitors re-established their edge moments later when Slovak Juraj Huska arrowed a slapshot into the far corner with his team on the powerplay.

In the second frame Danny Marshall then completed another close range finish to establish a two goal cushion with the man advantage and the Raiders were 4-1 up when Lithuanian Andrius Kaminskas also tallied on a powerplay.

Richard Bentham answered for the hosts with a rebound strike but his effort was cancelled out as J.J. McGrath slotted beyond the netminder from the left channel. The Dynamos were still in contention after forty minutes however, as ‘import’ forward Just Noble fired in having escaped on a 2-on-1 breakaway with Robbie Brown to cut the deficit to 5-3.

In the final period three quick Romford goals then killed the tie as the Raiders crafted an insurmountable lead. Anthony Leone set them on their way with a powerplay strike, J.J. Pitchley made it 7-3 with a neat one-timer and Billy Phillips’ deflected drive from deep eluded replacement shot stopper Joe White.

Corey Watkins managed to stem the flow as he notched a reply whilst the hosts had the extra skater but again Romford answered quickly to kill any momentum with Danny Marshall completing a hat-trick with a venomous slapshot from close range. Ryan Ellis tallied his second of the evening to pull the Dynamos within four at 9-5 down but it would be the visitors who had the final say on the evening as Andrius Kaminskas drove in from close left to put the Raiders into double figures and complete a resounding 10-5 victory.

So it was a crushing home defeat for the Dynamos who took to the ice without Zach Sullivan, Michael Timms, Tim Smith and Daniel Fudger and were then further hampered by knocks to Anthony Lennon and Jack Tarczcyki.

Nevertheless Head Coach Kevin Parrish will be disappointed by his side’s emphatic loss and aware of the ground to be made up should his side harbour ambitions of succeeding in both the league and the cup. From here the team now return to league competition with a double header away weekend starting next Saturday in Cardiff before a trip to Bristol the following evening.