BRACKNELL Bees blazed the goal trail in sensational style on Sunday, inflicting a humiliating 11-1 defeat on Cardiff Fire, writes Dave Wright.

And, such was their domination of this NIHL South One match, that the winning margin could so easily have been much bigger.

Scott Spearing’s sizzling side slammed in an astonishing 66 shots at the visitors’ net, so just 11 goals was a pretty low return.

That was partly due to the heroics of over-worked net-minder Lewis Davies and it was easy to see why the youngster is part of the Great Britain Under 18 squad.

Sadly for him, most of those in front of him looked out of their depth and, with four league defeats out of four and 30 goals conceded, the Welsh side could struggle to survive this season.

In a very one-sided opening 20 minutes, Bees drove through the Fire defence almost at will, yet managed to convert only two of their 23 goal attempts even when Cardiff had two players sitting in the sin-bin at the same time.

It was Frankie Bakrlik who opened the scoring in the 12th minute and 58 seconds later fellow import Jan Bendik doubled the lead with Shaun Thompson having a hand in both goals.

Even at this early stage, the result was a foregone conclusion and it soon became just a matter of how many goals Bees would score in 60 minutes.

Cardiff did manage to force Alex Mettam into making a couple of stops, but for much of the time the Bees No.1 was little more than a spectator.

Bees’ most productive period was the middle one, with 19 shots producing five goals, while Mettam faced just three.

The visitors were again down to three players when Thompson made it 3-0 on 27:17 and a little over two minutes later it became four with Josh Ealey-Newman finishing off a chance created by Bakrlik and captain Matt Foord.

Bakrlik, with a superb strike in the top-hand corner, notched the fifth on 32:37 with Foord and Thompson providing the assists.

And the in-form Czech completed his hat-trick with another unstoppable drive in the 36th minute.

Thompson also had a hand, along with Josh Martin, in the next goal scored by Jared Lane on 37:47, making it 7-0 at the break.

There was no let-up for Cardiff with Lane taking just 35 seconds of the final period to get his second goal of the game.

Callum Best then bagged a quick-fire double, netting on 45:38 and 48:29 to take Bees into double figures – and it is some time since that last happened at The Hive.

Steve Osman made it 11-0 before Foord hit the crossbar with the final period turning into a shooting practice session, with 24 attempts at goal in all.

Bees did become a little too casual at times and their hopes of completing a clean sheet were ended when Callum Buglass netted a consolation goal with a little under two minutes remaining.

At the time, Bendik was in the sin-bin, having incurred a 10-minute penalty for misconduct.

Considering their overall superiority, Bracknell still managed to clock up 24 penalty minutes – four more than than their rivals – and at one stage in the final period the Stead brothers, William and Harvey, were sitting beside each other in the sin bin.

Another visitor was Josh Tetlow following a bout of fisticuffs with Brad Watchorn, but someone must have been impressed with his punching as he was voted Bees’ man of the match, ahead of Bakrlik, with three goals and as many assists, Thompson, with a goal and five assists and Best with two plus two.

Alex Barker missed the game due to his head injury, but he is hoping to be back for this weekend’s game at Basingstoke on Saturday (6.30pm) and MK Thunder at The Hive on Sunday (6pm).