PROMOTER Matt Ford blasted Poole Pirates for their “dreadful” surrender of a 12-point lead in the final six heats at Wolverhampton on Monday.

Pirates were 33-21 up after nine races at Monmore Green but relinquished the advantage after Freddie Lindgren led an 8-1 tactical victory for Wolves.

And the Wimborne Road chief pulled no punches in his post-meeting assessment and called on his stars to “take a long hard look at themselves” in the aftermath of the last-ditch setback.

An irate Ford told the club website: “That can only be described as a dreadful performance and it has really hampered our chances of claiming the top spot.

“I said before that I wouldn’t be happy with just a consolation point and happy I am not. It was unacceptable from certain quarters and some will have to take a long hard look at themselves. We did not see the championship potential in Pirates and that is what I strive for.

“It would be easy to look at the scores and say ‘if we hadn’t conceded that 5-1 through the tactical’ but we did and we didn’t bring out the arsenal to recover from it.

“We still held a lead even after that but surrendered it when we should have been building on it. That was certainly three very big points dropped.”