Speedway: 'We've been beaten by a better team' admits Simon Stead after Sheffield KO Cup defeat by Leicester
Sheffield boss Simon Stead admits Sheffield were beaten by the better side, in their KO Cup defeat by Leicester.
The Tru7Group Tigers lost 44-46 on the night, and 100 - 80 on aggregate to the Lions, ending the South Yorkshire club’s hopes of retaining the trophy they won last year.
After a bad start which saw Sheffield fail to win a heat advantage until heat six, Sheffield were knocked out at the end of heat 10.
Sheffield team manager Simon Stead said the Tigers were very disappointed as a team.
He said: “Ultimately we've not been good enough over the two legs and that's been our downfall, probably not so much tonight really. A lot of Leicester's hard work was done at Leicester.
“It's a competition we've always done really well in and I'm disappointed that our knockout cup journey has come to an end but over the two meetings we've been certainly beaten by the better team so that gives us a good gauge of where we need to be because Leicester are one of the in-form teams at the moment so we've got some improvement to do.”
He felt Sheffield’s bad start was down the the early gate positions.
“Gates one and three were so good early on,” he said: “We lost a toss and Leicester picked gates one and three so that certainly didn't help our cause.
“I don't think it would have been enough to rescue the fixture for us and progress through but I think had we got gates one and three then the end result might have been slightly different in terms of turning it into at least a home win. So we're disappointed but it's fine margins.
“You can always try and find an excuse but we were beaten by the better team.
“We've got some improvement to be found and you know the only saving grace is at the moment is that our 100 per cent home league record is still intact and that's something that we need to try and keep hold of for the rest of the season.”