Eight major trophies in four years but no league crown since SL31 for Coventry. A long run without success for the record seven time champions, who have had to witness Houston win the last three titles, a team they have finished runners-up to in two of those three campaigns. John Hawke, Angus Rogers and Anthony Collier have all been ever-presents for Coventry as the Mustangs racked up their hat-trick of successes, and Dave Hood has gone with the trio again at heat leader in a bid to wrestle the league crown from the Scots’ grasp. Having hardly dropped a point between them in pre-season it looks a good call by Hood, Hawke—who won the World Championship for the first time in his ninth GP series last year—in fact has scored maximums in three of the four warm-ups, his only failure coming at Rhonnda this week where the Crusaders suffered their only pre-season defeat to date, even then he managed 11 in the narrow 44-46 loss. Collier and Rogers both have two maximums apiece from the four fixtures, leaving the Coventry faithful very content that the points will be there at the top end. Hood has turned to Stuart Goodman to bolster the Coventry second string ranks, he hoping the 24 year old can bring some of that title magic—he arriving on loan from Houston where he played a big part in all of their recent successes—to Diamond Park. The jury’s still out if the move will be a success, however he has out-scored SL35 £190,000 signing Jake Bryant throughout pre-season, a rider who lines-up at number two despite averaging just 1.76 in his eight league meetings for the club last year. Having Thomas Gentry at reserve—he’s averaging 7.75—mitigates that somewhat.