There was disappointment at West Row on Sunday (26th.June) as Mildenhall Fen Tigers – proudly sponsored by Manchetts Rescue and Recovery – suffered a surprise 11 point defeat by Leicester Lion Cubs.

The 39-50 loss was a result few would’ve seen coming but the hosts were caught cold by a Leicester team who were in their seventh NDL match of the season, while for Mildenhall this was a first home match of their title defence.

Eleven points adrift after the opening third of the match was completed was to prove a deficit Malcolm Vasey & Jason Gardner’s charges were unable ultimately to overcome.  

That it was going to be a highly unusual afternoon was seen as early as the first race when skipper Jason Edwards (who’d barely dropped a point around his home circuit this term previously) was relegated to third place behind surprise winner for the East Midlanders’ Mickie Simpson and the 2019 NDL champions’ number one Dan Thompson – a display of team riding to keep Edwards at bay. 

Jason had found the outside trap a tricky place to start from and thus it was two races later for normally fast starting Jack Kingston.  Trailing last exiting bend two, Kingston took a nasty tumble. There was no way he’d be up either to remount or clear the track from such a fall but the red lights didn’t come on – well, not until the two Leicester riders were exiting bend four. Just the two Lion Cubs? Yes, because in those fatal seconds of prevarication the Fen Tigers’ Sam Bebee (talking the Rider Replacement slot due to Alex Spooner’s withdrawal through injury) had slid off into the air fence. So, to the dismay of the home supporters the decision was to exclude both Mildenhall riders – the 0-5 meaning it was a nine points deficit already.

With the Thompson twins in sizzling form, it was always going to be tough to reel in that sort of lead. Joe of the siblings was the next to take the chequered flag first in a terrific battle with home debutant, James Shanes – the Leicester skipper taking it by centimetres on the line. Then brother Dan held off Kingston and the 4-2 took the visitors’ lead into double figure territory.

There was a comeback mounted in the middle stanza of the match - three successive home 4-2s brought the scoreline to a more manageable looking 21-26 at the de facto halfway point of heat eight.

But the recovery was short-lived and former Fen Tiger Connor Coles had the beating of Edwards in heat 10 and despite two wins from his last two rides for Kingston (riding in his 50th. match for Mildenhall) there was to be no catching the rampant Lions – with the Thompson twins delivering a 4-2 in heat 13 (though to many in the stadium it had seemed that Edwards had caught Dan on the line) to clinch victory on the day. 

The brothers then went one better in a further match-up with Shanes & Edwards in heat 15 - with the 5-1 meaning a final winning margin of 11 was more than enough for the East Midlanders to take the full four match points.

Co-Team Manager Malcolm Vasey spoke at the end of a disappointing afternoon,

“The expression sometimes used is a bad day at the office - this was a dire day at the office.

“It certainly affected us to lose Alex [Spooner] to a dislocated shoulder before the match as R/R certainly didn’t get us the points Alex would have done based on his recent form at West Row. 

“Then having predominantly outside gates in the opening heats put us on the back foot. Obviously, the circumstances of heat three when we saw both our riders disqualified and conceding a 0-5 was really damaging and a 9 points deficit was always going to be a tall order to turn around against a team like Leicester with two such big hitter, in-form heat leaders like the Thompsons. After Jack [Kingston] fell I think most people would’ve expected the red light to come on straightaway but the ref didn’t stop the race until the riders were coming around to complete the first lap and by then Sam [Bebee] had tumbled off and so both of our riders were out - it was certainly not the first bit of particularly bad luck we’ve suffered.

“But we need to remember that we suffered an early set back losing our opening home match last season and went on to win the league, so we are not going to panic and we will regroup and go again with even greater vigour”

Mildenhall Fen Tigers 39

Jason Edwards    1, 3, 2, 0, 1          = 7
Sam Bebee         0, FX, 1, 3, 1*      = 5+1
Jack Kingston      FX, 2, 0, 3, 3       = 8
Alex Spooner – Rider Replacement
James Shanes    2, 3, 2, 2, 2, 0      = 11
Josh Warren       2, 1, 0, 1             = 4
Luke Muff         1*, 1*, 1, 1           = 4+2
Jacob Fellows (no. 8) – did not ride

Leicester Lion Cubs 50

Dan Thompson   2*, 3, 3, 1, 2*       = 11+2
Mickie Simpson   3, 1, 2, 1             = 7
Connor Coles      2*, 2, 3, R            = 7+1
Tom Spencer      3, 0, 0, 2             = 5
Joe Thompson    3, 2, 3, 3, 3          = 14
Vinnie Foord       3, 0, 1, 2, F         = 6
Max Perry           0, 0, 0                = 0

Heat details:

1 Simpson, D.Thompson, Edwards, Bebee 52.6  [1-5]
2 Foord, Warren, Muff, Perry 54.6  [4-8]
3 (rerun) Spencer, Coles, Bebee (fell exc. NUP), Kingston (fell exc.) 55.8 [4-13]
4 J.Thompson, Shanes, Muff, Perry 52.7  [7-16]
5 D.Thompson, Kingston, Simpson, Warren 54.1  [9-20]
6 Edwards, J.Thompson, Bebee, Foord 53.0  [13-22]
7 Shanes, Coles, Warren, Spencer 55.0  [17-24]
8 Bebee, Simpson, Muff, Perry 55.0  [21-26]
9 J.Thompson, Shanes, Foord, Kingston 54.7 [23-30]
10 Coles, Edwards, Bebee, Spencer 54.2  [26-33]
11 (rerun) D.Thompson, Shanes, Simpson, Warren 54.6  [28-37]
12 Kingston, Foord, Muff, Coles (fell rem. Ret.) 57.3  [32-39]
13  J.Thompson, Shanes, D.Thompson, Edwards 56.3  [34-43]
14 (stpd; awarded) Kingston, Spencer, Warren, Foord (fell) no time  [38-45]
15 J.Thompson, D.Thompson, Edwards, Shanes 55.9  [39-50]