Manchester Phoenix 3 Belfast Giants 0 by Nigel McFarlane: Manchester's Jekyll-and-Hyde collection of imports, veterans and kids entered the closing stage of a bittersweet campaign with an encouraging, solid win against a Belfast side on the wane.

Having been given their second 'home' playoff game against Sheffield at the Ice Sheffield Arena on Thursday, this was the last game in front of a truly home crowd at the Manchester Arena, and they needed to turn it on.

Having scraped through to the playoffs, the side needed to prove that they were going to be serious challengers for a last-four place at the finals weekend in Nottingham next month.

Playoff hockey is rarely pretty. There is no room for a bad result that can be put right over a season. To use a footballing analogy, every game is like a local derby - but with punching and sticks. Intense, frenetic and rougher than usual, the entertainment value is high, but so is the tempo.

Both sides provided no surprises at all as they came out flying. It was fast, big-hitting hockey, packed with mistakes, and tempers were never far from the surface. It was Mark Bultje who gave first blood to Manchester, tapping in from a Dwight Parrish pass on 4.47 with Giants' Shane Johnson serving a two minute interference minor.

Ironically, it was Manchester's powerplay - so often a weakness this season - that gave them two of their three goals. Belfast's Paxton Schulte - given two game penalties the previous evening in their 3-1 defeat at Sheffield, has (by his standard) a fairly quiet evening, picking up a mere 6 penalty minutes, two of which came at the end of the first period after the buzzer had sounded, with Phoenix's Aaron Davies receiving a blow to the face from Schulte while still on the bench.

The tight, fast hockey continued in the second period, and Belfast seemed to have equalised on 30 minutes, only for referee Andy Carson to disallow the goal and throw Parrish into the box on an interference minor. Phoenix pretty much wrapped the game up after 50 minutes, when MoM Bultje struck again from close range for Manchester's second, this time with Todd Kelman serving two minutes for high sticks.

Giants pulled netminder Colin Ryder with 90 seconds left, but to no avail. Rick Brebant - playing his last ever game in Manchester before returning to North America after this campaign, fired a shot the length of the ice, but narrowly missed. Bultje, however, found the empty net seconds later to seal vital points for Phoenix as their playoff quest began.

This has been a rollercoaster of a season. The contradictions are striking. The entire campaign has flown by, but individual games have, at times, seemed interminable. The team has put in stunning performances that have been a shining testament to Elite League ice hockey, and also ones that made you wish for a speeding puck to the head, just for an excuse to go home early.

In essence, it has been the sort of season that any sports fan would expect, and we should remember that during the close season. We should also remember that, were it not for the stirling efforts of MD Neil Morris and his team of volunteers at Phoenix, there would have been no Manchester season to start with. A true fan who put his money where his mouth is, he looks all set to do the same through the summer and beyond, as next season's team building will start to take place. Paul Heavey will, assuming he stays as coach, fashion a very different side to the inaugural Phoenix outfit, and there will, I'm sure, be a bigger marketing push to bring back the thousands of fans out there. Morris has taken the flak, and in return dished out nothing but goodwill. He deserves our admiration.

And the team deserve some luck. With the immense Rick Brebant going home after 17 immaculate years in British ice hockey, an era has drawn to a close. There are no tributes that have not already been paid.

Where Manchester Phoenix will end this season's campaign is anyone's guess. They may make the finals, they may not. In the final analysis, though, the important fact is that they are THERE, competing. It will be a long summer. But it will be bearable, because the wait is finite. Roll on next season.