Workington Comets will be without Australian number one Connor Bailey for Saturday’s National Development League meeting at Berwick.
Bailey rides for Championship side Redcar Bears, as well as the Comets, and as they have first call he will be tracking for them against Poole Pirates on Saturday night.
But Bailey, who top-scored with 13 in the Comets’ opening week against Edinburgh, last Saturday will be back for the return against the Bullets on Sunday afternoon.
The Comets can use a guest to replace their absent number one and have opted for the vastly experienced Lee Complin.
The Yorkshireman, now 38, started his speedway career in 2001 and rode at various times for the likes of Stoke, Eastbourne, Wolves and Berwick before walking away from the sport in 2011.
In 2022, he made a surprise comeback and signed for Newcastle Diamonds in the SGB Championship but they folded in June and he signed for Plymouth Gladiators in August, finishing the season with them.
This year he signed with the Glasgow Tigers for the 2023 Championship season as well as for Mildenhall Fen Tigers in the National Development League.
Bailey had scored two vital points for Redcar Bears last night in the first leg of their 48-42 defeat at Poole in the BSN Series semi-final.
Only two late 5-1s ensured the Pirates took the advantage from their home leg into the return leg on Saturday night.
Australian Bailey, the Workington Comets number one in the National Development League, took second in heat seven behind Poole’s former Workington rider Richard Lawson.
Bailey and another ex-Comets rider Charles Wright shared the points in that heat and it took the Pirates until the following heat to level the scores. Indeed they were two points down once again before taking the maximum from Heats 14 and 15.
Danny King starred on his old home track for the visitors with 15 points, but he and Charles Wright (12+1) were upstaged by Richard Lawson (13) and Steve Worrall in Heat 15 after Kyle Newman and Zach Cook had put the Pirates ahead with a 5-1 in the previous race.
Bears co-promoter Jade Mudgway said: “I think you’ve got to look at the match as a whole, we did a great job, everyone worked hard and got stuck in.
“Poole go just as well at our place so we will have to be on our game right from the off for the return on Saturday night.
“We can do this, we are on course for another Final so the fans, as they always do, need to get behind the boys and make themselves heard on the terraces.”
News of other ex Comets – Edinburgh gave their season a major boost with a thumping 54-36 away win at Birmingham in the Cab Direct Championship.
The Monarchs put on a dominant display at Perry Barr, led by their ex-Comet stand-in skipper Craig Cook with 14 points from five rides.
Kyle Bickley failed to score in three outings at reserve but the former Workington rider, who raced for Edinburgh’s Academy side at Northside on Saturday, gets a guest booking at reserve for Wolves tonight at Belle Vue.
Bickley is a former Belle Vue Colt and he gets the opportunity because Leon Flint is contesting the FIME European Under-23 Team Championship semi-final in Germany.
