RICHARD Lawson was left "really annoyed" by the antics of Glasgow Tigers star Ulrich Ostergaard during last night's clash at Wimborne Road, insisting: "For me, it's cheating."

Lawson enjoyed a fine evening, named rider of the night after totalling paid 14 from his five rides, as Pirates won 51-39.

The Whitehaven-born star was beaten just once by an opponent all night, finishing second behind veteran Dane Ostergaard in heat seven.

And Lawson expressed his frustrations at the 41-year-old for supposedly moving at the start line, before flying out the gate to victory.

"I was a little bit annoyed with the referee (Chris Gay) for that one with Ostergaard," said Lawson.

"He’s notorious for it. He did it to me at Glasgow when we were up there and he did it twice at King’s Lynn.

"He just cannot sit still. I get annoyed when I get beat, but, for me, it’s cheating.

"That’s not the way it’s supposed to be, so that really annoyed me. But it also fired me up, so it might have been a good thing!"

Reflecting on Poole's victory, which moves them to within a point of second-placed Glasgow, Lawson added: "The track guy did something slightly different, on the starts as well. So I think that was positive because we were all making good starts.

"Everyone here, we were all up for it (last night).

"With a team like Glasgow, we knew it was going to be tough.

"I think these last few weeks we’ve been underperforming and we knew what we needed to do. Like Middlo (Neil Middleditch) said on the track walk, 'this is crunch time, we’ve got to do the business and now is the time to do it'."