Josh and Ricky briefly head Auty. It didn't last. Image Credit: Ian Rispin

Well Beaten At Scunny

REPORT Sunday 4th August 2019, 7:53pm

by Graham Muncie

  Edinburgh Monarchs

The Scunthorpe Scorpions were quick to avenge their 16 point defeat at Armadale on Friday night with a 56-34 victory over the Staggs Bar Monarchs on Sunday afternoon.

The meeting had a mixture of everything with a delay to the start due to the paramedic getting the start time mixed up that allowed a thunderstorm to roll in leading to difficult conditions and a lack of track work meaning by the end clouds of dust rising.

Heats 3 and 4 were raced in torrential rain causing difficulty for the riders to see with the meeting referee refusing to pause for the thunderstorm to pass over. A track inspection was called for following heat 4 purely to create time for the rain to stop and to allow the fallen water to soak into the surface. A sensible course of action which allowed racing to improve upon resumption.

None of that is an excuse though in what was a pretty toothless display by the Staggs Bar Monarchs with none of the riders particularly happy with their display.

One rider who was competitive throughout was Willie Lawson with the Auchterarder man saying after ''I thought at the start of the meeting we would run them close but then that rain came and messed us up a bit, it took us a bit to get going. It's disappointing but it's just the way it goes.''

The Monarchs got off to the best possible start as guest Rasmus Jensen and James Sarjeant raced to an opening heat 5-1 but that was to be as good as it got.

The home men had the deficit pulled back by the end of heat 3 and with further heat advantages for the Scorpions in heats 4,5 and 6 also the Monarchs were 10 points down and fighting a losing battle.

Any hopes of gaining anything from the match were extinguished in heat 9 when tactical substitute Rasmus Jensen could not trouble the Scunthorpe pair with Cameron Heeps adrift also and from then in it was damage limitation.

Their was a couple of bright spots with Josh Pickering battling to 2 wins, the young Aussies night finished on the deck in heat 15 though with Pickering complaining of being sore after but hoping no further damage done.

Elsewhere Lawson and Sarjeant were competitive and guest Jensen battled manfully.

All in all though the Scorpions were deserved winners with Josh Auty in imperious form well backed up by Simon Lambert and Ben Barker in particular. The Monarchs must now look to improve with important matches to come.