PREVIEW: LEICESTER v OXFORD (NDL)

LEICESTER and Oxford meet in a clash of two of the National Development League play-off contenders at the Paul Chapman & Sons Arena tonight (Saturday).

The Lion Cubs are in second place, four points ahead of the Chargers, who have one meeting in hand.

The Cubs are at full strength with Connor Coles returning for the Cubs after Championship duty, whilst Henry Atkins makes his Oxford debut, Jake Mulford guests for Nathan Stoneman who is racing for Berwick and Jody Scott steps in for Luke Killeen who dislocated and ankle at Redcar last night.

Leicester boss Dave Howard said: “On paper now, Oxford probably look the strongest team in the league, but we need to keep our unbeaten home record going.

“We had a key away win at a top-six team, because there’s now six teams going for the play-offs, so our win at Mildenhall was such a big one.

“Now on Saturday it’s just so key that we win at home, and we win by more than six points to stop the away team from getting a league point.”

Chargers co-manager Peter Schroeck said: “It’s going to be a really good match between two evenly matched teams.

“Quite a few of our boys have practised up at Leicester. We don’t put pressure on the riders in our Chargers team, so we’ll going to go up there to enjoy ourselves and we’ll see if we come away with a victory.”

LEICESTER: Dan Thompson, Mickie Simpson, Connor Coles, Tom Spencer, Joe Thompson, Vinnie Foord, Max Perry.
OXFORD: Jordan Jenkins, Jacob Clouting, Sam Hagon, Henry Atkins, Jake Mulford, Arran Butcher, Jody Scott.