PIRATES chief Matt Ford lifted the lid on his play-off anguish and admitted: "Unquestionably, there were regrets."

Poole's hopes of an unprecedented fourth straight Elite League title came crashing down at Wolverhampton last week, with Peter Adams's side now possessing the upper hand heading into tonight's grand final second leg at Belle Vue.

The defeat at Monmore Green saw Pirates relinquish a 12-point advantage from the first leg and occurred against the backdrop of the enforced late withdrawals of Antonio Lindback – deputy for the sidelined Hans Andersen – and Bjarne Pedersen, who had replaced Davey Watt in April.

And while reserves Kyle Newman and Adam Ellis bagged 23 sensational points between them, top-five riders Krzysztof Buczkowski, Brady Kurtz and guest Rohan Tungate managed just four combined.

Ford admitted prior to the play-offs he had considered making other changes to his talented but inconsistent septet during the season. And now the Wimborne Road promoter has revealed he "probably should have".

He told the Daily Echo: "Going out in the semis does leave a bitter taste. The truth is there were three clubs, Poole plus the two clubs which qualified for the final, which had the ability to win the league.

"On our days we were all very good but we were also capable of under-delivering and sadly for us, the day we failed under-delivered was in the second leg of the semi-final.

"I did contemplate making changes during the season and hindsight is a great thing. There were one or two who didn't deliver and perhaps they were the same people I was considering making changes with over the past couple of months.

"Should I have done it? Chances are, I probably should have. But sometimes things are personal and you don't want to take people's jobs away from them without a lot of thought.

"It's so cruel in speedway. I wish we had the opportunity to take people out of the team for a few matches. If a player is out of form for Eddie Howe at Bournemouth, he can bring someone else in who he feels more up to the task at that point in time, whereas we have to make a permanent change and that's it.

"I don't want to go into names, I don't think I need to. I think the fans will make their own judgments as to who failed to perform and I'm sure it won't be any different to my thoughts.

"It was disappointing all-round."

Pirates' failure to make the grand final was the first time they had fallen short of that goal since 2009. And Ford admitted the semi-final exit had made him question a number of his own decisions.

He added: "Receiving the phone call from Antonio's manager at 7.30am on the morning of the semi-final to say he had been in hospital threw up all types of concerns.

"You then question if the decision you made to make that change in the first place was a wise one. When things go wrong in any form of life, we all have a moment of reflection where we think, 'did I do the right thing?'.

"In 2016, I would say a couple of points during the season, probably those I've mentioned, made us not perform to our highest standard.

"Perhaps I should have not made the (Lindback) change and gone with a guest for those meetings, although that may not have been to our advantage. Who knows?

"I live on the fact that if Bjarne and Hans had been with us then I feel things would have been different.

"You reflect and think whether you have made mistakes, whether you should have changed things beforehand. Perhaps now I need to stop being quite so personal with the riders and let them be in the team purely on merit rather than building too close a friendship with them.

"The two reserves were an absolute dream on the night against Wolves and walked out with their heads held high. But sadly it didn't happen for the rest of the team."