STARS SINK LOCAL RIVALS

KING’S Lynn overturned ROWE Motor Oil Premiership leaders Ipswich for a memorable 51-39 local derby victory at the Adrian Flux Arena on Monday.

Reserve Jan Kvech piled up 18 (paid 20) from seven rides to inspire a Stars comeback from four points down at the halfway stage of the meeting as they produced a stunning performance in the second half of the meeting.

Remarkably it was Lynn’s first home league win over the Witches in nearly six years, and they finished in style with Chris Harris involved in 5-1s in the last two races.

Harris added 12+1 from five rides whilst Ipswich were further hampered by the withdrawal of Jason Doyle who scored five from two but aggravated his recent injuries and was unable to continue.

Emil Sayfutdinov scored 9+1 as the Witches did enough to take the aggregate point after a 53-37 win in the reverse fixture, keeping them top of the table.

Stars boss Rob Lyon said: “It was really important that we tried to get this one over the line tonight, and the boys were great.

“Obviously Ipswich had their problems with Jason having to pull out of the meeting, but I think we rode well as a team and just had enough in the tank anyway.

“The problem with r/r for the rider who is fifth in the averages is there isn’t a lot of wriggle room for problems, but if your No.6 is firing like Jan was tonight, it works perfectly and it can actually be stronger in some respects.”

Ipswich manager Ritchie Hawkins said: “After being up halfway through to go down to a defeat is really disappointing. I thought the boys gave it everything, but we haven’t quite got the consistency from some of them and are not firing as a whole at the moment.  

“We lost Jason, he aggravated his injury in the grippy conditions and couldn’t carry on. He was in a lot of discomfort, and it was definitely for the best to withdraw from the meeting. I don’t think that was the reason we ended up losing the meeting, we can’t use that at all.

“We will get through this period stronger and should improve. We have got time on our side to get that right for when we really need to be firing and can’t have any mishaps, which is later on in the season.”

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Photo credit: DEREK LEADER