Depleted Wolves lose out

(Coventry win the bonus point 103-83)

Depleted Wolves were no match for title-chasing Coventry in last night's Elite League speedway clash, but it wasn't difficult to sympathise with the Monmore Green outfit, writes Rob Taylor.

It would have been a tall order to beat the Bees with a full-strength line-up but the absence of injured duo Freddie Lindgren and Billy Hamill was too severe a handicap.

Guest rider Adam Shields did an admirable job as Hamill's replacement, recovering from a duck in his opening ride to record five second places.

But the efforts of the Arena Essex rider, plus the use of the rider replacement facility for Lindgren, were never going to be enough to seriously trouble the powerful Bees.

Yet the early indications were that Wolves might just upset their Midland rivals.

Skipper Peter Karlsson's stylish first bend manoeuvre saw him slip inside the Coventry pair of Scott Nicholl and Billy Janniro, while David Howe was involved in a tremendous battle with Janniro before claiming third place.

Honours were even in heat two but Coventry then took control with two consecutive 5-1s and a 4-2 to lead by eight points.

When Howe passed Rory Schlein to follow home his captain in the following race, home hopes were raised again, only for Coventry to take major points from the next three heats.

Once again, Wolves refused to buckle, Karlsson's tactical ride in the 10th race earning double points as he got the better of British Grand Prix champion Chris Harris.

With Howe finishing third, a 7-2 success reduced the deficit to five, but Wolves must have realised in the following heat that it just wasn't their night.

Although William Lawson was quite rightly excluded for nudging Steve Johnston into the pits bend fence on the pits bend of the final lap, but the race wasn't stopped until Shields was crossing the line for what should have been his only win.

Rather than taking the usual course of awarding the result, the referee ordered a re-run - and Shields was beaten by Nicholls this time around.

To add to the Monmore men's woes, reserve James Grieves was forced out of the meeting with bruising when he ended up in the fence following a collision with Harris, who was excluded for unfair riding.

Karlsson's win in the re-run, with Lawson stepping in for Grieves and taking third place, narrowed the gap to five points once again.

But it was a brief respite. The Swede's maximum was wrecked when he was boxed in on the first bend of heat 13 - and Wolves' slim hopes were finally extinguished when Lawson and the out-of-sorts Magnus Karlsson suffered a 5-1 reversal to Johnston and Martin Smolinksi in the penultimate race.