RYAN Aldridge admitted that his team’s 5-1 victory over Bracknell Bees didn’t really get his pulse racing but the Swindon Wildcats chief was happy to settle for a comfortable home victory.

In their only game of the weekend, the Wildcats breezed past their near neighbours at the Link Centre but head coach Aldridge thought that the visitors, and the overall feeling of the clash itself, lacked intensity.

Even Sam Bullas’ fight with the Bees’ James Galazzi, a re-run of their dust-up during the two teams’ last clash earlier this month, did little to kick the contest into life.

“I don’t think we ever really got off the back burner to be honest. We were a bit sluggish last night in practice and I thought we were a bit sluggish tonight,” said the Swindon chief.

“But we did what we needed to do to win.

“We scored some nice goals, I thought the young kids played well, I thought Richie (Lee Richardson) was outstanding in defence - but I don’t think we had a lot of competition to be honest.

“It was just flat. Just to get it out the way and come out with a win is a good thing.

“They used to play a lot tougher than they do.

“Galazzi asked Bully to go tonight. He obviously didn’t do so well in the fight last time and he wanted a bit of payback.

“Bully stepped up. He didn‘t really want to but it didn’t really give them much momentum because we scored in the shift after.

“It was niggly but they’re not as tough as they used to be.

“Sometimes, you’ve just got to roll with it and tonight was one of those nights. I had some stern words after the first period but, at the end of the day, as long as we’re winning, there’s no point in losing my temper, especially going into the play-offs.

“Next weekend is two road games and two tough teams, so to get a win tonight is important because that weekend is going to be tough.”

Aldridge did pay tribute to hat-trick man Aaron Nell and says that the forward’s spectacular second goal proves that he has the ability to crack home blistering first-timers in his locker.

The Wildcats boss said: “We always joke about him taking one-timers; he doesn’t want to take one-timers from there.

“And he came to the bench and I said ‘don’t ever tell me that you can’t score one-timers from there again’ because it was a beautiful goal.

“He scored three nice goals tonight but all the goals were nice. Tomas Kana’s was a good pass from Hoogy (Jonas Hoog) and Hoogy’s was a weird one but a nice goal at the end of the day.”

D-man Shane Moore missed tonight's victory over Bracknell through injury whilst forward Tomasz Malasinski was rested ahead of next weekend's trips to the Basingstoke Bison and Guildford Flames.