Aaron Fox may have seen this all before with Sheffield Steelers team

He has had a sense of coaching the Challenge Cup winning team of 2019-20, the multi-faceted side which boasted the likes of Marco Vallerand, the late Marek Troncinsky, Aaron Johnson, and Nikolai Lemtyugov.

"It is a bit of a '19-20 feel to me where it has taken a little bit of time for some of the guys to understand why we do things in a certain way but it is coming," said the Sheffield bench boss.

The team of three seasons ago lost two of their first three - in that brace of defeats, they conceded 11 goals.

A four-game period of stability followed but then they lost the next three, eventually going on to find their rhythm and win silverware.

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This season's crop of players disappointed in last Saturday's opening home defeat (1-3) by Cardiff Devils but collected their first two points of the season in a 4-1 win at Guildford Flames, 24 hours later.

Ironically, coach Fox thought they played better against Cardiff than Guildford although he admitted there was some confidence missing from the line-up.

So there is work to be done this week before Sheffield takes on another team that might well be light on confidence.

They host Manchester Storm who were caned 8-1 by Cardiff on Sunday.

Steelers' skipper Jonathan Phillips felt that Steelers dominated play in their own defeat, blaming three defensive mistakes.

"It is early in the year, there are a lot of new guys who are kind of getting that system down where it is second nature to them, and if we keep working hard and play defensively as we are playing then the offence will come for sure.

It takes time for players to figure out the best way to execute game management and find chemistry, he said.

Prior to last weekend, line combinations had started to look creative, he said.

"I don't think we will be a team that scores pretty goals all year we will be a team that sticks to its system and gets those greasy ones."

After Sunday's game, Guildford boss Paul Dixon rated Steelers as a "very strong team, as always"

This coming Saturday's fixture is Steelers' first Challenge Cup match of the campaign.

The trophy currently resides in Belfast Giants' cabinet.

Cardiff's Swinton-born goalie Ben Bowns is currently the top EIHL netminder with a 96.49 per cent save ratio.

Matt Greenfield, praised by Fox after Sunday's win, is in third spot overall, with 92 per cent.