Thank you to our friends at Diamonds Media Tean for the post and photo.Newcastle Diamonds 62 (94)
Sheffield Tigers 28 (86)
(Knockout Cup quarter-final 2nd leg)
Newcastle win 94-86 on aggregateTop Scorers:
Newcastle Diamonds - Ludvig Lindgren 14 3, Claes Nedermark 12 2
Sheffield Tigers - Ricky Wells 9, Richard Hall 6
The Newcastle Diamonds comeback from a whopping 26-point knockout cup quarter-final first leg defeat at the Sheffield Tigers last week goes down as one of the clubs' very best in its entire history, grabbing a very well deserved entrance into the semi-finals with an eight point aggregate victory.
They had a mountain to climb at Brough Park last night against the Tigers but fought back in the most determined styles in a performance to make every Diamonds supporter very proud indeed, and all this without regular men Mark Lemon, Christian Henry and Richie Worrall, all sitting on the injury list.
Rider replacement covered Henry's races whilst Ipswich's Kevin Doolan guested for Lemon and Berwick's Jason King did likewise for Worrall - both excelling on behalf of their club-for-the-night.
In Heat One Stuart Robson ended up in third place on bend one, but passed both his partner Claes Nedermark and Tiger's number one Josef Franc on the line to sneak a fine home 5-1, and with guest King hammering home a solid and determined win in the second as part of a 4-2 the Diamonds were chipping their vast deficit away steadily with the score at 9-3 and 41-61 overall.
With Steve Worrall and guest Doolan well away to another 5-1, Richard Hall spun on the second lap, brining his partner Chris Schramm down as well with the referee excluding Hall, whilst in the re-run the Diamonds' pair shot away again to seal the maximum and take the score to 14-4.
Another 4-2 came in the fourth to reduce the aggregate deficit to 14 whilst Doolan and Lindgren took yet another 5-1 in Heat Five ahead of Argentinean international Emiliano Sanchez.
Ricky Wells became the first Tiger to win a race in Heat Six after a mammoth battle with Robson in a shared race, but a revived King hit hard round the outside line on bend two of Heat Seven, followed by an inside run from Lindgren over Schramm to take yet another 5-1 moving the score on to 31-11 and overall the aggregate totals were not a tantalising 63-69!
Worrall made a dramatic race of things with Wells in Heat Nine, blocking and weaving throughout with Doolan making the most of a brief fuel-starvation to Wells' bike on lap three slowed him to allow the guest through for another home maximum cutting the gap to only two points.
In a storming Heat 10 being led by Nedermark, Robson was vying for places with Schramm, but the Tiger went down right in front of the Diamond who laid his machine down to avoid his stricken opponent with the referee stopping the race, excluding Schramm and awarding the result another 5-1 to Newcastle taking them into the lead on aggregate 76-74.
Yet another astonishing home 5-1 came in the 11th, whilst in Heat 12 Doolan ran riot again to take a guest paid-maximum-recording win in a shared race, the same as Heat 13 with Wells taking Sheffield's second heat winner of the night, but over all the aggregates were still tight in Newcastle's favour 87-81 with two races left meaning Sheffield had to take two 5-1s to take the tie.
Nedermark and Worrall carefully nursed home the second and third placed points having been ferociously passed by a Hall on a mission in a last-ditch effort to prove Sheffield did have some sharp claws left, and his moves certainly got the crowd going, but the 3-3 sealed one of the most sensational aggregate victories seen in decades with one race to spare.
Team manager George English said: "Without Mark (Lemon), Christian (Henry) and Richie (Worrall) and faced with a 26-point deficit we produced the most stunning performance to follow on from a superb display at Workington! To talk of pride doesn't do the emotions justice."
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