POLISH ace Patryk Wojdylo is the latest victim of the King’s Lynn injury curse as the Stars prepare to round off their Premiership campaign.
Wojdylo crashed and broke his hand riding for Krosno at Rybnik on Sunday and will miss the fixture against Belle Vue tonight (Wednesday) and the visit of Sheffield to the Adrian Flux Arena on Thursday.
Jan Kvech is missing due to a Czech league fixture tonight with Richard Lawson again guesting at No.1 while Drew Kemp replaces Wojdylo and Chris Harris guests for the injured Nikolai Klindt. The Stars continue to operate rider-replacement for Benjamin Basso.
But it’s not all bad news for the Stars as captain Niels-Kristian Iversen is available as he is not racing in Denmark and the use of a “no facility” guest against Oxford on Thursday means he is free to return to the starting seven.
Belle Vue have qualified for the play-offs but will be looking to bounce back from a heavy defeat at Sheffield on Monday night.
The Aces await a fitness report on captain Brady Kurtz who rode in the lunchtime fixture between the sides but aggravated an injury suffered in Poland the previous week and did not make the return trip over the Pennines.
Stars manager Rob Lyon said: “Jan’s away in a Czech Ekstraliga match which wasn’t on the calendar when we looked at it but which we can’t change unfortunately. It’s just one of those things but Richard (Lawson) had another great score for us last Thursday.
“As we aren’t in with a chance of the play-offs it does take the pressure off a little bit but the team gave 100 per cent last week and we move on to the next one.”
King’s Lynn: Richard Lawson, Benjamin Basso r/r, Chris Harris, Drew Kemp, Niels-Kristian Iversen, Lewis Kerr, Anders Rowe.
Belle Vue: Dan Bewley, Norick Blodorn, Jaimon Lidsey, Ben Cook, Brady Kurtz (or R/R), Antti Vuolas, Jake Mulford.
Words by George Dodds.
Images by Taylor Lanning.