Panthers need one last push to save their season

Simon Lambert was in great form against Scunthorpe.

The city team will travel to Rye House to take on Lakeside in a re-arranged semi-final second leg clash in the SGB Championship starting at 6pm.

The meeting was postponed last weekend with Panthers not happy about the re-staging date due to being unable to call on chosen number one guest Jason Garrity, whose Scunthorpe side are now involved in the KO Cup final on that day.

Regular Panthers guest Thomas Jorgensen will stand in at number one even though Rye House is not one of his preferred tracks.

Club bosses did seek special dispensation to use Ricky Wells even though his average is slightly higher than that of Scott Nicholls – the man he would be replacing – but he has now been snapped up to guest for Scunthorpe anyway.

Finnish racer Tero Aarnio stands in for Michael Palm Toft and Carl Wilkinson steps in at reserve again for Tom Bacon.

The club continue to use the rider replacement facility for Bradley Wilson-Dean.

Panthers trail 46-44 from the first leg and Rathbone said: “We need one last push to save the season.

“We made it clear we weren’t keen on going back to Rye House on Sunday, but it looks like we’ll be forced to race then.

“We appreciate dates are at a minimum so late in the season, but we feel for the integrity of the sport we should be given the opportunity to field the team that we wanted to track last Sunday when the meeting was postponed.”

Should Panthers be successful, then their home leg of the final against Workington would be staged on Sundat October 28 at the East of England Arena.