REACTION: IMPRESSIVE PIRATES KEEP TREBLE DREAMS ALIVE

At a stage in the meeting when this cup tie could easily have turned against cup holders Poole,  the Pirates produced an unbelievable string of heat results of two 4-2's and  four 5-1's to turn an aggregate four point defeat into an advantage of eighteen points , securing a place in the cup final where they will meet the Redcar Bears.

This recovery against the Leicester Lions, the team that finished top of the SGB Championship league table, will undoubtedly go down in the Pirates' club history as one of their greatest comebacks. The Lions had just recorded a 5-1 from Nick Morris and Connor Mountain to edge into a 14-16 lead on the night to double their aggregate advantage to four points, when the onslaught came.

But as Danny King explained, "when we went behind after heat five and were down on aggregate we just all got together and said this just isn't good enough so come on. Well I suppose there were a few choice words exchanged, but it seemed to do the job and when those 5-1's started coming we thought right that's great we are back in it. Then we got another one , and it was right, let's keep it going. Then the third 5-1 that's it, you're away, everyone's buzzing, everyone's bouncing around and we just kept it going. To see that scoreline at the end was just unbelievable . To be that close after five heats and to win by thirty, it's just crazy.

It was King and his ever reliable partner Ben Cook who managed to settle any pre-meeting nerves as they combined for a 5-1 in the opening heat to write-off the first leg deficit and an early lead of their own. Cook went on to complete a brilliant five ride paid maximum, which included a breath-taking on-the-line pass of track specialist Kyle Howarth in heat six, a move that really kick-started the Pirates recovery. 

Cook admitted "to be honest, coming into that last corner I didn't think I had a chance but he (Howarth) ran out a bit and I hit the fresh dirt on the inside and all of a sudden it was a run for the line and we were toe-to-toe. I couldn't be sure I had got it, so I didn’t want to celebrate too much and then find I hadn't got it, but I did feel I had."

That triggered the Poole recovery and although their run of heat advantages was interrupted with a shared heat twelve, Nathan Ablitt just being denied a point by Max Clegg, the Pirates can look back at an incredible 46-15 return across the final ten heats to keep their treble dreams alive with Richard Lawson masterminding two more maximum heat scores from heats thirteen and fifteen as he too went through the card unbeaten, with an infallible display of speedway racing.

POOLE 60: Richard Lawson 14+1 (3,3,2',3,3) ,Zach Cook 12 (2,1,3,3,3) ,Ben Cook 11+4 (2',3,2',2',2') ,Danny King 9+1 (3,1,3,2') ,Drew Kemp 7+1 (2,0,3,2') ,Steve Worrall 6+1 (0,1,2',3) ,Nathan Ablitt 1+1 (1',0,RS,0) 
LEICESTER 30: Richie Worrall 9 (3,2,1,2,1) ,Max Clegg 5+1 (3,1',0,1',1) ,Kyle Howarth 5 (2,2,1,0) ,Nick Morris 5 (1,3,0,1,0EH) ,Connor Mountain 4+1 (0,2',1,1) ,Joe Thompson 1+1 (R,0,0,RS) ,Dan Thompson 1 (1,0,0,0)