PREVIEW: PIRATES HEAD BACK TO COWLEY DETERMINED TO DO BETTER

Making their second visit of the season to the Oxford Stadium on Wednesday night, the Poole 'Wessex Marine' Pirates will be keen to put on a more rounded display than in their BSN Series group visit last month.
 

With a spot in the MAXiCab Knockout Cup semi-finals the prize for the aggregate winners, putting themselves in the strongest possible in this first leg will be uppermost in the minds of the Pirates who were beaten by twelve points in that BSN visit. 

Dan Ford explains

'We never really got going as a side when we went there in April. I think conditions caught us out a bit especially early on. We outscored them over the course of the final five heats, I recall. It was the first five heats where we lost far too much ground and we can ill-afford that to happen again, especially of course as there are no opportunities for tactical substitute recovery in this competition. After that April trip the lads were all quite despondent and the one thing I can say about this team is they are nothing if not resilient. As a man they will each be determined to go better this time around and if say four of them improved by just two points each that equates to a sixteen point swing and we are then talking about victory!"

Teams 
Oxford (TM Peter Schroeck) 1 Sam Masters 2 Luke Killeen 3 Anders Rowe 4 Mitch McDiarmid 5 Nick Morris (Guest) 6 Darryl Ritchings 7 Dayle Wood
Poole (TM Neil Middleditch) 1 Richard Lawson 2 Rider Replacement for Fraser Bowes* 3 Lewis Kerr 4 Kyle Newman 5 Zach Cook (Capt) 6 William Cairns 7 Cooper Rushen
 

* Poole have been forced into utilising the Rider Replacement facility for Fraser Bowes after he suffered an eye injury whilst preparing his bikes in his workshop.