Dean McAmmond victim of a vicious hit.

The Ottawa Senators and the Philadelphia Flyers were disputing one of their scheduled pre-season games yesterday.

Early during the second period, Steve Downie of the Flyers lined up Dean McAmmond who was skating from behind the Flyers net. Downie lined up McAmmond and hitted him viciously, even leaving the ice just before the hit. McAmmond had no chance to protect himself and suffers a concussion as a result of the hit. The National Hockey League has suspended Steve Downie indefinatly and he will remain suspended as long as he will not meet the NHL discipline commitee.

If the sequence becomes available, I will post it here later on.

I ignore if there was some bad blood between those two players but I think that Downie should serve as an example and will be suspended for a very long time. Yes, I love physical play but a line has to be drawn. The kind of hit that Downie inflicted to McAmmond has nothing to do with hockey nor physical play. This kind of behaviour is an attack, nothing more.

(Picture: Canadian Press)