Keefe facing big rebuilding job

Belfast Giants’ head coach Adam Keefe admits he faces a sizeable rebuilding job ahead of the Elite League season 2017/18.

The Giants will be without Mike Forney, James Desmarais, Derrick Walser and Keefe himself as they look to build on their second place league finish last time around.

“Over the last week it’s been a real busy time and I know Steve (Thornton) has been working tirelessly in terms of recruitment since the season ended to get ahead,” he said.

“Now I can get more involved and reach out to my resources to get as many references as I can so we don’t make any mistakes.

“I like to wait and see what’s available before we jump in. There’s a ton of good hockey players out there, so I would say we’re in the early stages of recruitment.

“But if the right player comes along at the right time, which could be tomorrow or the next day, then we’ll go for it, but it’s important to get the right pieces of the puzzle.

“If you look at our roster we’ve lost two of our top centres in Forney and Desmarais, so those are big places to fill.

“If we can, we’ll look to improve in that area, not to mention losing a player of Derrick’s calibre, which will hurt us, but we’ll try to find the best player available to fill his shoes.

“The gap I leave in the roster won’t be too hard to fill though, but any player we have to bring in has to fit into our plans and the way we want to play.”

(Image permission: Press Eye)