Edwards shines but Tigers maul Bears
GLASGOW TIGERS 57 REDCAR BEARS 33
JADE Mudgway hailed fast-rising teenager Jason Edwards while admitting Redcar have a lot of work to do after going down heavily at play-off -chasing rivals Glasgow.
The Agilia Bears made what is becoming a customary awful start to the meeting, slipping 18-6 behind following heat-advantages to their Scottish hosts in each of the first four races.
However, a trio of home 5-1s between heats eight and 10 opened the gap to an insurmountable 26 points and left the Teessiders scrapping for respectability over the remaining third of the meeting.
Edwards, elevated from reserve to the main body of the team for the first time in his career at this level, scored well in each of his four rides, leaving team manager Mudgway to reflect:
He said: “Glasgow are strong all the way through at the moment and many of their riders are in good form
“Jason was great and moving up to number two where races are generally reckoned to be more difficult didn’t seem to phase him at all.
“He’s a terrific lad - he just turns up and does his job and usually well - and nearly beat Craig Cook in heat one!
“He has bad night like anyone else but he can make some starts which is something which has been a problem as a team all season.
“It’s something we have tried to work on but there’s no magic pill to cure it and it’s a fact that 60-70% of winning races in speedway are done at the starts.”
Edwards led the former British Champion for almost the entire four laps in the first race before Cook nipped inside on the final corner on the way to an otherwise largely untroubled 15-point maximum
The unbeaten-at-home Tigers’ number one had strong support from every corner of the Glasgow side of the pits with ex-Redcar favourite Ulrich Ostergaard, British under-21 champion Tom Brennan and Connor Bailey adding nine points each.
Only skipper Charles Wright, in heats 11 and 12, and Kasper Andersen, in heat 14, managed to take the chequered flag for the visiting Bears.
Mudgway added: “League leaders Leicester have won most of their matches, home and away - and they went to Glasgow last week and were also pummelled.
“I think we just have to accept that, on the night, they were the better team but it’s not time to pack our bags and go home yet.
“I believe if we win the rest of our home matches we’ll be in the playoffs but realistically in order to win the play-offs we need to be a better team however that comes about. I can’t say in what way that will be but as a team manager I am always looking out for ways to get better.
“Yet, so far any options that have come up for us wouldn’t or haven’t made us any stronger.”
GLASGOW TIGERS 57 (Craig Cook 15, Ulrich Ostergaard 9+1, Tom Brennan 9+1, Connor Bailey 9, Danyon Hume 6+1, Benjamin Basso 5+1, Broc Nicol 4+1).
AGILIA BEARS 33 (Charles Wright 10+1, Erik Riss 6+1, Jason Edwards 6, Lewis Kerr 5, Kasper Andersen 4+1, Adam Roynon 1, Jordan Jenkins 1).