​NOTTINGHAM Panthers and Belfast Giants served up a rip-roaring start to the Elite League season and a real cracker for the live television cameras in front of more than 5,300 fans at the National Ice Centre.

Panthers finally won 4-3 after penalty shots, but had to claw themselves back from two down to take the lead at 3-2, before Giants hit a late leveller.

The victory was no more than Panthers deserved after match-winner Jade Galbraith’s second penalty shot goal was incorrectly ruled out by referee Moray Hanson.

TV relays clearly showed the puck had hit the roof of the net and bounced out.

Galbraith argued, but to no avail. But at least the play-maker had the satisfaction of sealing victory with another almost identical strike that counted.

“It was definitely in and the ref made a mistake, but everybody makes mistakes,” said Galbraith.

“We’re just grateful that we had another chance to win it. It was awesome that we did it in the end.

“Belfast are an excellent team and I know why they are the favourites.

“They got the jump on us early on. But everybody is rusty at this time of year and there was a lot of nervous energy to start with. The crowd was just unbelievable.

“We out-battled them and that’s what we’re going to do this year. We’re not going to kill teams.

“A lot of teams may have more skill than us but we have guys on every line who can hit.

“Look at Matt Myers. He was unbelievable, hitting everything that moved

“And it’s great when you have a someone in the team as dangerous in front of goal as Beauregard. When he gets a chance, he’ll score. He didn’t hit 61 goals in this league for nothing.

“It was a great start to the season but now we have another big one against Coventry (on Sunday). It doesn’t get much tougher than this.”

Panthers – without injured pair Jay Henderson and Marc Levers -- found themselves trailing to a Tim Cook power-play goal after two minutes, followed by a second by Giants Mike Bayrack less than two minutes later, after a fortunate bounce on the blue line.

In between those goals the promised fight between Alex Penner and Giants enforcer Mike Hoffman saw the Panthers man just edge it, but there were few big punches thrown.

However, with that sideshow out of the way, the home side slowly but surely gained in confidence and it was clear they had no intention of letting this one slip away, like past Panthers side might have done.

With a new-found grit, led by returning centre Myers, they wouldn’t let this highly-rated Belfast side settle.

I can’t recall so many big hits for the entire 60 minutes and by forcing so many turnovers deep in the Belfast zone, it was inevitable a goal would come.

And with two Giants in the penalty box, Panthers made them pay, with David Clarke opening his account at the far post.(11.03) with a lightning strike.

It was all square at 2-2 on the half-hour mark when, with new defenceman Guillaume Lepine in the penalty box, Danny Meyers sent David Beauregard clear to clinically finish short-handed past Stephen Murphy (28.29).

Panthers finished the second period on top and carried that on into the third to go in front at 3-2 just a minute on the restart, with Myers’ cross towards goal being deflected in off a defenceman’s skate.

With Kowalski looking so assured in Panthers’ net, it gave them the confidence to look for more goals and one nearly came when Lepine’s wicked slap-shot seemed like it would carve its way through Murphy’s padding.

But despite Panthers seeing off Meyers’ penalty with comparative ease, Belfast’s momentum saw them level, with Brett Hemingway scrambling one home from in front of the net to force overtime, (57.13).

Panthers almost shot themselves in the foot in the last minute of the extra five minutes, when they were penalised for having too many men on the ice, with just 37 seconds on the clock.

But they survived that little scare for Galbraith to hit the sudden-death penalty-shot winner in the seventh round of shots.

All Panthers' new boys did well and, for the record, the excellent Jonathan Zion netted both his penalty shots, Beauregard missed both his, while Colin Shields and Dan Welch hit one each for Belfast.

*Sheffield Steelers – who could have gone under during a troubled summer – made a fine start to the season with a 5-1 beating of Cardiff Devils.

Panthers report from Coventry in Monday’s Post.

Match facts

PANTHERS 4, BELFAST 3

(1-2, 1-0, 1-1, 0-0)

Beauregard 1+1; Clarke, Myers 1+0; Zion, Galbraith, Meyers, Lee 0+1.

Shots on goal: Panthers 34, Giants 38 (13/12, 10/13, 9/9, 2/4)

Penalty minutes: Panthers 21, Giants 17 (9/13, 4/2, 6/2, 2/0)

Referee: Moray Hanson.

Attendance: 5,313

Other result: Sheffield 5, Cardiff 1