Aces Suffer Hammer Blow Ahead Of Playoff Showdown

Belle Vue have suffered a major blow on the eve of the Premiership play-offs with No.1 Max Fricke ruled out for the remainder of the season through injury.

The Aces go into their biggest meeting of the season at Ipswich tonight (Thursday) in the first leg of the Premiership play-off semi-final, as they bid to win their first top-flight league title in 29 years, without their top star.

Australian Fricke crashed heavily when racing for Polish side Zielona Gora in their Division One Promotion final defeat to Krosno on Saturday, and confirmed that he had sustained multiple injuries.

Fricke said “I suffered a broken sternum, bruised lungs, sprained shoulder, cracked shoulder blade and concussion as a result of my crash”.

“This requires an extensive time to recover, but we’ll be back to 100 per cent before next season.  Unfortunately I will be missing the final Grand Prix of the season in Torun and the play-offs for Belle Vue, but the team has my full support from the sidelines”.

It’s a huge blow to the Aces who have often been cursed by injuries at play-off time in recent years.

They go into the semi-final as favourites to reach the play-off final, having beaten Ipswich 91-89 and 100-80 in their previous meetings in the regular league season this year.

However the options to cover Fricke’s absence are now very limited.

 With a guest unable to be drawn from a fellow play-off team, and King’s Lynn also in action in the League Cup final tonight, it leaves only Peterborough as a potential source of a guest replacement.

 The Rider Replacement facility, where Fricke’s races can be shared amongst the other riders in the team is another option, but again is unlikely to cover Fricke’s scoring power.

Ideally the Aces will be looking to hold Ipswich to a single figure first-leg lead to give them the best chance in Monday’s massive return leg at Belle Vue’s National Speedway Stadium.

Belle Vue stage the semi-final second leg on Monday (7.30pm) where a few more options could come into play should they go down the guest route.

 With King’s Lynn not in action that night, their Danish star Nikolai Klindt and Aussie Josh Pickering are further alternatives who could come into the thoughts of Aces team boss Mark Lemon as he looks to fill the gap in his side.

 Belle Vue and Ipswich will have to wait until next Thursday to find out who their prospective play-off final opponents will be as league leaders Sheffield face fourth placed Wolverhampton in the other semi-final.

 Their first leg at Wolverhampton was rained off on Monday night and has been rearranged for this Monday, whilst the second leg will be at Sheffield’s Owlerton Stadium next Thursday.

 The Belle Vue Colts bid to book their place in the National League play-offs tomorrow night (Friday) when they travel to Edinburgh to face the Armadale Devils in their final league match of the regular season.

 The Colts need one more league point to reach the play-offs, and will secure that point if they can claim a win in Scotland or limit any loss to six points or fewer.

 Leicester, Mildenhall and Berwick have already claimed their place in the title play-offs, whilst a minimum of a point will see the Colts leapfrog Oxford in the table to take the fourth place.

Picture by Ian Charles