Reaktor took Irbis 4:3 in the MHL on Wednesday evening, keeping both sides rooted at the bottom of the table with zero points each after three games. We had backed the visitors at 62 per cent confidence, but the match went another way entirely — and here's the thing, Irbis started brightly enough but couldn't find that extra touch when it mattered.
Both sides came into the fixture with identical records: one win, two defeats, nothing between them in the standings. Reaktor's recent form had been uneven, losing three of their last five before pulling off a win against Auto, while Irbis had bounced back from a heavy defeat to Красноярские Рыси with a couple of victories of their own.
To be fair, neither team looked particularly sharp in the opening exchanges, but the home side gradually took control of the tempo. Irbis fought back to stay in it, and the game opened up into something more end-to-end than either side anticipated — by then the visitors had already shown they weren't going to roll over.
The final score tells only half the story though. Four goals for Reaktor against three for Irbis suggests a contest that stayed within reach until the closing stages, and that is often the difference between sides at this level — who composes themselves when the pressure builds.
Neither team moved an inch in the table, which is perhaps the most honest reading of the evening. Both remain on zero points after three matches, and neither has yet found the consistency that separates them from the rest of the pack.
