Scottish Speedway derby: Edinburgh Monarchs meet Glasgow Tigers in semi-final

Two Scottish sides will meet in a Speedway Championship semi-final play-off for the first time in a decade when Glasgow Tigers take on Edinburgh Monarchs.

The first of two legs will take place at West Lothian’s Armadale Stadium, home of the Monarchs on Friday.

Both sides compete in the British Speedway Championship against eight other teams from across Great Britain.

The Tigers are the reigning league champions and currently top the league, with their Edinburgh rivals in fourth place.

Ahead of the first leg of the play-off clash, Glasgow Tigers captain Chris Harris says he is looking forward to another “feisty” derby.

Speaking to STV Sport, he said: “It’s always exciting when you get to this stage of the season, the play-off is always what we all aim for, so to finish the league at the top going into the play-offs is encouraging, but obviously we all now start from scratch.

“Edinburgh came to us at the start of the season in the Scottish Cup, and they beat us, we won at their place, but they came to us a week later and beat us, so you can never write Edinburgh off, we never write anyone off, but especially Edinburgh because both sets of fans, management and drivers know what it means to win these local derbies.

“It’s going to be a real ‘ding-dong battle’ as they say, and we will have to up our game.

“I always love a local derby, I’ve had a few in my time, but the Scottish ones always seem a bit more feisty, if you like but I always love the atmosphere between the two sets of fans, the riders, and the management, it’s great.

“It always makes it a better atmosphere when you have a rivalry like that.”

Edinburgh Monarchs’ Justin Sedgmen said: “It’s been a hard year for the team. There have been times when we have just missed out on meetings. We have always gone on to the final heat of the night, and it’s been a last-heat decider.

“We’ve kind of scraped through the qualifying stages to get to this position, but other than that, it has been a good, solid year, really.

“We are in the play-offs now, and obviously anything can happen from here.

“I played in the last derby at this stage in 2015, hopefully I’m a little bit of a lucky charm to help the boys get across the line.

“That game ten years ago was a bit of a milestone for Scottish Speedway, with Glasgow and Edinburgh going against each other in the final, luckily for Edinburgh we came out on top that time.

“This is only the semi-final this time, but obviously very important to get through to the next stage and reach the grand final.

“The fans take this game and rivalry to another level. The riders all have a mutual respect for each other. It is really cool for a rider to come here and ride in front of your own fans, with all the away support from Glasgow.”

Each speedway match has 15 races, with two teams battling it out to win league points.

Each four-lap race sees four riders compete against each other, two from the home team and two from the away team, each riding a 500cc motorcycle with no brakes.

Tapes go up at 7.30pm on Friday at Armadale Stadium.