SWINDON gave their season a massive boost with an impressive 55-37 win over King’s Lynn at the Abbey Stadium – in a meeting packed full of entertaining racing.

Alun Rossiter’s patched-up side pulled together superbly to secure a convincing victory against a Stars team who are once again tipped to be amongst the Elite League’s front-runners.

Stand-in skipper Nick Morris led the M&S Van Rental Robins in fine style as he dropped just one point from five rides – getting the better of visiting No.1 Niels-Kristian Iversen on no fewer than three occasions to add to his defeats of the Danish superstar in Wednesday’s fixture at King’s Lynn.

Morris was joined in the major points by guest Hans Andersen who again proved to be a more than capable stand-in at No.1 whilst there were two confidence-boosting race wins for Grzegorz Zengota.

British Under-21 Champion Kyle Howarth received a warm welcome back to the Abbey and was involved in some of the night’s best action, notably a ding-dong scrap with his national title rival Robert Lambert as the duo exchanged places throughout Heat 5 with the Robins rider prevailing.

At that stage the home side were just four points to the good, but back-to-back 5-1s in the next two races saw them establish control.

Stars boss Rob Lyon utilised the tactical ride facility in Heat 10 with Iversen, but he was restricted to four points for second place thanks to another fine ride by Morris, with Chris Harris passing Robert Lambert for third place.

The visitors’ best ride of the night came with a third-to-first effort from skipper Rory Schlein in Heat 11 as he got the better of Howarth and Andersen, but the Robins maintained a comfortable advantage.

And Morris raised the roof in Heat 15 with a gutsy defence of second place ahead of Iversen to partner Andersen to a final 5-1, resisting the Lynn man right to the line in a classic battle.

Rossiter said: “I don’t think you’ll get much better racing than that. It was a great win and I’m over the moon, because it’s been really tough – probably the hardest time I’ve had in my managerial career.

“That was a good all-round team performance and I’m pretty happy. Special praise for Nick, and I’m pleased that we’ve all dug in deep and won really well.

“We need to win at home to try and build up some confidence for when we go away, and certainly Nick, Kyle, and Zengi went well, and Lewis (Rose) showed some good signs too so I was pleased for him, and the guests did a great job for us.”

Rossiter confirmed he is hopeful that both Peter Kildemand and captain Troy Batchelor will be in the team for the Robins’ next meeting at home to Wolverhampton on April 30.

SWINDON 55: Hans Andersen 13, Nick Morris 11+3, Grzegorz Zengota 8, Kyle Howarth 7+1, Kyle Newman 7+1, Chris Harris 6+1, Lewis Rose 3+1
KING’S LYNN 37: Niels-Kristian Iversen 11, Lewis Kerr 8+2, Robert Lambert 6, Rory Schlein 6, Nicklas Porsing 3, Kenneth Bjerre 3, Ashley Morris 0
Elite League points: Swindon 3 King’s Lynn 0