SWINDON Wildcats tasted victory in their final home match of the regular season this evening but they far from had things their own way as they locked horns with a plucky Hull Pirates.

Aaron Nell’s troops looked on course for a cakewalk after they cruised into a 5-0 lead but second-from-bottom Hull fought back admirably during the match’s middle stanza and forced the hosts to stay frosty at the Link Centre to get their hands on two points.

Toms Rutkis came close to handing the hosts a perfect start as he hammered an effort against the frame of the Hull goal but once the action settled down, the 18-year-old did manage to open the scoring as he forced home past netminder Ashley Smith from close-range.

Despite showing a fair amount of attacking intent early on, the Pirates soon found themselves all at sea as Cats struck a quickfire double-salvo, player-coach Nell firing in first before Tomasz Malasinski was allowed too much space by the visitors’ defence and duly slammed home high into the net to make it 3-0.

Swindon were finding things all too easy and they soon grabbed a fourth when Carlo Finucci got on the end of Nell’s pass and beat Smith, with the Hull stopper failing to save at his near post – he was soon hooked for Martins Raitums after Malasinski superbly found Jonas Hoog from behind the Pirates goal and the Swede arrowed home to make it 5-0.

An amusing technical issue saw the buzzer signalling the end of the first period sound a minute too early and Hull were soon relieved that they hadn’t been put out of their misery sooner than expected as they opened their account with four seconds left on the clock, Nathan Salem finding a way past Stevie Lyle after the Cats netminder had kept out Tommi Laine.

Raitums denied Adam Harding early in the second period and moments after his deflected effort almost caught out the visiting stopper, Malasinki smacked one against the goal-frame.

But with 14:57 on the clock, Swindon suffered a major blow as they lost their captain to a match penalty, Jan Kostal receiving a boarding call and a heavy sanction in the process for slamming into Sam Towner from behind.

The visitors took full advantage of the ensuing five-minute power play and after Salem was able to turn home to make it 5-2, Jamie Chilcott lashed in an unstoppable rocket and ensured that it was very much game on.

Shortly after returning to a full compliment, Cats were handed their first power play of the evening but Nell was twice denied, first by the goal-frame and then by a sublime stop from Raitums.

But Swindon did managed to steady themselves following Hull’s swashbuckling fightback and after Sam Bullas got in the way of a Finucci strike, Floyd Taylor latched onto the rebound and slotted away past an unsighted Raitums to make it 6-3.

During another Pirates power play, the hosts’ Finucci twice broke free but on both occasions, he found goalie Raitums in bullish form as the hosts were unable to add to their score further before the next break.

Hull set about once again proving that they were no pushover in the final period, with Salem catching out Lyle and claiming his hat-trick by shooting through the Swindon stopper’s legs.

The visitors upped the intensity and exerted plenty of pressure on the Wildcats zone but the hosts still carried a goal threat and they struck a blow when Malasinski regained possession and enabled Hoog to wriggle into space before finishing with aplomb to hand Swindon their seventh of the night.

The Swede had the chance to match the Pirates’ Salem by grabbing a hat-trick when he was awarded a penalty shot but Hoog was unable to find a way past Raitums in a one-on-one situation.

There was also a painful ending to the night for Stevie Whitfield, who took Pasi Salonen’s stick to the face and was forced to head straight for medical attention, the Hull man receiving a match penalty for his troubles.

Despite the visitors completing the match a man down, Lyle had to be at his best to keep out James Hutchinson but there was to be no late twist in the tale.