'Bad luck' robbed Pirates of first away win says Wilson (From Thisisdorset)

'Bad luck' robbed Pirates of first away win says Wilson

7:00am Saturday 25th July 2009

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BEN Wilson insisted Pirates “were robbed” by bad luck after they threw away a seven-point lead with four races to go and cruelly lost 46-43 at Coventry last night.

There was only one team in the Elite League clash up until the end of heat 11 as Poole Castle Cover charged into a 36-29 lead.

Even when Oliver Allen and Ricky Wells bagged a 5-1 over Daniel Davidsson after Wilson had retired in race 12, the Dorset club still looked set to seal their first away triumph of the year.

But Chris Holder was excluded after he fell on the fourth bend when he and Hans Andersen were on a 5-1 in heat 13, and Bjarne Pedersen was handicapped 15 metres for touching the tapes in the penultimate race.

Their late collapse meant, rather than being seven points ahead with two heats to go, Pirates went into the last race trailing for the first time, 42-41.

Then Andersen – unbeaten up until then – was passed by hard-charging Kennett on the second bend as Bees’ bagged a final heat 4-2 to secure their unlikely three-point success.

There would probably have been few dissenters among Coventry’s fans in a bumper 3,000 crowd who would have argued if Poole had won, as the home side had looked second best for most of the meeting.

And Wilson, who impressed with a Pirates-best score of eight points, said: “We got robbed. We should have won this one, but we had a bit of bad luck in a couple of races at the end.

“Chris fell off and Bjarne touched the tapes, and in my last ride I came off.”

Wilson added: “Chris and Hans would probably have all-but won the meeting for us if Chris had been able to stay on, but that’s speedway.

“With the wet conditions of the track, it was tricky and you make mistakes.

“I just couldn’t believe we threw it away.”

Wilson, who won heat two and also bagged two seconds, continued: “Tonight I made the gates when it counted.

“I was getting stuck in and racing, so personally I was happy with eight points.

“It’s just a pity I ran into the third bend a little too fast in heat 12.

“I clipped the side of Ricky’s bike and it knocked my fuel tank, then my fuel line came off and I just fell off on the first bend because the fuel wasn’t getting through.”

Pirates captain Pedersen, who scored six, added: “Fair play to Coventry, it was a difficult track but the conditions are the same for both sides.

“We ran into some bad luck at the end, but that happens.

“I don’t know what happened to Chris because I didn’t see it, but it was not easy out there.

“Then I just touched the tapes after Ben (Barker) had moved slightly.”

Asked if he thought Wilson might have been able to replace him from the gate in the re-start, Pedersen replied: “I went back into the pits but Middlo (Poole team manager Neil Middleditch) just said ‘go off 15 metres’ straight away.

“In the re-start, I ran up close behind Ben and Steve (Boxall) but I couldn’t push (Boxall out of the way) because it was too dangerous, and he almost passed Ben anyway.”

Pedersen added: “We should have won tonight, but the main thing is everyone in our team is fit for Belle Vue in the cup on Monday because it was a tricky track and we could have lost someone to injury.

“We need to put this defeat behind us and put all our focus on that one.

“Everyone knows we’re not going to get in the play-offs, so we’ve got to do everything we can to try and knock the Aces out of the cup.

“We may have lost tonight, but the team is looking good at the moment. We didn’t get the result, but we are still looking strong.”

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