GB U20s 5-3 Romania U20s


Great Britain Under-20s beat Romania Under-20s 5-3 to record their second successive victory at the U20 World Championship Division II Group A in Vilnius.

Mason Alderson Biddulph scored a hat-trick while Louis Chabot and Cade Neilson were also on target as GB moved on to six points from three matches.

GB went ahead after only 23 seconds as Alderson Biddulph jumped onto a mistake in the Romania defence on the first shift of the game.

A well-worked goal - with Mitchell-King and Patrick Larkin getting the assists - saw Chabot make it 2-0 at 15:34, before Dragos Petrica closed the gap from the right circle early in the second session (21:36).

After a scrappy second period, the third session burst into life with four goals in a little over four minutes.

Romania equalised short-handed through Eduard Casanean (44:27), while Alderson Biddulph danced through the defence to put GB ahead again (46:50).

Zsolt Reszegh hauled Romania level (47:54) Alderson Biddulph completed his hat-trick when his shot from the blueline crept in (48:51) and Neilson scored with a rebound (53:25) to wrap up an impressive victory.

Head coach, Martin Grubb, said: "We got off to a good start just like we did against Lithuania, but then we got sloppy and stopped doing the little things right and got ourselves in trouble.

"We talked about patience and finding a way to win no matter what and I thought our big offensive players stepped up.

"We showed resilience and character to find a way to win despite being nowhere near our best.

"These tournaments are about winning and keeping the momentum rolling and thankfully we’ve done that today. We need to be better tomorrow and keep finding ways to win."

GB are straight back into action tomorrow as they play Spain at 10am (12noon UK time).