Express & Star

Dudley Heathens suffer semi defeat

Timing, as luckless Poole found out on Monday, is everything in speedway.

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Dudley 40 Buxton 50

Timing, as luckless Poole found out on Monday, is everything in speedway.

The runaway Elite League leaders lost at home by 10 points in the play-off final second leg against a Coventry side which peaked at exactly the right time to take the crown.

Two divisions down and at the semi-final stage, Dudley suffered a similar fate in last night's first leg.

The Heathens are all but mathematically certain of topping the National League but ran into an in-form Buxton side happy to demonstrate that their cup victory at Monmore three weeks ago was no fluke.

Dudley started well en-ough but never looked like pulling back the deficit once the Hitmen took control.

Central to the visitors' success was their precocious but highly erratic reserve Jason Garrity.

The 15-year-old is a prodigious talent but at times - many times - represents a menace to friend and foe alike.

His heat eight dive up the inside from last position going into the third turn was executed at ridiculous speed.

Dudley's Ashley Morris came down, Buxton teammate Robert Branford - whose Garrity radar is highly tuned after the same rider nearly wiped him out for a third place at Monmore Green in the cup - successfully took avoiding action and Garrity then collected the full set by cannoning into Micky Dyer.

Yet Garrity, booed throughout, was not the only target of the crowd's ire.

Visiting number one Craig Cook fell in the first and was reckoned to be somewhat tardy in clearing the track, with partner Lewis Dallaway marooned at the back of the race.

Cook may have collected abuse from some of the home supporters but he also collected a brace of wins.

Indeed, Lewis Dallaway was the only visiting rider not to be first to the flag while Dudley could muster only four race wins, three from captain Lee Smart and one by Micky Dyer.

They were the only home riders able to take much satisfaction from a defeat which means that Dudley must win twice at Buxton, in both cup and league play-off, to prolong their season.

Now that would be good timing.

By Tim Hamblin

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