Monarchs aggregate defeat by Exeter in the Young Shield Quarter-Final was trailed earlier as blessing in disguise for the Armadale outfit. The postponment of the home leg last week meant that had Monarchs made it through to the Semi-Finals they would have faced Newport at Armadale on Friday 15th October. This is just 24 hours before the cruicial Cup Final second leg at Arena Essex. A match against such tough opponents as Newport is not ideal preparation for a Cup Final!
Injuries have recently hit Ross Brady and Brian Turner and mechanical problems have plauged Kevin Little and Justin Elkins. Given this, Monarchs chances of beating a fired-up and in-form Newport would have been slim.
Since the priority for Edinburgh is the Cup Final, it is possible that defeat by Exeter will not seen as a disaster by the Monarchs team and promotion. Alex Harkess summed the situation up prior to the home leg in the Edinburgh Evening News.
"We don't particularly want to race against anyone the night before the Cup Final. Of course circumstances might dictate we have a meeting but that's the price you pay for success in getting through to the finals in all competitions."
"If we fail to beat Exeter by the required margin it's on the cards that there won't be any speedway at Armadale next Friday. I will be suggesting that we postpone our Scottish Cup second leg against Glasgow Tigers until the following week."
"To have a match before a British Cup Final and risk somebody getting injured is something we'd like to avoid. Having to chase down to Arena Essex with riders having to clean their bikes en route is not ideal preparation."
All this does beg the question as to why Monarchs ever agreed to schedule the Cup Final on a Saturday. It was always possible that rain would hit one of the Young Shield ties at Armadale in October. Had the Purfleet leg been scheduled for Friday, Arena's normal race night, this would allow Monarchs to fix any Young Shield tie on the Armadale change night of Saturday. This is not ideal but it would at least have allowed the priority to be given to the Cup tie and for the Cup to be presented to the Armadale crowd on the Saturday.
A win against Exeter would have entailed Monarchs going to Newport on Sunday. Given Peter Carr's past 'tongue in cheek' statements on the Newport track and not wanting to race there, many were looking for his score with interest. Carr was certainly in the clear on this one with an untroubled paid maximum against Exeter. James Grieves put in probably his best pefromance of the season with a 15-point full house including a stunning win from the back against Michael Coles. Unfortunately the rest of the team did not measure up with Ross Brady still struggling with his arm injury and also Blair Scott rather tentative despite another double-figure score.
Despite this defeat Monarchs are the only team to have qualified for the final stages of every Premier League competition. Monarchs achieved third place in the League, finalists in the Cup and the Premier National Trophy. They also qualified as finalist in the Fours, the Pairs, and most recently Quarter-Finalist in the Young Shield. Newport and Sheffield come closest to matching Monarchs' consistency. Monarchs eliminated both in the Cup and effectively eliminated Sheffield from the National Trophy by taking the wild card place.
But for injury, Monarchs could well have gone on to win more silverware than they look like ending up with.