Poole Pirates must bounce back after shock defeat, says owner

The Pirates suffered a shock defeat to Glasgow Tigers in the SGB Championship grand final, ending their two-year winning streak.

Ford said his team had been left “devastated” by the loss, but vowed they would regroup ahead of their fixture with Scunthorpe Scorpions this Sunday in the Knockout Cup final first leg.

He said: “The whole team and the whole club are absolutely devastated and gutted.

“It was something we were working all season towards. We were going for a treble, a double is still on the cards, but we wanted to win it [SGB championship] and we gave our everything but no excuses.

“Over the two legs Glasgow were certainly the better team.”

The Dorset-based motorsport team will now turn their attention to securing the three-peat in the KO Cup and adding another SGB Championship to their name.

“We can’t reflect on that too much, we’ve got to draw a line under it,” Ford added.

“We’ve got the first leg at Scunthorpe of the KO Cup final this Sunday, and then we’re back at Wimborne Road on Wednesday.

“We need to bounce back quickly, we’re not sure how we’ll do that just yet, but we need to dig deep and forget about last week.”

Ford said that The Pirates do not plan on leaving the second division, having attracted a flourish of supporters to Wimborne Road since leaving the topflight due to games being televised in the first division.

“We’re sticking with the second division, we have the option to move up whenever we choose to,” he said. “We’ve won the league for the past two seasons, so the option has been there to move up a division but it requires you to fill a TV contract which just doesn’t suit us.

“The crowds we’ve been experiencing have been a reflection of that, we are probably the highest supported club in the league and maybe even in the country, so we see no reason to move back up to the top league.

“We’ve been there, done that, and had success there but were enjoying our time in the championship at the minute.”