8:00am Thursday 3rd June 2010
By Graham Merry
THE re-signing all Basingstoke Bison fans have been waiting all summer for was announced last night.
Super scorer Ondrej Lauko will once again be wearing a Herd uniform for their forthcoming English Premier League campaign.
The Slovak sniper put fear into every defence in the EPL last season, when he finished as the league’s leading goal scorer.
Lauko was a real fans’ favourite and that was proved when he scooped the Supporters’ Player of the Year Award at the end of season.
Helping him achieve that feat in part was the amazing 63 goals he scored in the league campaign. That was 10 more than his nearest rivals.
Three times the player nicknamed the fox in the box scored four goals in a game and he also netted another six hat-tricks.
It took him only two games to score his first treble - in the victory in Guildford - and that was part of an eight-game scoring streak that signalled the arrival of the 28-year-old to British game.
His goal count was the highest ever by any player wearing a Bison shirt for a league campaign.
You have to go back 16 years to find the last Basingstoke player to better his goal-scoring feat in a single league season when Mario Belanger netted 73 times for the Beavers, as the team was called then. As well as hammering in goals from all angles with his trademark lethal wrist shot, Lauko also picked up 48 assists for a points total of 111 – the third best tally in the league.
He will be a major part of the Basingstoke forward line and Bison player/coach Steve Moria, who linked up well with the Slovakian at the end of the season, is pleased to have secured the signature of the hitman once again.
He said: “A number of clubs were interested in Ondrej, but he enjoyed his team in Basingstoke and the team he was on.”
The Slovak joined as an unknown last season, having never played in Britain before and Moria added: “You never know what players are going to be like coming to a new country, playing in a new league and not really knowing anyone or the system.
“He came in straight away and started scoring and never looked back. He would score one, then two, and you knew if you could get the puck to him again he would score again.”
He added: “He is natural goal scorer and is going to be a key member of this team for the coming season.”
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