POOLE PIRATES captain Bjarne Pedersen believes they put one wheel into the Knockout Cup semi-final with an impressive 58-34 home win over Reading.

The Dane also paid tribute to teammates Grzegorz Walasek, who scorched to a 16 paid 18 point maximum, and Jonas Davidsson, who got 13 paid 15, as Poole RIAS demolished the Bulldogs, writes Phil Chard.

Pedersen, who scored 10 paid 12 himself in the quarter-final, first leg, tie, said: "Fingers crossed, we shouldn't have any problems winning on aggregate now.

"I know we lost 50-40 at Reading in the league last week, but that was without Antonio Lindback and he is back for us in the second leg on Friday.

"Reading is not a new track for us either, like it was a week ago Monday.

"It was five years ago since I had last ridden there but we know the track now so we should be able to protect our 24-point advantage."

Pedersen added: "I am happy with our performance. I really feel we pushed hard right to the end.

"Jonas was firing tonight and it is nice to see him do that, while Greg got 18 points as well. The main thing is that everyone scored points."

Walasek, who notched his second paid maximum for Poole, said: "I was feeling pretty good tonight and the bike was going well, so that helped me get so many points.

"Also I changed my mechanic a couple of weeks ago and he pushes me more.

"I think a 24-point lead should be good enough to win on aggregate at Reading."

Pirates: 1 Antonio Lindback (1*-3-2-3-1) 10+1, 2 Craig Boyce (2-1-1*-2-2*) 8+2, 3 Rider replacement for Krzysztof Kasprzak, 4 Grzegorz Walasek (2*-3-3-2*-3-3) 16+2, 5 Bjarne Pedersen (3-3-2*-0-2*) 10+2, 6 Jonas Davidsson (3-2*-1*-3-3-1) 13+2, 7 Shaun Tacey (0-0-1) 1.

Team manager: Neil Middleditch.

Reading: 1 Greg Hancock (3-2-1-2*-1) 9+1, 2 Travis McGowan (fell exc-0-3-0) 3, 3 (guest) Chris Schramm (0-0-1) 1, 4 Janusz Kolodziej (1-1-0-0) 2, 5 Matej Zagar (2-3-4-3-0) 12, 6 Glenn Cunningham (1*-0-fell exc-0) 1+1, 7 Sam Simota (2-1*-0-1-2) 6+1. Team manager: Jim Lynch.

POOLE RIAS PIRATES 58 READING BULLDOGS 34 Referee: Paul Carrington (Ipswich).