PETERBOROUGH have rung the changes ahead of Friday’s Elite League home match against near-neighbours King’s Lynn at the Showground.

PETERBOROUGH have rung the changes ahead of Friday’s Elite League home match against near-neighbours King’s Lynn at the Showground.

The Readypower Panthers have suffered injuries to Linus Sundstrom (scaphoid) and Kenni Larsen (broken arm and dislocated wrist) in the past week or so, and in a bid to also boost their chances of moving away from the bottom of the league table have made no less than three changes.

In have come popular Polish duo Krzysztof Buczkowski and Norbert Kosciuch who are both already well known to the Panthers supporters from their many previous spells with the club, plus joining them is Swedish born Finn Joonas Kylmakorpi who has been signed on loan from Eastbourne. The changes are subject to official approval by the BSPA MC.

Kylmakorpi and Buczkowski will replace injured duo Larsen and Sundstrom whilst Kosciuch takes over from Nicolai Klindt who has struggled since arriving at the Showground in early May. In an ironic twist Klindt was originally signed as a replacement for Kosciuch but after some impressive scores on the continent the Pole has been recalled.

Kylmakorpi brings with him a wealth of Elite League experience from his time with a number of top-flight clubs, which include; Eastbourne, Lakeside, Coventry and also a spell with Peterborough in 2005.

He won the League Championship with Coventry later that year and has also been crowned World Long-track Champion three times, the latest of which was last season.

Co-promoter Trevor Swales said: “We would like to thank Eastbourne for allowing us to speak to Joonas and I’m sure he will do a good job for us and will become a popular figure with our supporters. He’s got plenty of experience in the UK and is the type for rider who always gives one-hundred-percent - you can’t ask for any more than that.

“We’ve finally tracked down the three targets we wanted but we had to wait until after this weekend as there was a chance that Linus may have been able to return from injury sooner that expected. He visited his doctor on Friday and looks set to be out of action for longer so now is the right time to push ahead with these changes.

“We had to act as soon as we could do as we couldn’t carry on with multiple guests and rider-replacement for our second and third heat-leaders, but it’s great to have a full team again which will hopefully start to see a change in our fortunes.

“We would like to thank Nicolai for everything he’s done since he’s been with us, wish him well in the future and we’re just sorry it hasn’t worked out for him with the Panthers. To be honest it’s not been easy for him to get himself out of a loss of form with a team that has also been struggling. I’m sure he will bounce back though and quickly get signed-up elsewhere.

“This is what our supporters have been screaming for and we’ve finally done it. They have two popular Peterborough boys back in Krzysztof and Norbi and in Joonas we have someone who can perform well on all the tracks.

“I’m sure the fans will now get behind them plus giving us all their valued support as we all look to go forward from here.”

PANTHERS RE-DECLARED 1-7

Kenneth Bjerre 7.91

Joonas Kylmakorpi 7.56

Krzysztof Buczkowski 6.55

Ryan Fisher 5.92

Norbert Kosciuch 5.43

Patrick Hougaard 4.74

Dakota North 4.35