By Julie Martin - Weymouth Wildcats Speedway

Weymouth Doonan Wildcats welcome the nomadic Wimbledon Dons to the Wessex Stadium this Saturday 17th May, in what promises to be a tough test for the home side. Once a dominant force in the Conference League, the club formally based at Plough Lane has been homeless since 2005 when contract negotiations between the Wimbledon Speedway Plc promotion and the stadium owners GRA failed to reach a satisfactory conclusion. Since then, while the Plc fruitlessly searches for an alternative venue, Nick Taylor who runs the Wimbledon Supporters club has worked tirelessly to keep the Dons name alive by arranging challenge matches with current clubs using former members of the Dons teams.

This Saturday’s team is possibly one of the strongest yet with the bulk of the team being former Dons. Jem Dicken Wildcats team manager said, “Not only have they got a strong team, several of them know their way round the Wessex Stadium a bit too well! There will be no resting on our laurels after last weeks crushing victory over the Crusaders, my boys won’t want to be beaten on their home turf and looking down the race sheet there is going to be some cracking encounters. Young Jerran Hart showed us what he could do last week when taking the scalp of Jay Herne and Tim Webster in his tactical ride for Sittingbourne, and Andrew Bargh came off 15 meters when riding for the Somerset Giants and did exactly the same. Tom Brown, Nathan Irwin and Terry Day know this track as well as any and in form Lee Strudwick was flying here in the Under 21s where he finished 3rd. Matt Wright is also pretty handy round the Wessex so the whole team are going to have to be on song to have any chance of pulling this one off!”

Provisional Line Ups are

Weymouth Doonan Wildcats
1 Jon Armstrong
2 Brendan Johnson
3 Luke Priest
4 Karl Mason
5 Jay Herne
6 Tim Webster
7 Kyle Newman

Wimbledon Dons
1 Andrew Bargh
2 Jerran Hart
3 Tom Brown
4 Nathan Irwin
5 Matt Wright
6 Lee Strudwick
7 Terry Day

Weymouth Speedway host the coveted Conference League Pairs in just over two weeks on Saturday 31st May tapes up 7.15pm. The groups are as follows line-ups to be confirmed:-

Group 1
Weymouth
Redcar
Sittingbourne
Buxton

Group 2
Boston
Plymouth
Rye House
Scunthorpe