Speedway: Sheffield pull superheat special to break Leicester hearts and seal play off final place
Late drama after Tigers were pegged right back by rampaging Lions
Sheffield pulled off a dramatic late superheat victory to book their place in the Rowe Motor Oils Premiership final.
Tigers had led 57-33 from the first leg at Owlerton, but Leicester dominated their own home leg to secure the same margin of victory at the Hydroscand Arena. It took Sheffield until heat 11 before Max Fricke and Anders Rowe won their team’s first heat advantage of the night, a 4-2.
And with the meeting going to a superheat, where the team whose rider finishes in last place loses, skipper Josh Pickering finally found a way past Leicester’s Nick Morris to secure a 6-3 win using pairs scoring, Max Fricke winning the heat for Sheffield. Pickering had trailed in last place until midway through the race.
A delighted Pickering said afterwards that it had been a bad start to the meeting. but Sheffield had managed to hang in there.
He said: “They’ve got such good riders around here the whole way through to be honest and when some of our boys aren’t firing, it does make things difficult. I couldn't not stop my thing from spinning tonight. I had way to much speed. But we got there in the end and it was the result that we obviously came here for. We didn’t really want it to be that close.”
“I’m not going to say the best team won because we were both very even - the coin could have landed on either side.”
Tigers team manager Simon Stead added:”We made hard work of it but we dug deep. Midway through the meeting I was really concerned , they had dragged so many points back. But we dug deep, we stopped the rot..”
He said Leon Flint had been working hard with Ty Proctor in the pits before he pulled off a vital win in heat 14 which kept the scores level going into heat 15..
“They made some drastic changes and his second two rides were really good so I’m proud of him that he managed to turn it round,” he added.
“They’ve all dug deep.”
Sheffield will now face Belle Vue in the two legged final, with the Owlerton leg on Thursday, October 8, 2026, and the Belle Vue leg on Monday, October 12, 2026.
Leicester 57: Joe Thompson 14+1, Ryan Douglas 13+1, Nick Morris 11+4, Sam Masters 9+1, Drew Kemp 7+1, Paco Castagna 3+1, Dan Thompson R/R.
Sheffield 33: Max Fricke 13, Chris Holder 6, Josh Pickering 5, Leon Flint 5, Anders Rowe 2, Luke Killeen 2, Jye Etheridge 0.
Aggregate scores tied 90-90. Sheffield win Super Heat 6-3.