PIRATES HOPING TO BE THE EARLY BIRD

Poole Ready Power Pirates will be hoping that it will be a case of them being the 'early bird' on Friday morning and not opponents Swindon Robins when they begin the defence of their Elite league title at 11am.

It will be the first of two meetings in the day for the club that are gunning for a third successive league championship honour and who have already suffered injury knocks to three of their riders.

Kyle Newman who crashed out of the Pirates' Elite Shield encounter when he shed a chain in heat 2 in Poole's opener rejoins the side as too does Chris Holder who withdrew from the second leg of the Shield fixture at King's Lynn after aggravating a wrist injury in a first ride fall.

But the Pirates will be without talisman Dave Watt who crashed on Sunday and is set to be sidelined for four to six weeks nursing a broken left foot and ligament damage. His team place will now be covered by Josh Grajczonek for the duration of Watt's lay-off.

The visitors will be at full strength for what will be their first team outing of the campaign and they boast former Pirates Adrian Miedzinski, Kyle Howarth and Troy Batchelor amongst their number together with, back from injury Charles Wright, who dislocated a finger last Friday night in the Somerset challenge against the Poole Select side. Wright impressed on his stand-in performances for Poole last season and the Pirates are fully aware that they will need to be firing from the off.

Poole boss Matt Ford claimed "We have not had the best fortune so far this year taking three knocks already but on the plus side we have seen some really good performances from Dak (Dakota North), Kacper (Gomolski) and Paul Starke as our three new boys have quickly settled in."

"We have recalled Josh to cover for Davey and I know that he will be keen to shine again for us and Swindon will, like King's Lynn did, provide us with a good barometer to measure ourselves against.

Doors will open at 9.30am with tapes up at 11am before the two sides head for Wiltshire in the evening both making changes due to riders' Premier League commitments.

Swindon will be without Charles Wright and have called in his brother James to cover whilst both Grajczonek and Starke will also be in the same Somerset team as the Swindon Fast track rider and so Rory Schlein and Nathan Greaves will come in for the Pirates.

Teams from (at Poole)
Poole Ready Power Pirates:- Josh Graczonek, Kacper Gomolski, Chris Holder, Maciej Janowski (capt), Dakota North, Kyle Newman, Paul Starke Team Manager Neil Middleditch
Swindon M&S Van Rental Robins:- Troy Batchelor (capt), Kyle Howarth , Adrian Miedzinski, Nick Morris, Grzegorz Zengota, Lewis Rose, Charles Wright Team Manager Alun Rossiter

(at Swindon)
Swindon M&S Robins:- Troy Batchelor (capt), Kyle Howarth , Adrian Miedzinski, Nick Morris, Grzegorz Zengota, Lewis Rose, James Wright Team Manager Alun Rossiter
Poole Ready Power Pirates:-
Kacper Gomolski, Chris Holder, Maciej Janowski (capt), Dakota North,  Rory Schlein (G), Nathan Greaves, Kyle Newman Team Manager Neil Middleditch