PETERBOROUGH promoter Ged Rathbone could not hide his disappointment following a Premier League KO Cup exit on Thursday night.
The Readypower Panthers went out of the competition after a 47-41 loss in the second leg of their first round tie at Plymouth – that handed the Devils a 91-87 verdict on aggregate.
Rathbone was left to reflect on bad luck and hotly-disputed decisions which he felt cost his team any chance of making progress.
Panthers twice conceded 5-0 scorelines and saw several key incidents go against them at the St Boniface Arena as their use of the rider replacement facility at number one also backfired as it produced just one point. Planned guest Ben Barker was hurt in a bad British Final crash earlier in the week.
Top-scorer Robert Lambert was harshly excluded in the opener and Lewis Blackbird suffered a similar fate in heat 11 before Panthers were left perplexed by referee Margaret Vardy’s decision not to dismiss Devils captain Kyle Newman in heat 15.
Panthers pair Lambert and Ulrich Ostergaard made electric starts to move into a 5-1 which was needed to force a run-off before Newman came down - and the home rider made the most of his unexpected second chance to win the re-run and settle the tie.
Rathbone said: “There is no doubt in my mind that a number of decisions cost us a place in the next round of the KO Cup.
“It is frustrating to find ourselves in that position, but there is nothing we can do about it.
“The riders did all they could and battled hard all night, but not a thing went their way and it was summed up in heat 15.
"Everyone in the stadium expected Kyle to be excluded, just as Ulrich had been for a crash in exactly the same place earlier in the night, but he was allowed in the re-run.
“In hindsight we didn’t do enough in the home leg last month when only building up a two-point lead, but I still felt we deserved to go through. It was just a case of too many things going against us.
“I must admit I have never been a fan of rider replacement and last night again showed that it does not work.
“We were very unfortunate with the guest situation as we had Ben booked until his bad crash in the British Final.
“We then approached Richard Lawson who couldn’t commit and we did have another rider on stand-by, but he only scored seven points from five rides when he last rode at Plymouth.
“We thought we could get by, but it highlights that we are probably not quite strong enough currently and we need to have a very good look at things in the coming days.”
Panthers were seven points down on the night after the first of those 5-0s in heat four when Ostergaard was excluded for tumbling in the initial staging and guest reserve Ashley Morris retired in the re-run, but a sizzling streak of two 5-1s and a 4-2 in the space of three races turned their deficit into an advantage.
The second 5-0 in heat 11 (when Blackbird’s exit in the initial staging was followed by Ostergaard crashing out of the re-run) put them behind again and a 5-1 in heat 13 strengthened Plymouth’s grip on proceedings before they saw the tie out.
There were positives in defeat for Panthers as Lambert scored heavily again while Ollie Greenwood delivered his most encouraging display for some time with a heat two triumph helping him to five points.
Panthers return to action tomorrow night (Saturday) when travelling to Rye House in the Premier League (7pm start).
“We responded very well to a big disappointment last weekend and now the challenge is to do the same again,” added Rathbone.
SCORES
PLYMOUTH: Kyle Newman 12+2, Ryan Fisher 10, Morten Risager 9, Jack Holder 6+1, Sam Simota 4+1, Todd Kurtz 4+1, Roland Benko 2+1.
READYPOWER PANTHERS: Robert Lambert 11+2, Ulrich Ostergaard 8, Lewis Blackbird 7, Michael Palm Toft 6+1, Oliver Greenwood 5, Ashley Morris (guest) 4+2, Rider replacement for Olly Allen.