COVENTRY suffered another bitterly disappointing result on the road with a 59-35 defeat at Belle Vue in Monday’s Elite League fixture.
The Buildbase Bees’ away record now stands at one win in eleven, and there never appeared too much chance of that statistic changing in Manchester as they were out-gated throughout much of the contest.
A win in Heat 1 from Krzysztof Kasprzak got Bees off to a good start, but a rush of advantages for the Aces followed, so much so that they were 21-9 up after five races leaving Bees immediately calling for a tactical ride.
Stuart Robson went for double in Heat 6 and scored four points for second place, but skipper Scott Nicholls was relegated to the back behind Ulrich Ostergaard as the Aces shared the race 4-4.
Any thoughts of a Coventry comeback were ended with successive 5-1s to the home side in Heats 9 and 10 with Nicholls and Robson beaten by Craig Cook and Kevin Wolbert in the former race for that partnership’s third maximum of the night.
At 20-42 down Bees deployed Kasprzak for their second tactical ride in Heat 11 but he also was limited to second place with the back-to-form Magnus Zetterstrom taking the win for the home side, although Robson’s third place at least gave the visitors a 5-3.
There was little in the way of further damage across the closing races but the job was already done for the Aces, who added 4-2s in Heats 12 and 14 before Cook missed out on a paid-15 maximum to Kasprzak in the last race, the Pole having also taken the flag in Heat 13 on a night where really only he and Robson could be satisfied with their displays.
Robson said: “Paid-13 isn’t bad for me, including the four-pointer, although it was a shame I got that last in the middle of the meeting. I changed a few things after that and it pulled things together a bit.
“The Belle Vue guys were quick off the start and there were about two passes all night, so that just goes to show how important the starts were.
“Scott (Nicholls) is riding his heart out and you can see he’s really trying, and he’s so frustrated. I know how he feels because I was going through this myself recently for a month or so. It’s so frustrating when you try everything and nothing works.â€
BELLE VUE 59: Craig Cook 12+2, Magnus Zetterstrom 10+2, Matej Zagar 10, Kevin Wolbert 9+1, Kevin Doolan 8+1, Josh Grajczoenk 5+1, Ulrich Ostergaard 5+1.
COVENTRY 35: Krzysztof Kasprzak 13, Stuart Robson 12+1, Aaron Summers 4, Grzegorz Zengota 3, Scott Nicholls 3, Adam Roynon 0, Michal Szczepaniak R/R.
