Edinburgh Monarchs in menacing mood to take down Scunthorpe Scorpions

Justin Sedgmen turned in a superb display for the Monarchs. Picture: Jack Cupido.

It's the Capital septet's third success on the trot on home shale following last month's shock defeat to the Plymouth Gladiators. However, it's the magnitude of victory that will do wonders for morale ahead of a busy run of fixtures that will see the Monarchs contest four meetings in seven days, starting with next Friday's return leg at Scunthorpe.

Despite last night's Armadale triumph, Monarchs are still propping up the table but do have matches in hand on some of the sides above them.

There's an air of confidence growing within the blue and gold camp and that is evident by some big scores throughout the team - both Josh Pickering and Justin Sedgmen went through the card unbeaten by an opponent, skipper Paco Castagna continued his rich vein of form with three heat wins and Kye Thomson was impressive as he made the switch to No.2 from the middle riding order. Lasse Fredriksen and Connor Coles chipped in with 11 between them and although teenager Max James failed to score, it was great to see the youngster back in the saddle following a spell off the bike due to a rib injury.

Australian Sedgmen said afterwards: "No disrespect to the Scunthorpe guys but when you look down the list, we should win comfortably on our home track. When we go there on Friday, it might be a different story because they are pretty dialled in. We needed to do a good job - heats 13 and 15 we just did our thing. When it came to gate positions I felt I was gating well so it gave Josh a good run round the outside.

"I do as much as I can in the pits but Paco's doing a really good job as captain and I'm really enjoying riding my bike at the moment. I can't complain. I'm just trying to do my own thing and score as many points as I can for the club."

Monarchs: Sedgment 14, Pickering 13, Castagna 9, Thomson 9, Coles 6, Fredriksen 5, James 0.

Scorpions: Allen 9, Howarth 8, Lambert 8, Ablitt 6, Mountain 2, Simpson 1.