Edinburgh Monarchs v Somerset Rebels

REPORT Friday 3rd October 2008, 10:00pm

by Mike Hunter

  Edinburgh Monarchs

Somerset relied heavily on Jason Doyle again, but they had enough contribution from others to prevent Monarchs from completely killing them off in the first leg of the Premier Playoff semi-final.

At 43-17 after 10 heats it seemed to be going very much Monarchs? way, but the Rebels rallied and knocked five points off Monarchs? lead before the end.

Our guest Tomasz Piszcz rode across the first bend in heat 1 and took Doyle into the fence, but there was no serious damage done. Doyle sped to a win in the rerun with Derek Sneddon not far back, and Piszcz held on to the point.

Aaron Summers jetted away with heat 2 after an excellent gate, while Derek battled to try to pass Werner without success.

Two 5-1s followed pretty comfortably with neither Kramer nor Frampton looking on form. Werner was the early leader in the first running of heat 4 but he came a cropper at the end of lap two.

Doyle won against the formidable Fisher-Tully pair in heat 5, and there was a surprise in heat 6 as Kroger shot away from gate 4. Piszcz was the early challenger but he dropped back, and eventually Matthew Wethers took up the chase and finished within a length of the German.

We were back on the 5-1 trail then with a vengeance, taking four in a row. Rebels didn?t risk their usual tactic of using Doyle as a TS on a track on which passing was not easy.

Unfortunately things went wrong in an overly eventful heat 11. Frampton was ruled out on two minutes, replaced by Werner, and Doyle took a TR. As soon as the tapes went up the red lights came on, and an exclusion for Derek Sneddon was announced for ?a starting infringement?.

This was later announced to be spinning his tyre after previously being warned. It is difficult to imagine any other ref than Jim McGregor getting involved in a match in this way.

Next, the Rebels gated and Matthew Wethers crashed trying an outside move on Werner off the fourth bend of lap two.

Finally Rebels took the 8-1 with Aaron Summers unsuccessfully trying to catch Werner.

It was gradually becoming obvious that gate 1 was unproductive, and Fisher missed the start badly off that grid in heat 12. He got himself in a tangle trying to recover, leaving Derek Sneddon to split race winner Kramer from Kroger.

Suddenly the match was turning but heat 13 turned it back in the other direction! This time Doyle was badly away from gate 1 and never improved on fourth place as Matthew Wethers and Tomasz Piszcz took our seventh 5-1.

The gates were playing a big part now and Kroger and Werner were away from gates 2 and 4 in heat 14. It took more than a lap for Sneddon and Tully to make much impression, but both passed Kroger, and with an amazing effort Andrew actually caught and passed Werner. Definitely the ride of the night.

We won the toss in heat 15 and took gates 2 and 4, which should have ensured at least a shared race, but it didn?t. Doyle won it and Kramer did well to take third off gate one.

So the Rebels finished much better than had seemed likely at the two-thirds mark, and we will see how things go on Wednesday at the OTA.

HERMISTON MONARCH OF THE MATCH: Andrew Tully

Full Result Details