THE Basingstoke Bison recorded their seventh straight win of the season over the Manchester Phoenix, thanks to a narrow 2-1 success in their play-off quarter-final first leg.

This gives the Herd a one goal advantage going into this evening’s second leg on home ice, which starts at 6pm.

The Bison travelled to Deeside minus Aaron Connolly and Ryan Sutton and in a very tight game, there were no goals in the first 40 minutes, but plenty of action.

The Herd had chances from Tomas Karpov and Alan Lack who were both denied by Stephen Fone, while Stanislav Gron and Robin Kovar tested man of the match Tomas Hiadlovsky.

The Phoenix had the better of the start of the second session as Hiadlovsky did well to deny Michal Satek.

He then made a smart save to stop Gron putting the home side in front, before the Herd came back strongly with Ciaran Long, Jarolin and Joe Greener all going close.

As the period came to an end, Manchester’s James Neil forced Hiadlovsky into a good save.

The deadlock was finally broken at 43:21, as Gron scored from close range assisted by former Bison man Jacob Heron and Satek.

The Herd took 24 seconds to reply, as Greener put away a shot off the pads of Fone.

The visitors then made sure they would have an advantage to defend, as Jarolin netted from Shaun Thompson, just as their last powerplay of the game ran out.

Karpov came close to adding a third goal for the Bison, but another excellent save from Fone denied him.

The winners of this quarter-final will face the victors of the Milton Keynes and Telford clash where last night in MK the home side won 3-1.

In the other quarter finals, Swindon beat Guilford 2-1 and Sheffield lost at home to Peterborough 4-1.