Wolverhampton 56, Oxford Cheetahs 34

GRESHAM Oxford Cheetahs' purple patch ended at Wolverhampton last night and an injury to Paul Hurry added to the misery..

Hurry was taken off in an ambulance after a nasty looking fall in heat 6 which caused ligament damage to his knee which will keep him out of tomorrow's clash with Poole and possibly this weekend's Intercontinental Final.

There was an omen of things to follow as Jason Crump missed the gate in the opening heat and he had to settle for second place behind Mikael Karlsson, who clocked a new track record.

Heat five saw Crump back out, but once again he could not get his nose in front despite a battle royal with Sam Ermolenko, and the Cheetahs were already eight points adrift.

Hurry and Steve Schofield gated well enough in heat six but got shunted out of the way on a very dubious first turn, before Hurry's night ended in the dirt.

Paul slowly reeled the Wolves in and was going for a sweep around the last bend when he hit a big patch of dirt and went hurtling towards the fence at an immense rate, eventually ending up on the dog track with the fourth bend fencing demolished. It was immediately clear that all was not well as Paul failed to stir for quite a while, and eventually as taken off in the ambulance.

Another 3-3 in heat 7, with Jason Crump being put under severe pressure by Gary Stead, and then a 5-1 to the Wolves saw the Cheetahs sixteen points behind after just eight heats.

Martin Goodwin then used Todd Wiltshire as a tactical substitute in heat nine with Oxford 16 points down and, together with 'Schoey', Cheetahs had their tails up for the first time in the meeting, only for Ermolenko to slide off on the third bend and stay down so that the race was stopped.

In the re-run, Wiltshire got ahead again, but Schofield had to settle for a third, in what was the Cheetahs only heat advantage all night.

A succession of 4-2s for the Wolves through the second half of the meeting meant that the Cheetahs' fate was sealed as early as heat 11. Wolverhampton: M Kartlsson 14, G Stancl 5+2, S Ermolenko 14+1, M Loram 13+1, G Stead 2, JJensen 8+1. 56 pts.

Oxford: J Crump 12+1, S Johnston 4+2, T Wiltshire 9+1, P Hurry 1, S Schofield 5+1, J Staechmann 3.

Heat Details

Heat 1: Karlsson, Crump, Johnston, Stancl. 56.28 secs. Heat 2: Jenson, Staechmann, Schofield, Stead (ef). 58.57. Heat 3: Karlsson, Ermolenko, Wiltshire, Johnston. 57.18. Heat 4: Loram, Jensen, Hurry, Staechmann. 57.71. Heat 5: Ermolenko, Crump, Johnston, Stancl. 57.68. Heat 6: Karlsson, Stancl, Schofield, Hurry (f). 57.51. H eat 7: Loram, Wiltshire, Crump, Stead. 58.13. Heat 8: Jensen, Stancl, Staechmann, Johnston. 58.81. Heat 9: Wiltshire, Loram, Schofield, Ermolenko (f-ex). 58.94. Heat 10: Karlsson, Crump, Stancl, Wiltshire. 57.02. Heat 11: Loram, Johnston, Stead, Crump (f). 58.07. Heat 12: Ermolenko, Schofield, Wiltshire, Jensen. 58.11. Heat 13: Crump, Karlsson, Loram, Staechmann. 57.53. Heat 14: Ermolenko, Wiltshire, Stead, Staechmann. 58.31. Heat 15: Ermolenko, Crump, Loram, Wiltshire. 57.80.

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.