The much changed Berwick Bandits are the visitor at Armadale on Friday. The good thing about Berwick visiting is that you never know who is going to turn up in the team until they arrive!
Having been knocked back in their attempt to bring in Paul Bentley, the Bandits have now turned to former captain Scott Lamb to replace out-of-form Will Beveridge. Last week Berwick did succeed in replacing David McAllan by Scott Robson.
The reason why Bentley was not allowed to be declared was that he was a member of the Berwick line-up at the end of last season but was initially left out of the team. Scott Lamb was out injured at the end of last season after being a fixture in the Berwick team since they returned to senior speedway in 1997. He was not affected by the rule and returned to the Berwick team this week in thie defeat at Newcastle.
There are only four survivors of the team that Monarchs defeated at Shielfield last month. Thee are the Czech trio of Adrian Rymel, Michal Makovsky, and Josef Franc plus Scottish Internationalist David Meldrum. South African Beven Compton has made a belated appearance to replace Phil Pickering. All three of the Czech have seen their averages fall and only Rymel has retained his heat leader place. Josef Franc has actually dropped to reserve.
It is difficult to judge how this Berwick team will perform. It looks very strong on paper but none of the team has much of an Armadale pedigree. The three Czechs all appeared at Armadale last spring with the Jawa touring team and none impressed. Paul Bentley and Scott Lamb have never really performed to their true ability at the Arena while David Meldrum has been rather hit-and-miss. Scott Robson has made a few Armadale appearances for Hull back in 1997 scoring points but not beating anyone of note before moving to the Elite League. He did join Berwick mid-season in 1998 but missed their visit to Armadale through injury.
With an away win by one point, Monarchs will be looking to put some pressure on second placed Sheffield by winning and collecting the three points on offer. This will also put some space between them and the chasing pack including Glasgow Tigers and Newcastle.
Teams for the Premier National Trophy Match at Armadale on Friday 4th May (start time 7.30, doors open 6.30) are:
Edinburgh Monarchs: Robert Eriksson, Blair Scott, Peter Carr (capt.), Rene Aas, Jan Andersen, Christian Henry, Derek Sneddon.
Berwick Bandits: Adrian Rymel, Michal Makovsky, Scott Robson, David Meldrum, Scott Lamb, Josef Franc, Bevan Compton.
Hopefully there will be some dry weather this week to allow the track staff to get the some consistency into the strip. After weeks of wet weather maybe the summer could soon be arriving? Monarchs have two more Premier Trophy qualifiers at Armadale for the riders to sort themselves out before the season starts in earnest with the First Round Cup match against Newcastle and the Premier League opener against Trelawny.
Although Paul Bentley will not be appearing for Berwick this Friday, he will be making the trip a week on Friday with his new club Hull Vikings. Hull have changed things to introduce Bentley and Edinburgh's own Ross Brady in place of Lee Dicken and Justin Elkins.
Monarchs will have to be on top form to beat Hull especially with Paul Thorp at second string and Ross Brady at reserve!