NOVOSIBIRSK, Russia — Dinamo Riga beat Sibir 7-2 on Tuesday evening, improving their record to one-win, one-loss on their first road trip of 2010.

The series of away games began shakily on Sunday afternoon in Novokuznetsk when they went down to the lowly Metallurg 3-2. It was a below-par performance by the Latvians who would have been targeting the game as very winnable.

Trailing by as much as two, Girt Ankipans got Dinamo Riga on the scoresheet in the 35th minute and when Mike Iggulden continued his fine form with another in the 54th minute, Dinamo Riga would have considered themselves a real chance with time eating away. However these hopes were extremely short-lived with Metallurg replying almost instantly with a goal 8 seconds later to seal the 3-2 victory.

Perhaps it was in the knowledge that their second trip on the road would be against a tougher opponent that changed their attitude entering the game or perhaps they were still feeling the retribution of coach Julius Supler post-match speech from their previous loss. Whatever it was, it worked with Dinamo Riga producing some scintillating hockey when they met Sibir on Tuesday .

A goal to Mihail Anisin in the second minute gave Sibir the perfect start, but they had certainly not expected the backlash that was too follow. By the end of the first period, Dinamo Riga had not only equaled through Miķelis Rēdlihs before taking the lead through Martin Kariya but then added insult to injury by claiming a further two goals to be leading 4-1 as the period came to a close. The further two goals came through Ankipans who added his second for the year and the hardworking Jānis Sprukts.

Sibir were hoping that Dinamo Riga’s momentum may have been stalled by the break in play, but their hopes fell on deaf ears with Dinamo Riga only doing more to add to their already healthy lead. By the end of the second period, their lead had been extended by a further three goals. Gints Galviņš joined the action by grabbing two before Iggulden proved this could be his year by adding yet another.

The final period lost some of its shine with Dinamo Riga knowing full well that their was no coming back for Sibir. With time running out they would have been happy to claim back one token goal, if nothing more than to please their home fans but their was no doubting which team the night belonged too.

It will now be interesting to see how Dinamo Riga back up tomorrow evening with their tough road schedule seeing them play Amur in Khabarovsk. This is another game that Dinamo Riga can not afford to lose if they want to survive through March.