Ipswich Witches v Poole Pirates

The Poole Pirates will have to wait until 2020 before they can possibly ride their 45th play-off fixture after Ipswich marched into this season's Grand Final having wiped out the Pirates ten point advantage from the opening leg.

Just as the first leg ended in a remarkable sequence of five successive maximum heat advantages, so each of the first ten heats of the second leg were of a 5-1 permutation, Ipswich claiming six of them to Poole's four. Three of Poole's big scores came from their engine room, the Pirates heavily reliable on Nicolai Klindt and captain Josh Grajczonek to keep themselves in the tie for thirteen heats at Foxhall.

The Pirates ran out of resources early on with Tomas H Jonasson still struggling with the shoulder injury he aggravated on Thursday, then saw Jack Holder damage his foot when falling in heat six and withdrawing from the meeting.

There were further problems as they also had Brady Kurtz struggling, scoring just paid four and those coming in his first two rides, and one of those points was a gift after Nico Covatti pulled up on the second lap after leading. Equally, Ricky Wells' two point score was built in his first two outings.

He was passed in his final ride, heat 14, when rival reserve James Sarjeant recovered from getting out-of-shape at the first turn to take third whilst Richard Lawson was out front in control. The resulting 4-2 advantage pushed a deserving  Ipswich side six points clear of the defending champions with just one heat remaining, thus ending Poole's dream of reaching their 11th play-off final.