MATCH REPORT: Bury entertain Sheffield in season opener

April 4, 2017 Andrew Parr

The sun shone on the opening day of the 2017 cycle speedway season, as Sheffield visited Goshen Sports Centre to take on Bury Comets.

The Division One fixture began with a competitive race featuring Will Owens and Danny Taylor against Sheffield’s Niall Morton and Laura Watson. A freak coming together between Taylor and Morton saw a rerun, but Morton was not to recover from his resultant injuries and was out of action for the rest of the day.

Bury surged ahead before an excellent 7-3 from Adam Watson and Ed Morton, one which they repeated later in the match.

In general, it was Bury who were scoring the maximums though, with both sides taking advantage of the additional reserve slots available in 2017; Sheffield featuring 9 riders and Bury the full 10.

Kaysar Mohammadi continued to impress with a four ride maximum, plus Eryk Motala with two wins from to his two races, whilst Kristian Ramsden supported his team mates throughout for 15+4 from 5 rides.

Bury 108
Danny Taylor 16+2 (from 5 rides), Kris Ramsden 15+4 (5), Kaysar Mohammadi 14+2 (4), James Elston 14+1 (5), Will Owens 13+3 (5), Neil Howarth 10+1 (4), Adam Turnbull 9 (3), Eryk Motala 8 (2), Asim Hussain 6+1 (2), Louis Turner 3 (1).

Sheffield 72
Adam Watson 19+3 (6), Ed Morton 15+1 (6), Luke Morton 12 (6), Laura Watson 11 (6), Sam Haines 8 (6), Niamh Morton 2 (2), Keilan Burton 2 (2), Jack Brownell 1 (1), Niall Morton 1 (1).

Division Two was a much tighter affair, especially early on, as Bury suffered a series of gate exclusions. As the match progressed, Bury gradually drew clear with some strong gating and judicious use of the reserve rides, Eryk Motala coming in with three wins from his three starts.

For the visitors, Niamh Morton was consistently impressive, as was Sam Haines, with great backing from Laura Watson, Sammy Marsh and the rest.

Bury 82
Louis Turner 14+1 (4), Eryk Motala 12 (3), Kaysar Mohammadi 10+1 (3), Alan Plimley 10+1 (4), Steve Mann 10 (4), Harry Radford 9+2 (3), Asim Hussain 9+1 (3), Adam Turnbull 7+1 (4), Josh Neath 1 (1).

Sheffield 64
Niamh Morton 12+2 (5), Keilan Burton 9 (4), Sam Haines 9 (4), Sammy Marsh 9 (4), Laura Watson 7+1 (4), Logan Perkins 6+1 (3), Luke Morton 6 (2), Jack Brownell 5 (3), Joe Brownell 1 (1).

As if to continue the day’s pattern, the Division Three fixture was very close with Bury just edging it by weight of greater numbers in the Grand Prix format.

Sheffield’s Keilan Burton was unbeaten, followed closely by teammates Jack Brownell and Logan Perkins. For the Comets it was Dawar Mohammadi and Josh Neath who offered most resistance, but as highlighted , it was the whole squad who secured the victory.