Lakeside 47 Poole 46LAKESIDE made their early advantage count as Poole came within a whisker of snatching all the league points of offer in Friday night's clash.

Lakeside 47 Poole 46

LAKESIDE made their early advantage count as Poole came within a whisker of snatching all the league points of offer in Friday night's clash.

The Pirates were led by recent acquisition Hans Andersen, who netted a magnificent paid 20 points and teamed up with Bjarne Pedersen for maximum advantages in heat 13 and 15. It was a good job, then, that the Hammers' pairing of Jonas Davidsson and Phil Morris slotted into the minor placings in heat 14 to ensure the home side went into the last heat five points up, otherwise all of the early hard work to establish a twelve point lead would have been in vain.

The Hammers were quick off of the blocks as Lee Richardson and the returning Joonas Kylmakorpi relegated Pedersen to the back in heat one. This was followed by consecutive 5-1's, the most notable coming in the third race when Joe Screen was an early leader but was passed by both Davidsson and Adam Shields before pulling up.

As the first half of the meeting progressed it all looked so good for the Hammers as Shields got the better of Andersen in heat five and Richardson and Kylmakorpi got one over Pedersen in heat six to open up that twelve point lead.

Screen came good in heat seven, though, and a six point ride from Andersen appeared to get the Pirates back on track, particularly as Pedersen had recovered from his early blip at this point and rattled in another victory in heat nine. It was Andersen who shepherded Daniel Davidsson home in the eleventh heat as Poole clawed further points back and ultimately ended up snatching that consolation league point at the death.