Bears mauled after being hit by call-offs

NEWCASTLE BTS Diamonds completed a much easier than expected SGB Championship league victory over arch rivals Redcar Bears at Byker last night, 64-26, after unfortunate late calloffs left the Teesside outfit short of three regular racers.

German star Tobias Busch was ill, while the Andersen brothers were stuck in Denmark owing to flight delays and, with only local junior riders to help out, the visitors were always going to be up against it.

And so it proved as the Diamonds came close to equalling their biggest-ever win.

The fact that they didn’t achieve it was virtually down to the efforts of Redcar skipper Ben Barker who scored exactly half the Bears’ total himself in a superb performance, while Newcastle asset Matej Kus, on loan to the Teesside outfit this year, was the only other visitor to win a race.

Barker also had the satisfaction of beating every Newcastle racer at some stage of an always interesting meeting, despite the crushing scoreline, thus ensuring no Diamond scored maximum points.

For the final race, team manager George English selected skipper Ludvig Lindgren and Matthew Wethers, who both had paid maximums to their name, but the Bears sent out Barker and Kus.

Sure enough, Barker made a fast start to grab an early lead and kept the two Diamonds at bay for the full distance.

Wethers fell rounding the last bend and, unable to get his bike going again, pushed it to the finishing line to earn a third-place point to great cheers from the crowd.

The Diamonds rattled up no fewer than nine 5-1 race wins and a 4-2, with the other five shared as the beleaguered Bears, Barker apart, could not halt the Newcastle steamroller.

Redcar promoter Kevin Keay took the microphone to apologise to the crowd for the weakness of his team through circumstances beyond his control, while Newcastle co-boss Martin Phillips said some progress had been made with a foreign racer possibly joining the Diamonds ranks.