19
85Mediocre Heathens But Erik Conquers All again
![]() Season Review Once again the points limit finally
culminated in the departure of Lance King but it must be said that Lance
helped to rule himself out of consideration with his financial demands on
the club. |
|
|
The Heathens finished top of the League Cup table, qualifying for the semi-finals but then had to wait for months before knowing who their opponents were and during that time the team had lost some of its previous good form. |
L to R. Alan Grahame, Jan O Pedersen, Steve Collins team manager - Colin Pratt |
Gundersen was
superb throughout but the rest began to struggle. Phil Collins, Jan O
Pedersen and Simon Cross were all pretty poor gaters and they suffered
because of the lack of dirt on most tracks making passing extremely
difficult. Alan Grahame was injured and while he was out of the team Cradley
went out of the League Cup being beaten by Coventry. In the League they lost at home to Sheffield and could only win twice away, at Wolverhampton and Kings Lynn (although they were awarded the result at Reading which they refused to ride). They went out of the K.O. Cup in the semi-final being beaten by Ipswich both home and away. The Midland Cup went the same way when they were defeated by Oxford in the Final again both home and away. However after an absence of five years the Dudley Wolves Trophy was competed for again and the Heathens were able to put one over the Wolves at Dudley Wood and Monmore Green much to the delight of the supporters. Individually Erik Gundersen retained his World Title after a run-off with Hans Nielsen and Sam Ermolenko then went on to win the British League Riders Championship at Belle Vue. He began the season as the holder of the Golden Helmet and successfully defended it four times before being beaten by Bobby Schwartz. He regained it by beating Shawn Moran at Sheffield defended it against Chris Morton, Per Jonsson and Hans Nielsen then lost it to Jeremy Doncaster at Ipswich. Jan O Pedersen reached his first World Final and scored 7 points to finish 9th. The British semi final at Dudley Wood was won by Andy Grahame with 14 points and Cradley's own great individual the Golden Hammer was won by the very talented Kenny Carter. |
|
Riders Performance Chart
|
statistics taken from the Cradley Speedway database for BL matches only.
Final League Table
|
League Cup
|
|
|
Again
Erik Gundersen 'cleaned up' by winning the World Championship, this time
in Bradford after a run off with Hans Neilsen and Sam Ermolenko. Erik
rounded off the season by winning the British League Riders Championship
at Belle Vue. |
|
|