Peterborough Panthers 51 Wolverhampton Wolves 45 - Elite League B
Panthers took the win but a late charge by Wolves saw them take a point after heroics from Freddie Lindgren and Peter Karlsson
Top scorer and man of the match Ales Dryml had his best return in a Panthers race jacket this season, but to be fair this was a fairly solid team display where everyone contributed and Wolves never looked like repeating their ELA result.
Panther’s captain Iversen won the opening heat in a very fast time and it was only Lindgren passing Dryml on the last bend that prevented the Panthers opening proceedings with a first race maximum.
That was soon rectified as Vissing sped away to comfortably take the second with Bager threading his way through the traffic to join him up front and put Panthers into a 6 point lead.
Dryml made no such mistakes in heat 3 as he led from start to finish but Korneliussen left at the start was unable to make any impression on the Wolves pairing and it finished all square.
Bjerre and Vissing were first away in heat 4 but it took Karlsson little time to pass Vissing and even less to account for Bjerre who battled away nevertheless for the entire race.
Wolves hit back with good starts for Lindgren and Klindt in five, Korneliussen slipped passed Klindt but he closed the door on Vissing and Wolves hung on for their first heat advantage of the meeting.
Karlsson blasted away to lead the 6th but his engine gave up the ghost at the end of lap 1 and Panthers gratefully took advantage to extend their lead to 8 points.
Bjerre won the 7th to maintain the pressure and Dryml again impressed with another good start in the 8th and he was joined initially by Vissing but Klindt slipped by to split the Panthers but the 4-2 made the difference now 10 and the expected tac sub materialised in the 9th with Karlsson donning the black and white.
The ex panther was never troubled after a superb start although Panthers limited the damage by taking the minor places.
Dryml showed it was his night with another superb start and first corner and he was quickly joined by Iversen who slipped by the Wolves pairing early on.
Heat 11 was shared with Panthers again taking the minor places from race winner Lindgren but any hopes of a second Wolves upset were pretty well finished in 12 as Korneliussen and Vissing combined for another maximum to establish a 15 point lead, with Vissing having to be shepherded home after his bike lost power on the last bend and it went completely on the wind down lap.
Lindgren took the expected tactical in 13 and led from start to finish with Karlsson slotting in for an impressive 8-1 after getting the edge over Iversen early on. The gap was now down to 8 and clearly heat 14 was important but Skornicki who up to that point hadn’t really pulled any trees up made his best start of the night and gamely hung on for a share of the spoils.
Any heat advantage was clearly going to ensure Wolves of a point and they duly got it with Karlsson fast away yet again. Dryml stubbornly held onto second place but Iversen was unable to get the better of Lindgren despite trying for the entire four laps.
Iversen summed it up well at the press conference afterwards when he announced that it would have been nice to take all 3 points but importantly they wanted the win and they got that with steady scoring from everyone.
Nevertheless expectations are always high at the East of England Showground and it was clear some thought this was one point dropped rather than two gained.