STEWART Dickson has called on his Glasgow Tigers side to stay “sensible” as they defend a 24-point lead in the KO Cup at Edinburgh tomorrow.
The Peugeot Ashfield Stadium side will be at full strength for the visit to Armadale, knowing that a 23-point deficit or better will see them into the semi-finals.
It’s a chance for the Tigers to bounce back from Sunday’s first home defeat of the season against Somerset.
Dickson believes that calm heads will put them into the latter stages of the competition – and has urged his team to get off to a strong start.
He said: “Our riders will still want to win races and score points at Edinburgh because it’s their wages, but the word is sensible – we can’t give them the momentum and let them get off to a good start.
“Teams that are good bounce back from defeats. We need to show some character on Friday night because when you lose a match, everybody comes for you – there’s no sympathy.
“We need to get a few race wins in the first few races and put a marker down, because hopefully by seven or eight races in, Edinburgh will realise that they’re not going to turn it back and it’ll settle down a bit.
“But we can’t afford to let them get off to a flying start, because we’ll make a hard night even harder. We’ll be going there to defend it sensibly, but at the same time to put on a good show for the fans that go through.”
Captain Aaron Summers, meanwhile, insists that Glasgow will return to winning ways soon – despite the setback of Sunday’s defeat.
He said: “It’s just one of those meetings but we’ll move on from it and start getting our wins back.
“It was just one of those days. We’ll come back strong and start winning again.”