PREVIEW: PIRATES LOOKING TO FINISH THE JOB ON SCORPIONS

With Poole on the brink of not having to send the BSN Series trophy back to the BSPL Rugby Offices, promoter Dan Ford is urging fans, new and old, to offer up their support of the Poole 'Wessex Marine' Pirates on Wednesday (2nd October) night when they look to finish the job of retaining the title.

Ford says "We know that nothing is actually won yet but the boys were formidable at Scunthorpe on Sunday and have put us in a very strong position of being the only club to win this competition. I can assure fans that the boys are determined to finish the job on Wednesday and will be going out to put on a similar showing as they did on Suday. To a man they have all been excellent and to hold a sixteen point is fantastic but I can tell you, that might have been even greater as the team fought hard in what was a great first leg. We are rapidly running out of meetings for this incredible season and so I would urge fans to come along and get as much of their speedway fix before the winter closes in on us."

The Pirates are hoping to have Ben Cook back from his concussion mandatory stand-down to lead the club to what they hope will be the first of three trophies this season. Besides this BSN competition the Pirates still have the KO Cup final to contest together with the big one, the SGB Cab Direct Championship Grand Final, both of which are against local rivals Oxford.

The Scorpions will be without their influential reserve Luke Harrison on Wednesday as he is involved in the FIM European U19 competition being staged in Germany on Thursday and they have booked Paul Starke to guest, whilst former British U19 and U22 Champion Leon Flint will guest in place of Scorpions' number one Michael Palm-Toft who is ruled out through injury.

Teams
Poole (TM Neil Middleditch) 1 Richard Lawson 2 Sam Hagon 3 Ben Cook - capt (subject to fitness) 4 Zach Cook 5 Tom Brennan 6 Tobias Thomsen 7 Vinnie Foord
Scunthorpe (TM David Howe) 1 Leon Flint (Guest) 2 Connor Mountain 3 Simon Lambert (Capt) 4 Kyle Howarth 5 Jake Allen 6 Nathan Ablitt 7 Paul Starke (Guest)
 

Photo credit: Tony Hartmann