PREVIEW: LEICESTER v SHEFFIELD (ROWE MOTOR OIL PREM)

LEICESTER take on Sheffield in a clash of two ROWE Motor Oil Premiership play-off rivals in tonight’s (Monday) live televised fixture.

The clubs are separated by four points in fourth and third places respectively, but it is the Lions who have had the better of previous meetings this season.

They inflicted the Tigers’ heaviest league defeat of 2025 with a 56-34 win at the Hydroscand Arena, Beaumont Park last month, and also won home and away against the South Yorkshire side in the KO Cup semi-finals.

The Lions once again operate rider replacement at No.2 for Luke Becker whilst the Tigers are at full strength at the start of a busy week, as they also meet at Owlerton on Thursday, this time in a Round 1 fixture.

Leicester boss Stewart Dickson said: “We’ve got the Cup Final to come next week but there’s a lot of racing to come before that, and we want more league points to cement our place in the top four, as well as looking to go higher if we can.

“It’s been good to see us rattling up 53s and 54s at home on a regular basis, which is the consistency we had last summer, but we’re under no illusions because Monday is still a difficult fixture.

“I expect Sheffield to be much stronger here than on their previous visits this season, and we need to be ready for that because they will be fired up after those results.”

Tigers skipper Josh Pickering said: “They were the way better team each time we’ve faced them so far. It was below par from us in each of those meetings but we’re only looking forward now and we’re focusing on the following matches coming up.

“We’re in a very good situation again right now, we’ve got Steady (Simon Stead – team manager) in our corner, we’re all leading from the front, we’ve got our full 1-7 back so let’s just keep things rolling.”

LEICESTER: Max Fricke, Luke Becker r/r, Ryan Douglas, Kyle Howarth, Sam Masters, Drew Kemp, Joe Thompson.
SHEFFIELD: Jack Holder, Anders Rowe, Josh Pickering, Lewis Kerr, Chris Holder, Justin Sedgmen, Leon Flint.

SCB Referee: Mick Bates