SWINDON are six points clear at the top of the Premiership after seeing off King’s Lynn 52-38 at the Abbey on Thursday.

British Champion Robert Lambert provided some thrilling resistance for the Stars, but the CFS Filtration Robins proved a much stronger all-round unit.

Admittedly things may well have been closer had Michael Palm Toft in particular been available for the visitors, but Alun Rossiter’s side still did a solid job in what was a far more convincing display than in last week’s narrow win over Rye House.

Robins went in front with a 4-2 in Heat 2 as Zach Watjknecht stormed inside Ben Morley going into the third bend, and the re-united Tobiasz Musielak/David Bellego combination secured the first 5-1 of the night in Heat 3.

Troy Batchelor got the better of Lambert in the next race before Musielak pulled off the ride of the night in Heat 5 as he chased Niels-Kristian Iversen before slipping through on the run to the line with a clever inside move.

Lambert won Heat 6 and then teamed up with Thomas Jorgensen for a 5-1 in Heat 7 as a tactical substitute as the Stars threatened a comeback, but that advantage was quickly cancelled out by Adam Ellis and Wajtknecht in Heat 8.

And Ellis was involved again two races later with a 5-1 alongside Nick Morris over Jorgensen which put the Robins in control at 40-26 with five heats to go.

Batchelor defeated Iversen in Heat 11 with Wajtknecht passing Lewis Kerr for third to effectively secure the points, and they were locked up completely in Heat 13 by Morris and Batchelor, who team-rode superbly to fend off the challenge of Lambert with Iversen at the back.

The Stars battled to the end and took 4-2s in the last two races, Bellego splitting Jorgensen and Kevin Doolan in Heat 14, whilst Lambert won Heat 15 with Musielak having to take a 15-metre penalty for a start-line offence.

Rossiter said: “As I said last week, we can’t be complacent. We had a long chat before the meeting, and whilst they did have some riders missing it was still important to get the points on the board.

“We didn’t want to be struggling and having to fight back like last week, so it was nice to see it work out.

“All in all, it was a good all-round team performance and I’m pretty happy with that. You can only beat what’s put in front of you, we’ve got the points on the table and we’re still up at the top.

Robins head to Rye House next Wednesday (June 27) in their next Premiership fixture, but the scheduled home match against Belle Vue on Monday July 2 is off due to a potential clash with an England game in the football World Cup.

PREMIERSHIP
SWINDON 52: Troy Batchelor 12, Tobiasz Musielak 11, Adam Ellis 9+1, Nick Morris 7+3, David Bellego 6+2, Zach Wajtknecht 6+1, Jack Smith 1.
KING’S LYNN 38: Robert Lambert 14+1, Niels-Kristian Iversen 8, Thomas Jorgensen 8, Kevin Doolan 5+1, Ben Morley 3+1, Lewis Kerr 0, Ty Proctor r/r
Premiership points: Swindon 3 King’s Lynn 0