STOKE Easy Rider Potters slumped to their sixth defeat in succession as they went down to a 43-35 defeat against Cradley at Loomer Road on Saturday night after the meeting was halted after thirteen heats due to a power failure, the result standing in the National League KO Cup.

The Heathens took the lead in heat two with a 5-1 heat win from reserves Michael Neale and Ellis Perks over Paul Burnett and they then extended their lead to 6 points after six heats as Matt Williamson got the better of Jon Armstrong with Neale third for a 4-2 to give the Heathens a 21-15 lead.

Cradley continued at pile on the pressure as visiting skipper Max Clegg managed to overhaul Danny Phillips to take victory in heat nine with Neale taking third place for a Heathens 4-2 before the Potters struck back with a 4-2 of their own from Armstrong and Chris Widman over Williamson to leave the Potters trailing 33-27 after ten heats.

The Heathens extended their lead back up to eight points in heat twelve as Williamson took victory from Ryan Terry-Daley with Neale again being involved in a heat advantage to leave the Potters trailing 40-32.

Lee Payne took victory from Clegg in heat thirteen in what was the race of the night as the home rider lowered the Heathens skippers colours for the first time of the night with Perks taking third after Armstrong has suffered a mechanical failure as the lights literally went out for the Potters with a power failure in the stadium leaving referee Dave Dowling with no alternative but to abandon the meeting after a twenty minute delay in order to rectify the issue.

Potters team manager Malcolm Vasey commented “I’m not making any excuses I thought they were a very good side although I thought we raced quite well against them and saw some exciting racing tonight Lee Payne in particular who rode his socks off after being so ill over the past 24 hours and still is and it was a tremendous performance from him tonight with him concluding the meeting with a superb win over their skipper Max Clegg who had been unbeaten up to that point. I also thought there were some encouraging signs tonight with Ryan Terry-Daley improving tonight and I’m optimistic that once we have these two Cradley meetings out of the way and we start racing against teams of similar strength to ourselves we will be a lot better. But that isn’t satisfactory as we’ve lost six meetings on the bounce and that is not acceptable it’s unfortunate the way the fixtures have fallen which have given us some very tough meetings and the meetings amongst them that we thought we could have won we have suffered the most chronic luck. Even so it’s not acceptable and we are working hard to do something better."

STOKE 35: Lee Payne 11, Jon Armstrong 6+1, Chris Widman 6, Ryan Terry-Daley 5+1, Danny Phillips 5+1, Ryan MacDonald 1+1, Paul Burnett 1.
CRADLEY 43: Max Clegg 14, Matt Williamson 13, Michael Neale 6, Ellis Perks 5+4, Arron Mogridge 4, Luke Harris 1+1, Nathan Greaves r/r.
Abandoned after Heat 13 (power failure) – Result stands