THE Basingstoke Bison’s English Premier League title defence did not get off to the start they wanted, as they lost 4-1 at home to the Telford Tigers.

The new look Shropshire side started the game the better and took the lead in the fifth minute, as two of their new signings combined.

Man of the match Michal Satek put the puck onto the stick of Matty Davies for him to score.

This seemed to wake-up the Herd as Aaron Connolly and Vanya Antonov forced Telford goalie Ondrej Raszka into saves.

Bison man of the match Grant Rounding then tipped a Joe Baird blue shot, before the first penalty of the game saw Telford penalised for too many men on the ice.

The Herd made the most of the man advantage as a nice pass to the left of the net from Declan Balmer saw Ciaran Long fire home.

The Bison’s Tomas Karpov then went inches wide, before the home side were given another powerplay, which proved to be very poor.

They paid the price for this, as soon after Satek scored from the slot after a nice centre pass from Davies, which made it 2-1 at 17:04.

The first penalty on the Bison, saw Jakub Barton depart to the sin bin for tripping Jason Silverthorn.

This saw the Tigers extend their lead to 3-1, as Rick Plant deflected in a shot from Satek, 23 seconds before the second buzzer.

The second session, saw the Herd have the majority of the possession, but they were unable to find a way of producing clear cut chances against a solid Tigers defence.

A powerplay saw Long test Raszka and then Daniel Lackey saw his shot deflected over later in the period.

Then out of the blue Telford added a fourth goal, as the Tigers’ Brit line struck with Macauley Heywood scoring.

The final session saw the Bison reshuffle their forward lines, but Telford stood firm even when the home side were given a powerplay after Heywood took exception to being held by Balmer. Heywood showed his displeasure with his fists.

As the period went on the penalties started to flow and with five minutes left, the home side found themselves with a four-on-three powerplay.

Scoring was a must if they were going to get back into the game, but Raszka saved from Long and Rene Jarolin fired just wide as the chance passed them by and with it any hope of winning.

After the game a dejected Bison head coach Doug Sheppard said: “This is a very disappointing start to the season and we have to put things straight in our next game.”

This evening (5.30pm), the Bison are on the road for their first away game at Hull, who came back from 4-2 down last night to win 11-4 against the Manchester Phoenix.

Scoring; Bison: Long 1+0, Balmer, Polodna 0+1, Tigers: Satek 1+2, Davies 1+1, Plant, Heywood 1+0, Zajac 0+2, Tait, Hill 0+1. Penalties: Bison 6mins, Tigers 14, Shots on Goal: Hiadlovsky 16 Raszka 22.