2011 - THE FINAL BY THE SEA!

It was certainly a winter of discontent as far as British Speedway was concerned with threats of two clubs, Coventry and Peterborough, withdrawing from the top league and the Pirates knowing that they would have to go into the start of the season without a rider who had scored over 300 race points from 181 rides in his debut season for the club, Darcy Ward.

Injury, sustained whilst out training on a moto-cross machine, left Ward side-lined for what proved to the first five meetings of the term, two of those being away league encounters from which, operating rider replacement for the, then 19 year old, the Pirates were able to bank back-to-back victories at Birmingham and Wolverhampton to kick start their title assault as they tried to erase the memories of the 2010 play-off capitulation against Coventry. 

Ironically, their first league defeat came when Ward made his 2011 debut, losing at Eastbourne on 16th April. Back at Wimborne Road however the Pirates were to kick-start a thirteen out of fourteen home league win sequence, only Belle Vue being able to escape from Dorset with a victory to their name and that was in the final league match of the season. 

After those early two Ward-less wins on the road Poole managed just three more travelling triumphs in the league (twice at Belle Vue, both by a 46-44 score-line and a seven point win at Swindon) but in addition they registered victories in the Knockout Cup (Swindon and Eastbourne), going on to win the cup with a 102-86 aggregate result against Belle Vue.

On the rider front, it was a little frantic at times. Not least when expected debutant Rafal Dobrucki withdrew from contract as he was making a stance on behalf of all Polish riders against new silencer regulations. Matt Ford looked to an 'old-boy' in Jason Doyle to bring in and the future world champion, despite being hampered by an ongoing shoulder injury offered solid support to fellow Aussies Chris Holder and Ward, until that shoulder cost him the chance of riding in the four finals. That fate also befell Christian Hefenbrock, whilst Russian Renat Gafurov lost his opportunity for silverware when he lost his way after a bright start to campaign. Tomas H Jonasson was called in as a replacement and made an impressive debut at Belle Vue with a paid 13 return from six rides. But his appearances were limited to just five more where he had a mix-bag of results including a near-maximum in what happened to be his final showing on October 3rd in the first leg of the play-off final at Eastbourne.

Poole lost by 8 points that night to set up  a title-night decider on October 10th, a meeting that features as our Pirates Media on-line screening this coming Wednesday night (6th May 2020) when under other circumstances Poole would have been preparing for action against the Kent Kings. But with lockdown still in-force and social distancing in place, pull up your armchair, log-on to your computer and enjoy Poole v Eastbourne Grand Play-off final.