Clarke and his first line partners, Toni Alasaarela and Ales Parez, were simply awesome on a night when Wildcats' hopes of repeating their shock midweek win at highly rated Slough Jets were blown sky high within the first quarter of an hour.

Many home fans feared a tough battle for Lightning following that victory at Jets but their fears proved unfounded as Clarke first converted a well-placed pass from Alasaarela out on the left on 9mins 21secs and then turned in a pass from the right by the same player on 11mins 51secs.

Wildcats were able to stem the flow of goals until the first break but they were undone again early in the second session when Nick Poole supplied Clarke who found a gaping hole to the right of netminder Nathan Craze on 22mins 19secs.

The visitors at last managed to put Lightning under meaningful pressure when Ross Bowers was called for hooking but goalie Barry Hollyhead stood up to the task and kept them at bay.

Back to full strength Parez played the puck across the face of goal for Clarke to poke home to give Lightning a four goal cushion at 32mins 27secs.

Swindon almost had the puck in the net while Daniel Croft was serving two minutes for tripping – Adam Brittle's shot hitting the underside of the bar before bouncing out behind Hollyhead. Seconds earlier Hollyhead had been forced into a great glove save from Lee Richardson.

Lightning carried on where they left off in the third period with Parez feeding Alasaarela for a topshelf shot into the goal on 40mins 53secs.

Great work by Clarke and Parez saw Lightning going further ahead on 46mins 6secs – Clarke getting his fifth of the night.

Seconds later Matt Towalski was penalised for tripping and Swindon quickly took advantage for their only goal coming from John Wheaton who fired high into the net at 47mins 4secs.

The six goal gap was quickly restored by Lightning as Croft unleashed a rocket shot from the blue line to the far side of Craze at 48mins 41secs – his first for the team.

That prompted a timeout by Swindon who replaced Craze with back-up netminder Joe White.

However it did not stop the hosts adding to their tally with goal number eight coming on 55mins 26secs. This time Clarke took possession of the puck as he came off the bench for the start of his shift and swiftly made a long pass to the onrushing Greg Randall on the left. White was unable to block his shot.

The following night Lightning had a tougher battle at Telford Tigers but their patience was rewarded in the end with a 3-0 win to maintain their third spot in the league.

Lightning had a goal washed out in the first period which ended 0-0 and it was not until 22 seconds from the next break that Parez netted from a pass to the back post.

Telford's defence was breached again 62 seconds after the restart when Adam Carr took possession on his side's blue line and raced forward to unleash a topshelf shot which gave goalie Mike Brabon no chance.

Mikko Skinnari made sure of the win when he netted on a five on three powerplay on 48mins 8secs.

Lightning v Wildcats statistics:

Lightning scorers: Gary Clarke 5+2; Toni Alasaarela 1+6; Daniel Croft 1+1; Greg Randall 1+1; Ales Parez 0+4; Nick Poole 0+1.

Wildcats scorers: John Wheaton 1+0; Matty Davies 0+1; Joel Petkoff 0+1.

Shots on goal: On Barry Hollyhead 21/1
On Nathan Craze 25/7
On Joe White 7/1