POSTPONED: EDINBURGH v POOLE + BIRMINGHAM (Cab Direct Champ)

FRIDAY’S double header at Armadale was postponed due to heavy rain shortly before start time.

EDINBURGH stage a massive double header at Armadale tonight (Friday) featuring Cab Direct Championship leaders Poole and play-off rivals Birmingham.

The Monarchs remain in the top six with their closest challengers all slipping up in recent days, and a win over the Brummies would make them strong favourites to progress.

That is the second fixture, whilst the first will see Poole looking to consolidate their position at the top, having been set for an away win when the meeting was originally abandoned earlier this month.

The Monarchs have confirmed that Dayle Wood is out with a speedway injury, with Luke Killeen booked to guest at reserve.

Edinburgh boss Alex Harkess said: “Birmingham is the one we’ve got to win, it is as simple as that, though we will certainly set out to win both.

“I believe if we beat Birmingham and Plymouth here at Armadale that should get us into the play-offs.”

Poole’s Northern manager Gary Havelock said: “Obviously it was a huge shame for our visit to Edinburgh to end how it did as we were so well in control.

“We were set for another 5-1 in Heat 6 and were already leading 21-9 at the time and it would have been difficult for us to have lost it from there. But we go again and just have to get out there and show what we are capable of.”

Birmingham will be without Stefan Nielsen who has been ruled out with a wrist injury, and they will operate rider replacement.

Brummies CEO Nigel Tolley said: “This is a huge fixture and we simply have to put Wednesday night behind us.

“Lately on the road, we’ve battled at Scunthorpe, we’ve won at Berwick and we’ve pushed a very good Redcar side.

“Edinburgh are the team currently level with us on points going for that final play-off spot and while they have that 18 point lead on aggregate, we need to focus on giving it everything we’ve got to try and get the two match points.”

EDINBURGH: Craig Cook, Max Clegg, Kye Thomson, Paco Castagna, Josh Pickering, Luke Killeen, Bastian Borke.
POOLE: Richard Lawson, Kyle Newman, Ben Cook, Zach Cook, Steve Worrall, Anders Rowe, Joe Thompson.
BIRMINGHAM: Richard Lawson, Stefan Nielsen r/r, Troy Batchelor, Alfie Bowtell, Justin Sedgmen, Sam Hagon, Paul Starke.

*LIVE STREAMING: https://www.edinburghmonarchs.co.uk/emtv