TINKERMAN Matt Ford is adamant he is not afraid to further ring the changes to make Pirates’ play-off dream a reality.

Excluding guests, Poole have used no fewer than 11 riders this season, a figure which is tomorrow due to increase to 12 when Frederik Jakobsen makes his debut against visitors Belle Vue (7.30pm).

And with Pirates second-bottom of the SGB Premiership and six points adrift of the top four, boss Ford says he will closely monitor any potential switches.

He told the Daily Echo: “It seems that in every meeting we have a couple of guys who lose their form. Last week it was Mat Szczepaniak and Richie Worrall, the week before, Josh Grajczonek and Brady Kurtz.

“It seems we are not clicking together. Something has to be done. I would not say we have made our final move, by any means, because we have still only ridden 12 matches out of 28.

“I am a realist and can see we are not as competitive as we should be. I will keep a close eye on whether anything comes up which we can do.

“The last thing you want to do is drop Poole assets in favour of other people who may come in for a short-term fix because these guys will have the chance to represent the club for many years to come.”

Although mindful improvements could be made, Ford is taking positives from recent league results.

He said: “What we are doing is getting points. We’ve taken something from the past seven league matches and had it not been for the home result against Swindon, we would be in a different position and people wouldn’t be so panicky.

“I’m still confident. If we can keep pinching these points away from home, we are still set to make the play-offs.

“So far, we have had five home and seven away but of the seven away we have ridden twice at Belle Vue, twice at Wolverhampton and once at Swindon, so we have taken on a lot of the bigger teams.

“Our past four away results are 48-42 at Belle Vue, Somerset and Rye House and 46-44 at Wolverhampton.

“We are running many of these clubs to last-heat deciders but are not quite getting the results.

“If we can keep pushing our rivals away and start getting some advantage at home, there is an awful lot still to play for. By no means are we out of this race.

“Hopefully, everyone will keep the faith like we are as a club.”

Nico Covatti guests for Poole against the Aces as Danish star Nicolai Klindt is due to race in his homeland.

Belle Vue will operate rider replacement for the injured Jason Garrity, while Scott Nicholls guests for Rohan Tungate, who like Klindt is riding in Denmark.

Pirates: (from) Brady Kurtz, Josh Grajczonek, Kacper Woryna, Richie Worrall, Linus Sundstrom, Frederik Jakobsen, Nico Covatti (guest).

Belle Vue: (from) Craig Cook, Jason Garrity r/r, Dan Bewley, Scott Nicholls (guest), Max Fricke, Jye Etheridge, Damian Drozdz.