Scottish Cup Hopes Still Alive
Edinburgh v Glasgow, Posted 18/09/04

Scottish Cup hopes are still alive after an improvement from their last visit to Armadale saw the Tigers hold the deficit to 11 points.

The first race saw Schott shoot out of the gate and try as he may George just could not catch him. It was Cockle who gated well in heat 2 but Woodward passed him at the end of the first lap. Things were to get worse for James when team mate McAllan seemed to have a rush of blood to the head and caused Cockle to fall on the first bend of lap 3, thus gifting the Monarchs another 4-2.

The next two heats saw the advantage go in the Tigers favour. Bentley scored his only point of the night in heat 3 after Carr had an ef in heat 3 with Shane Parker showing Rory Schlein the way from the tapes in heat four-not many riders can say they have done that this year.

The nearest we got to controversy in this meeting was in heat 5 when after a tight race Juul and Wethers raced for the line coming off the final bend. Most felt Juul just got it but the referee didn't and the heat was shared, as was heat 6.

Schlein destroyed the rest of the field in heat 7 with Bentley well off the pace at the rear. A reserve switch in heat 8 also ensured a heat advantage for Edinburgh although it could have been worse if Dickie Juul had not managed to pass Woodward at the end of the second lap.

As expected heat 9 was shared with the confident looking Parker taking victory. The action was all at the back between Cockle and Wethers. James rode a very good race but Wethers managed to pressure him into the mistake and James ended up in the fence on the final turn whilst trying too hard to get back past the Aussie.

It was no surprise that Edinburgh took an easy heat advantage in heat 10 with points being shared in heat 11. Monarchs were to get a very easy 5-1 in heat 12 and suddenly the Tigers were 10 points down and looked to be toiling.

Rather bravely Tigers brought Shane Parker out as a TR in heat 13 but he was kept at the back by a superb ride from Schott who concentrated on Shane with no interest in going after Stancl. This was followed by a pretty good attempt by the management to retrieve something in heat 14. Brady had ridden fairly steadily all night but McAllan had been poor. Therefore rather than risk all on a TR with Brady, Stancl was brought out as a GDTS in place of McAllan. It was an imaginative gamble but one that sadly did not work as hoped. Stancl was held up by team mate Brady for a lap and the Edinburgh pair then gave a superb display of team riding to thwart every attempt by Stancl to get through.

With the deficit at 15 points things were looking a little bleak for the Tigers but the top Glasgow men on the night were fired up for heat 15 and rode a good race to claim Glasgow's only 5-1 of the meeting and give the Tigers more of a chance of claiming the Cup.

It was certainly a better display by Glasgow than the last visit to Armadale but then that wouldn't be hard. In reality only Parker and Stancl scored as they should. Cockle was worth more than his solitary point but Bentley and McAllan were woeful.

There was an 'end of season' feel to the whole meeting. Lets hope that George and Shane can pass their attitude on to their team mates for the return leg.

One final snippet - it was interesting to hear the Monarchs draw out their sweep for the PLRC on Sunday. One lucky lady drew Schlein, but Schott was not even in the draw. Pity the organisers don't know it yet!

The scorecard and heat details can be found here.

Tiger Points:

George Stancl	*****	Another excellent performance
Richard Juul	**	As expected really
Paul Bentley	*	awful
Shane Parker	****	A good performance
James Cockle	**	Worth more than his points total
David McAllan	*	Worth less than his points total