Elite League
Coventry Speedway: Match report - Bees 37 Poole Pirates 56
By Nick
Jul 5, 2008, 12:47

ELITE League leaders Poole showed the value of fast gating and being able to track a full side as they came away from Brandon with an emphatic away win.

And Bees, already with two riders injured and two more away on World Championship duty, saw Olly Allen pick up a shoulder injury in a Heat 9 crash which is almost certain to rule him out of Saturday's trip to Eastbourne.

At the time of Allen's second-bend fall, the scores were level at 24-24 although the Pirates had already served notice of their intent with a 5-1 in the very first race.

And as Bees rapidly ran out of options in the final stages, the visitors plundered five 5-1s in the last six races - the only success for Coventry coming from a tactical ride win by super guest Fredrik Lindgren, who never stopped battling.

Of the other stand-ins, Piotr Swiderski could not be faulted for effort either but found himself out-gates, whilst the injury jinx also struck youngster Tai Woffinden who had to pull out of his last ride with a shoulder injury.

With their reserves failing to fire, it added up to a painful night for Bees and their supporters, with little chance of stemming the flow of points against them.

Manager Peter Oakes said: "There are absolutely no arguments that Poole were a class above us, and they were probably fancying their chances when they arrived and were aware of our problems.

"They out-gated us from start to finish, and obviously we are concerned about the situation at present. We've had numerous discussions about what we can do, but with the rules as they are we have very few options until August.

"The other problem is that we seem to be on a run where a rider gets hurt every meeting. I know Birmingham are struggling in a similar way in the Premier League, and it's the same for us. Chris Harris, Billy Janniro, Olly Allen and even our guest Tai Woffinden have all crashed and had to withdraw, and that makes things so difficult."

BUILDBASE BEES 37: Fredrik Lindgren 15+2, Piotr Swiderski 8, Tai Woffinden 5, Olly Allen 4, Andreas Messing 3+2, Stan Burza 2, Chris Harris r/r.

POOLE 56: Bjarne Pedersen 14, Magnus Zetterstrom 11, Freddie Eriksson 10+1, Chris Holder 8+4, Davey Watt 8+1, Adam Skornicki 5+2, Daniel Davidsson 0