The Invicta Dynamos will be looking to end their losing run on Sunday after an intense past weekend of action.

Karl Lennon’s side host the Junior Raiders at Planet Ice and hope to have a deeper roster to select from after being hit hard by injuries.

They lost 9-6 to Streatham at home last Sunday - recovering from a 5-1 first period deficit - having narrowly been beaten at Slough Jets in the league on the Saturday.

“We have had a bad run and it is about putting things right now,” said the coach, following five successive defeats.

“We beat the Raiders at the start of the season in the league and we need to make sure we get a result against them at home this week, and hopefully we can have a fuller complement of players.”

Last weekend started with a 3-2 reverse against the Slough Jets.

“It was a pretty intense weekend,” said the coach, who had Juraj Huska missing after he needed to return to Slovakia for family reasons.

“Family comes first in these situations,” Lennon said. “We were down on numbers, short benched and took a couple of injuries on Saturday as well, so it was a bit of a disastrous start with everything, but despite that we put up a really strong performance against Slough, who had beaten us the week before, we pushed them right to the end.

“If it wasn’t for some questionable decisions by the referee, late hits and things that were happening off the play, then I think we would probably have been in that game at least with a tie, taking them to overtime.”

The Mos pulled their goalie with a minute left to try and get that crucial leveller.

“We went for it but unfortunately we just couldn’t put it away,” said the coach.

Gregor McAllan suffered a collarbone injury in the game - the Mos are already missing Tom Soar with the same ailment - while Richard Harris took a puck to the face during the game, giving him a nasty cut and severe swelling around his jaw.

“It was pretty horrendous,” said the Mos head coach, who was surprised to be able to name Harris again on Sunday. He not only played against Streatham but fired in a hat-trick.

The Mos were recovering from a poor start to Sunday’s game, however.

“We started horrendously,” Lennon admitted. “In games like that you have to compete and we just backed off them completely for a whole period, we barely got amongst them at all. They punished us because they are a top team.”

The Dynamos were 5-1 down after the first period and knew they had to keep Streatham’s advantage down to five, having being awarded a 5-0 victory from when the sides met in the reverse fixture.

Streatham had won the first game of the season 11-3 but were found to have fielded a suspended player and had that cup result wiped out.

Once the Mos got going, Sunday’s match proved to be a thriller for another sell-out crowd.

“After the first period you wonder what’s going to happen,” Lennon said.

“We made some changes in the period, we put Ed Stedman, 18 and 16-year-old Brandon Chard up with our import Stanislav Lascek and they were brilliant, Brandon scored and Ed was getting amongst them, sparking a bit of energy into the team.”

A couple of scraps helped fire the contest up, with Harrison Lillis squaring up to the league’s tough guy Brandon Miles, while Joe Stephenson had one with Henry Aiken. Both Streatham players were former Mos, Aiken last season’s supporters’ player-of-the-year.

“That really gave a lot of energy to the boys,” Lennon said. “The crowd was electric after that moment.”

The Mos pulled it back to 6-4 but took a silly penalty and Streatham scored another to open up the gap again. One more goal took their advantage to four and with a fifth in sight, they pulled their goalie to go for broke. But the tiring Mos managed to score an empty-net goal to complete a 9-6 scoreline in favour of Streatham.

It’s a scoreline that could still help see the Mos through to the next stage of the competition. They face Oxford City Stars in a final group stage match next Sunday (November 13).

“It is in our hands, we need to make the most of it,” said the coach.

Among the players available this Sunday should be the Mustangs contingent which could include Matty Bell - a player who suffered a nasty injury in training, one that could have been a whole lot worse.

He suffered a cut to his neck caused by a blade after a collision with another player when they both tripped on the ice. Junior players must wear neck guards but it’s optional for seniors.

Lennon described it as a “freak accident” adding: “I have played hockey for a long time now and never have I ever seen anything quite like that, it was bad, but thankfully not as bad as it could have been.”

Bell ended up with the man-of-the-match award after playing for the Mustangs last Saturday in a 4-3 win against the Peterborough Phantoms.

For Lennon, it was a reminder of his own freak accident last season, suffering a nasty cut when his visor split in two, leading to stitching internally and externally.

“Freak accidents happen,” he said. “At the moment we are in a period where we are suffering and struggling a bit with the injuries. We just have to come through them.

“I know we have lost a few games now on the bounce, we have been close in all of those games, without a full complement of players so I can only credit the players that we do have, they are putting in a shift, wearing their heart on their sleeve and at least still fighting in games which is the minimum I can ask as a coach.”

With restricted capacity expected to remain in place this Sunday, purchasing tickets online is recommended. The puck drops in Gillingham at 5.15pm.