A fight that does damage

Paul Rouget, Media365: published on Tuesday March 16, 2021 at 4:05 p.m.

After a scuffle in the « Battle of Alberta » Monday between the Flames and the Oilers, an Edmonton player, who took a violent punch in the face, was unable to replay the game.

It was hot Monday night in Calgary, during the still very engaged derby against Edmonton. A « Battle of Alberta » won 4-3 by the Flames at home, against the Oilers who lost two players to injury. Tyson Barrie will have played only 7 minutes in the first period, before trying, in vain, to return in the third third. His teammate and fellow Canadian Jujhar Khaira will only have spent 2 minutes and 55 seconds on the ice.. Time to stamp an opponent, Oliver Kylington, before finding himself embroiled in a mess that caused damage. Especially for him.

Because Khaira fought with Brett Ritchie, who quickly got the better of the Canadian center, to whom he notably inflicted a violent punch in the face. Groggy, Khaira had to be escorted back to the locker room and did not reappear from the match. While we feared a concussion, his trainer was rather reassuring at the end of the meeting. « We never like to see this kind of thing, but JJ (Khaira, editor’s note) felt good after the first period, so we’ll see how it will evolve, explained Dave Tippett. Barrie is back on the bench but he does not was not feeling well, and he left. We had JJ and Barrie less for the whole second period, and it takes a lot of the others. Despite that, I think we hung on, but we committed too many errors.  » A second consecutive defeat for the Edmonton franchise, which still occupies third place in the North Division where the Flames are them in fifth place after this third success in a row. Calgary players who reacted well, who had lost their first two meetings after the arrival of their new coach Darryl Sutter on March 4.