Speedway
Elitserien Quarterfinals
#ingabromsar
The regular season may have only finished on Thursday, but the postseason is already swinging into action in Sweden this Tuesday. Tonight is the first of home and away meetings that will decide who will meet the top two teams, Dackarna and Vetlanda, in the semi-finals.
Kumla Indianerna v Västervik Speedway
Kumla Indians, who finished in sixth will meet third placed, Västervik Speedway. Despite their differences in the table, when the clubs have met it could have not have been more equal. In Round 3 they drew 45-45 in Västervik, whilst in Kumla in Round 16 it was a 46-44 win for the Indians.
So predicting who will win this quarterfinal is almost impossible as it will probably go down to the wire.
Kumla’s top rider, British three times world champion, Tai Woffinden has been out for two months, but actually played in both matches against the side from Småland, leading the team and scoring 13 each time. Dane, Kenneth Bjerre will also be a key rider for the Närke squad.
But sadly for Västervik, Danish veteran and three times world champion, Nicki Pedersen broke his hand in the last round of the Polish league on Sunday and is out indefinitely awaiting an operation.
That means additional responsibility on their other riders, particular Swede, Peter Ljung who is absolutely flying round the track this season, the top placed Swede in 13th on heat average.
Meanwhile, don’t expect there to be much brotherly love dished out between Chris Holder of Kumla and younger brother Jack Holder of Västervik during this series. Jack has been had an excellent season here is Sweden, but his older brother will probably be keen to remind him that he won both the heats when they met last time, as well as the fact that his younger brother scored 0 in Heat 15 when Kumla took home the match in that deciding heat.
Eskilstuna Smederna v Gisleved Lejonen
This match up bears much in common with the other fixture in that the team finished highest in the league actually did not win when they met in Rounds 3 and 16. That is to say that fourth placed Smederna lost 48:42 both times they met fifth placed Lejonen.
Apart from this the other fact that perhaps points to a victory for Gisveled is that they are a team on an upward curve. They have won four of their six matches since the restart at the end of July and have beaten all of the other clubs in the playoffs that they have met.
It is a team that is firing on all cylinders, but particularly worth of note is the young Pole Maksym Drabik who is having his best season as a senior in both Sweden and Poland. He is able supported by a well known figure from the GP circuit, Jaroslaw Hampel and the less well known, but actually more effective this year Krzystof Kasprzak.
For Smederna the one to watch is Scandinavian GP winner Fredrik Lindgren, who managed to take first place in Målilla. Lindgren also managed to bunny-hop over Dackarna's Patryk Dudek to avoid serious injury for the Pole who had fallen in the middle of the track during one of the heats.
However, Lindgren has already announced he will not ride with the Eskilstuna club next year amid rumours of a fallout with the organisation. How this will affect the Swede’s motivation during this crucial match remains to be seen.
They still have Dane Michael Jepsen Jensen on the roster and expect him to score in double figures if Smederna are to advance to the semis.
In the end this match may come down to who of the B-list riders performs best. Look out for yet more Polish riders, this time Adrian Miedzinski (ESK) and Kacper Woryna (LEJ). Both have performed excellently in the European SEC where Miedinski got to take part as a wildcard in the Round 2 in Torun.
Woryna is a permanent rider in the SEC and could be the unexpected winner of the whole competition, or at least be on the podium again if he scores highly in Chorzow at the end of September.
