REACTION: WILL HAS THE POWER

The Poole 'Wessex Marine' Pirates emphatically responded to promoter Dan Ford's call for a an 'all-round' team performance as they sent, second-placed Glasgow Tigers back to Scotland with, the words of Pirates' number one , Richard Lawson, " their tails firmly between their legs", after a 57-33 mauling of the Big Cats.

For the second successive meeting at Wimborne Road Lawson, billed 'The Rocketman', went unbeaten by an opponent, this time around recording a superb full fifteen point maximum. 

But even Lawson couldn't overshadow the superb debut of sixteen year old William Cairns. Poole fans had been given one hundred and ninety six days notice that the FIM SGP3 bronze medallist would be joining the Pirates, only his age preventing him from not starting sooner. That wait was well worth the patience as the teenager had the packed grandstand rising as one to a standing applause as he won heat two. He also added a heat eight victory to his credentials after running a third place in heat four and finishing his night's work tucked in behind Lewis Kerr for much of heat twelve and just able to repel a late dash-for-the line challenge from Tigers' guest Danyon Hume, to finish with a paid nine pay cheque. 

If that wasn't enough to win over the Poole fans he then ran around the track, on the wider former greyhound circuit, high-fiving the enthusiastic Poole fans that had witnessed a superb debut performance.  After recovering from that gruelling effort, Cairns said "I didn't have the best of nights last night in Poland but tonight was much better. Ever since Press and Practice it was like, this is where I want to be. I love the track and just feel at home all the time. So yeah, I'm here. I made it and hopefully may it live on."

Lawson, who is now just four point shy of moving into the top twenty five all-time Poole points scorers and just thirty seven points short of surpassing legends Gary Havelock and Tony Rickardsson, in those standings, summed his night up by admitting "it wasn't straightforward. Usually I am good from the start but tonight I had to work for it but it was good. We started the meeting really strongly and it was good to see it from everyone and hats off to Will. There was quite a lot of pressure and eyeballs on him and he has excelled so fair play to him and to everyone in the team it was a good team effort and we've despatched Glasgow back to Scotland with their tails between their legs."  

Poole only suffered one heat loss all evening, that in heat eleven, when Chris 'Bomber' Harris and Danyon Hume secured a 4-2 over Anders Rowe and Paul Starke but by this time the destiny of the league points was all beyond question. Undoubtedly the race of the night was the heat thirteen battle between Lawson and Harris as they traded places across the first two laps, before Lawson stamped his awesome authority on the race.

Scorers
POOLE 57 - Richard Lawson 15 (3,3,3,3,3) ,Lewis Kerr 11 (3,2,3,2,1) ,Will Cairns 8+1 (3,1,3,1') ,Anders Rowe 8 (3,3,2,0) ,Zach Cook 6+3 (2',1',2',1) ,Paul Starke 5+1 (2',0,0,3) ,Tobias Thomsen 4 (1,1,1,1)
GLASGOW 33  - Chris Harris 11 (2,3,1,3,2,R) ,Kyle Howarth 7+1 (2,2,0,1',2) ,Dan Thompson 7 (0,2,2,3) ,Joe Thompson (Guest) 4+1 (1,1',0,2) ,Danyon Hume (Guest) 3 (0,0,2,1) ,Freddy Hodder 1 (1,FD,0,TS,0) ,Max Perry 0 (0,0,RS,0)

For heat details and report 

Photo credit Liam Cockwell