ELITSERIEN: Lejonen one round away from victory

Yesterday saw the penultimate round in this year’s shortened regular season in Sweden.

Lejonen 51:39 Vetlanda 

Lejonen continues there winning ways to lead the league. Good news as they go towards the playoffs is that Swedish #2, Mattias Thörnblom scored a paid maximum of 14+1 to compliment strong performances from foreign heat leaders, Rohan Tungate (AUS, 14+1) and Nicolai Klindt (DEN, 11). Klindt remains the top scoring Dane in the league but surprisingly Adrian Gala (POL) struggled at #1 with just 6+1. 

Poznań’s Swedish rider, Filip Hjelmland, top scored for the visitors with 11 whilst Polish rider Michal Nowak scored 5+1. 

Masarna 46:44 Rospiggarna 

The visitors remain in 2nd and the home team in 3rd despite the latter’s narrow victory. Masarna rider Kim Nilsson continues a remarkable perfect 3.000 season and remains unbeaten at Avesta. Sweden’s SGP rider, Antonio Lindbäck, was also back at his best with  13+1 from 6 heats. 

Headline news for the visitors was the return of British U21 rider, Dan Bewley. He scored 11+1 and was only bettered by Rasmus Jensen (DEN) with 13+1.

Dackarna 49:41 Västervik 

The home team had the match sown up by heat 11, when they lead 40:26. So the visitors late serge only helped reduce the points difference in the end. 

Målilla’s Nordic riders led the way with Oliver Berntzon (SWE) 14, Frederik Jacobsen (DEN) 12+2, Jacob Thorssell (SWE) 11 and Hans Andersen (DEN) 10+2. 

Dackarna and Västervik signed SGP riders this week with Maciej Janowski returning to Målilla and Artem Laguta and also the U19 Dane, Marcus Birkemose joining the east coast team. However, none of them were available for this match. Instead it was Sweden’s Linus Sundström who top scored with 11+1. Australian, Sam Masters also took 9+2 for the visitors. 

Piraterna 40:50 Indianerna 

Another SGP rider, Niels Kristian Iversen made a happy return to Motala scoring a maximum 15 against his former club. Jonas Jeppesen also continued in his exceptional form, winning every heat he finished with 12. Only one exclusion when he clipped fellow Dane, Jonas Seifert-Salk in Heat 9 preventing him from competing for his third maximum in a row.

In this bottom of the table clash, Piraterna can be pleased that local boy, Jonas Davidsson continues to lead the team with 11+1 last night. For English speaking fans, new signing Broc Nicol from USA made a good start to his first ever match in Elitserien and scored 6+2. 

link for league table: