Sheffield Speedway Match Reports 2006

Chris Mills returned to the saddle and the Stars were back at full strength for the first leg of this final but the Tigers suffered a body blow when André Compton crashed riding in Sweden the night before and suffered a broken collarbone. His place in the Tigers line up was taken by Mildenhall’s Jason Lyons riding as a guest.

Sheffield enjoyed a real stroke of luck in the opening race when Kevin Doolan suffered an engine failure while in a commanding lead. Troy Batchelor ensured that the points were shared by winning from Ben Wilson who passed his partner Ricky Ashworth. The Stars went ahead in heat 2 as Chris Mills and John Oliver took a 5-1 from the reserves race and a four point lead, which was increased to six when Trevor Harding won heat 3 from Kyle Legault. Daniel Nermark, recovered from a hard first corner to pass Emiliano Sanchez for the third place point but could make no inroads on Legault so the race finished as a 4-2. Things looked bleak for the Tigers when Tomas Topinka and John Oliver gated for a 5-1 in heat 4 to the Stars with Jason Lyons relegated to third. Benji Compton fell at the back as he had done in heat 2 and the score after the first four heats was 17-7.

Bleak became desperate after heat 5 as Daniel Nermark and Trevor Harding added another 5-1 ahead of the top Sheffield pairing of Ashworth and Wilson so King’s Lynn had opened up a 14 point lead even at this early stage of the match. And it got worse for the visitors. The Trophy was looking a forlorn hope for them when Kevin Doolan and Troy Batchelor were next to relegate Jason Lyons to third place in heat 6 for yet another 5-1. The lead had now stretched to 18 points and the bookmakers had no doubt closed the book on the Trophy outcome. Sheffield stopped the rot in heat 7 though. Tomas Topinka was beaten from the gate by Kyle Legault but he chased him hard and eventually got past on the last lap to win the race. Behind him Chris Mills had passed Emiliano Sanchez on the first lap but he was re-passed a lap later. This resulted in a shared race with the Tigers finally getting into double figures. The respite didn't last long as King’s Lynn chalked up their fifth 5-1 in heat 8. This time it was Troy Batchelor and John Oliver who romped home for the maximum after Ben Wilson made a mess of the first bend. The score after eight races was 35-13.

Jason Lyons finally delivered for Sheffield by winning heat 9 from Daniel Nermark and Trevor Harding after making an excellent gate. Sheffield must have wished that they had given Lyons a tactical ride but the chance was lost. Normal service was resumed in heat 10 with yet another Doolan/Batchelor 5-1 although Sanchez was on the pace behind Batchelor. (Surely Kevin Doolan and Troy Batchelor form the most powerful pairing in the league!) In heat 11 Tomas Topinka and Ricky Ashworth came together on the first bend resulting in a fall for Topinka. The race was stopped with all four back for the rerun. In the rerun Ricky Ashworth came to life by passing Tomas Topinka to lead the race. Unfortunately for Sheffield he fell on the third lap and was excluded from the second rerun. At the third time of asking Chris Mills got to the front and Tomas Topinka sat in behind him for King’s Lynn’s seventh 5-1 of the match which opened the gap between the sides to 30 points. As anticipated Kyle Legault took a tactical ride in heat 12. Trevor Harding made a good start and was leading coming off the second bend when he suffered an engine failure. John Oliver behind him couldn’t avoid crashing into him causing the race to be stopped and rerun with Harding excluded. Chris Mills replaced Oliver in the rerun in which Sheffield cashed in when Kyle Legault won the race from Mills with Cooper third to give the Tigers a 2-7 heat advantage which took the score to 50-25.

Ricky Ashworth fell again in heat 13 while lying second. Tomas Topinka went on to win the race but Jason Lyons passed Kevin Doolan on the first lap for second place resulting in a 4-2 to the Stars. Sheffield then gave Emiliano Sanchez their second tactical ride in heat 14, a strange decision given that the only opponent Sanchez had beaten up to that point was Chris Mills. Sanchez gave it everything though but couldn’t pass Daniel Nermark and had to settle for second place ahead of John Oliver. This meant that the race was shared 4-4. In the final race there was no sign of Jason Lyons (blown engine) as Sheffield nominated Sanchez and Legault. However King’s Lynn scored their eighth 5-1 as Tomas Topinka and Troy Batchelor both completed their paid five ride maximums to give the Stars a 31 point lead for the second leg. No doubt the engraver can start work on the trophy now!

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