The Panthers manager highlighted two key races that were the difference between a morale-boosting success and a narrow defeat in their televised showdown of the strugglers at Coventry.

Panthers were never more than eight points adrift throughout a highly entertaining affair played out in front of the Sky cameras, but they rarely looked as though they could recover their small deficit and leap out of the Elite League relegation zone.

And according to Swales, the concession of the only 5-1 seen all meeting in heat eight and a 4-2 loss in a thrilling 10th contest, were the main reasons they came up short.

Young duo Claus Vissing and Ty Proctor couldn't land a blow in the eighth race before Kenneth Bjerre and Henning Bager's attempts at team-riding their way to a maximum in heat 10 went pear-shaped and Coventry pair Olly Allen and Chris Harris moved in.

"Heat eight was the undoing of us to be perfectly honest," said Swales.

"Then things changed for the worse in heat 10 when it looked for the first couple of laps as though we might get ourselves back into it.

"I was convinced we could go to Coventry and get a win, but that's speedway and we have to make sure we learn from the experience."

Panthers were spearheaded by impressive guest Bjarne Pedersen – drafted in to replace the present, but currently banned and departing skipper Hans Andersen – who led the way for the visitors with a dozen points.

The Poole man's copybook received its only blemish as he slipped from first to last in heat five, but he more than made amends with four heat successes to prove Swales' judgement in guest selection was spot-on.

Bjerre added a further nine at the same venue where he earned rave reviews for his display in the recent World Cup, but no other Panthers men could really tuck into the points despite all chipping in with small contributions.

Stand-in skipper Danny King was a fortunate beneficiary of a couple of third places (Ben Barker coming down in heat four and Olly Allen biting the dust in heat six) before impressively taking the ninth race spoils, while Henning Bager was disappointing until becoming Panthers' only other heat winner in the penultimate instalment.

Ironically, just as Bager found the fastest away around Brandon, Panthers' hopes of victory were ended as a 3-3 in that 14th race left hosts Coventry in an unassailable position.

Pedersen capped his polished display with another triumph in the finale, but Swales was again left mulling over what might have been.

"We are capable of picking up results away and that makes the defeats all the more frustrating," he added.