Great Win At Berwick

The Parsons Peebles Monarchs recorded a hard fought and exciting 48-42 victory over the Berwick Bandits at Shielfield tonight to complete a successful first weekend of their SGB Championship season.

A nip and tuck affair in the early stages firmly swung in the Monarchs favour after the heat ten interval as the Parsons Peebles Monarchs powered home for victory.

Monarch's director Mike Hunter was delighted by the result stating 'Excellent result, if you had offered me 6 points from our first two matches I would have taken it. I felt our top end was the foundation. Sam Masters and Ricky Wells were excellent and while Erik Riss was maybe lacking a little speed he still put in a good score.' Hunter was also full of praise for newcomer Josh Pickering ' What a bonus that was to get that from Josh, he was so impressive at Armadale last night but even more so tonight and we have definitely got a gem. Mark Riss also did his job and while he was a little unlucky he can be happy with his nights work. All in all a good team performance.'

The early stages had a mixture of bad luck for both outfits. Inexplicably the Monarchs suffered a two minute exclusion in both of the first two heats firstly for Josh in heat 1 then Mitchell in heat 2. The Monarchs managed to nullify the damage of this though and led after those two heats.

The only time on the night that the Monarchs were behind was after heat 3 when the dangerous looking pairing of Dmitri Berge and Claus Vissing sped from the tapes to take a 5-1. The Monarchs fought back to level in the next heat and didn't look back.

Heat 7 looked like it might be a turning point for the home men as Kevin Doolan rode an excellent race to cut under Erik Riss coming out of the second bend on the last lap to take an impressive win with Luke Riddick beating Max Clegg at the back it was all level and the next few heats perhaps looked stronger for the Bandits.

However that did not reckon for our new star Josh Pickering having missed his first ride Josh had looked good picking up a third in his second race but better things were to come. The young Aussie blasting from the tapes and riding a flawless 4 laps to take victory.

Race of the night was to come in heat 10 when the Riss brothers made a jet propelled start and looked for all the world like they were going to secure a 5-1. The excellent Lewis Bridger had other ideas though as he stalked them for a couple of laps before expertly cutting under Mark exiting bend 4 of lap two, even better was to come one lap later as he swooped round Erik on the same bend to take.

This meant we were all square going into the interval but this only seemed to galvanise the Monarchs as we blasted to a 10 point lead over the next 3 heats. Josh took another outstanding win in heat 11 before the Riss boys and our top two did the job in the next two. This meant mathematically all we needed was finishers and the tremendous victory was secured in heat 14.

So the early season signs continue to be encouraging and what a pleasure it was to see a big crowd enjoying an excellent match after the uncertainty Berwick faced during the winter.