PETERBOROUGH PANTHERS 41 READING BULLDOGS 52 Sky Sports Elite League – Thursday 30th March 2006
Panthers might well have been the league title favourites, but new skids on the block Reading showed how much they thought of that with a comprehensive and fully deserved victory at Alwalton.
A drawn heat 1 was followed by a Reading 4-2 in heat 2 as Polish Champion Janusz Kolodziej showed a liking for the pacy showground circuit by storming home in his very first ride. Another drawn heat followed in heat 3 as Panthers close-season target Matej Zagar showed why, with an easy win over Niels-K Iversen & Jesper B Jensen.
Ryan Sullivan’s win in heat 4 ensured another shared heat, but Greg Hancock & Andy Smith got a surprising 4-2 over Iversen & Jensen in heat 5 to put Reading 4 points in front. Hans Andersen & Tomasz Bajerski jetted away from the tapes in heat 6 to lift the home fans, but Charlie Gjedde & Sam Zimota both went by Bajerski on the back straight.
The alarm bells started ringing when Zagar & Travis McGowan surprisingly outpaced Sullivan in heat 7, and just when you thought things couldn’t get any worse, they did as Smith & Kolodziej repeated the score in heat 8.
At this stage Panthers were 12 points adrift of the Bulldogs and looking distinctly second favourites for the match. They needed a minor miracle and got it in heat 9 when Iversen (riding a tactical ride) got an 8-1 with Jensen. Despite a good first lap Andersen had to admit defeat to an impressive Zagar in heat 10 and with McGowan in third place, Readings lead was back up to 7 points.
Sullivan made a great start in heat 11 and with Richard Hall holding second place over Greg Hancock things were starting to look up, but Hancock’s experience stood him well and he eventually overhauled Hall, but the gap was now down to 5. Heat 12 saw McGowan & Kolodziej make great starts, but Jensen who had settled down after a slow start to the match eventually got past both of them to win in fine style.
5 points down with three heats to go and Panthers needed some luck, heat 13 always looked promising but it was Hancock & Gjedde that made the start and stormed away. Gjedde unfortunately picked up too much grip coming out of the second bend and after clouting the fence came down spectacularly on the back straight, thankfully he walked away but his exclusion gave the Panthers another chance. Hancock however made another jet propelled start and was never troubled.
Reading then wrapped up the match points through Zagar & Kolodziej who got a maximum over Iversen in heat 14 Heat 15 showed it wasn’t Panthers night as Andersen’s fuel pipe split as he was coming out and he was unable to beat the 2 minutes. Iversen got the better of Zagar in a hard first corner to deny him a maximum, but it was of little consolation as a Hancock win gave them a 52-41 win on the night, there second away win this year.
Reading were undoubtedly the best team on the night and with 9 race winners to Panthers 5 and with only 4 last places to Panthers 11, it’s not hard to see where we went wrong. The track was very slick which didn’t give the home side any advantage, and the steady rain didn’t help either, but with Reading tracking three relatively new riders with very little Alwalton experience plus two riders McGowan & Gjedde who are not exactly fans of our circuit, the Panthers missed a good opportunity to make strides up the league table.
Panthers now start a string of away matches to come in the next week and have the perfect opportunity to bounce back and restore some pride and belief.
PETERBOROUGH 41 1 Hans Andersen 3 3 2 2 M = 10 2 Tomasz Bajerski 0 R 1 0 = 1 3 Jesper Jensen 1' 0 2' 3 = 6+2 4 Niels K Iversen 2 2 6 1 2 = 13 5 Ryan Sullivan 3 1 3 1' = 8+1 6 Richard Hall 2 0 1 0 0 0 = 3 7 Ulrich Ostergaard 0 0 0 = 0
READING 52 1 Greg Hancock 1' 3 2 3 3 = 12+1 2 Andy Smith 2 1 3 0 = 6 3 Travis McGowan 0 2' 1 2 = 5+1 4 Matej Zagar 3 3 3 3 1 = 13 5 Charlie Gjedde 1' 1' 1 FX = 3+2 6 Sam Simota 1 2 0 = 3 7 Janusz Kolodziej 3 2 2' 1' 2' = 10+3
