Wolves speedway rebound for point

Swindon 48 Wolves 45

Title-holders Wolves may yet surprise the speedway world and turn over odds-on favourites Poole in the play-off final.

Alternatively, they might crash out over two legs in the semi-final, particularly given their indifferent form at the home of likely opponents Peterborough.

But however this extraordinary season pans out, Wolves fans will look back on it with pride - and never more so than last night when a five-man team somehow plucked a league point from their bogey track after being 18 down with four races left.

After four heats the sides were all-square. Seconds later, Fredrik Lindgren and Ty Proctor were lying unconscious on the Blunsdon shale.

Lindgren had fluffed the start but rounded Grzegorz Zengota inside a lap and began to chase down Maciek Janowski, only to lose ground after locking up.

As he tried to regain the impetus he ventured a vital fraction too wide going into the third bend and suffered a wipe-out crash.

Zengota, on the inside line, got by safely but Proctor, in hot pursuit on the wide line, had nowhere to go and despite a lightning lay-down ploughed into the wreckage.

Both were stood down from the rest of the meeting and the Robins promptly capitalised. No fewer than four 5-1 maximums in seven races left them 18 points clear.

Job done? So it appeared. But the sight of Adam Skornicki in the double-point black and white helmet in heat 12 sent a chill through the hearts of home fans recalling his match-turning win at exactly that point in last year's play-off final.

Skornicki again delivered, and when Zengota reared on the exit of bend four Ludvig Lindgren was through for the 8-1.

Wolves were staring down the barrel of a 5-1 in the next race only for Leigh Adams to pack up on the last lap and gift them a shared heat.

When Janowski, lying second in heat 14 behind Woffinden, slid off and was disqualified, Wolves saw their chance.

Woffinden made the gate on home reserve Justin Sedgmen in the re-run and clamped him to the white line as the younger Lindgren sailed round to join his skipper at the front.

The sparkling Lindgren fended off the young Aussie with great aplomb - he faced one or other of the home reserves on seven occasions and lost only one of the tussles on his way to an extraordinary paid 16 tally - and Wolves needed a heat advantage in the final race to steal a point.

The gutsy Woffinden - perilously close to a dreadful smash himself when shoved by Zengota at full tilt in heat three - led the way but Nicolai Klindt was adrift at the back.

However, Swindon were now imploding. Adams opted not to tuck in for the points and drove hard under Woffinden, who fell.

Referee Chris Durno, after repeated viewing of the replays, put on Adams' blue exclusion light.

The Wolves pair inevitably coasted home in the re-run to snatch the most unlikely of points.

By Tim Hamblin