Fans came to mourn Adam Johnson but amid the flowers and tears were fears and defiance

Three weeks after Johnson’s death during a game for Nottingham Panthers, Britain’s tight-knit ice hockey community has found itself in an uncomfortable spotlight

The flowers have been spreading like pooling water outside the National Ice Centre, one bunch after another, red, pink, purple, white, yellow and blue, most wrapped in Cellophane or paper, many with handwritten notes attached. Rest in peace, Always our 47, Thank you Adam. There were drawings among them, too, and framed photographs, even a carved pumpkin. The pile grew five, 10, 20 yards square; so big, in the end, that the Nottingham Panthers put up railings and set a steward to watch over it. Last Saturday bunches were still arriving in a steady trickle, new blooms on top of older.

The people who left them stopped and lingered for a slow moment. No one seemed entirely sure of themselves, no one really knew what to say or do. For the first week after Adam Johnson died when he was struck by a skate in a match, no one knew when, where, or even whether the Panthers would get back to playing, or how the fans were supposed to act when and if they finally did. There was no precedent, nothing in the rulebook or league regulations. After 12 days, the Panthers announced that they would play a memorial game against the Manchester Storm on Saturday 18 November, three weeks to the day after the accident.