THE Basingstoke Bison moved to the top of the English Premier League, after an excellent 4-1 victory at reigning league champions the Telford Tigers.

The opening goal in the contest came at 34:57, with Tomas Karpov sitting out a rare penalty, the Bison scored shorthanded from Shaun Thompson as he converted a Joe Rand pass.

Telford levelled things in the final period, as Nathan Salem netted and going into the final 10 minutes it remained 1-1.

The Tigers then ran into penalty trouble, as Vladmir Kutny received a hooking minor and 33 seconds later goalie Tom Murdy picked up a delay of game penalty.

Bison head coach Doug Sheppard called a time-out and it proved to be a master stroke as Joe Greener and Ryan Watt scored in the space of seven seconds, as they made the most of both powerplays.

Watt's goal also saw an assist for Ryan Sutton his first-ever league point for the Bison.

Any chance of a Telford comeback were ended when Tomas Karpov added a fourth goal for the visitors at 58:02.

Bison netminder Tomas Hiadlovsky was the Herd's man-of-the-match for an excellent performance between the pipes.

Next for the early leaders in the EPL is a home game against new boys to the EPL the Hull Pirates on Saturday (6pm) at the Basingstoke Arena.