Speedway: Craig cooks up a plan for quick return

Cook has been sidelined for almost five weeks after breaking his left wrist during Matthew Wethers’ Testimonial meeting last month but, depending on the results of an x-ray, the high-scoring Englishman could be back in the saddle earlier than planned as Monarchs eye a  possible league and cup  double.

Cook said today: “I don’t know how strong my wrist is because I haven’t been able to test it yet. I’m planning to have a practice session this week, failing that I’m going to do some moto-cross to see how my wrist stands up.

“But if my wrist isn’t strong enough then I won’t be riding, I don’t want to come back  too early and risk getting  injured again, especially as Monarchs look like reaching the play-offs.

“That’s my ideal aim, to be back for them as I seriously believe we have a good chance of winning the league.

“I’m booked in for an x-ray midweek before I undertake any try out, and if it reveals my wrist is healed, I will hopefully be able to ride on Friday. It’s still not back to full strength but feels strong enough to me. I can pull myself up off the ground, but when it reaches a certain angle, I feel a tweak and I get a bit of a sharp pain, it could be the tendons though.”

Cook has been named in the line-up for the Premier League Riders’ Championship at  Sheffield on September 23, but he cautioned: “If I was going  to compete in that, I would have to be back riding before  that date because it’s a very intense individual meeting  and I don’t want to go  along just to make up the numbers.”

It may well be that Cook will have to delay his comeback by a week, but with reserve Jozsef Tabaka, who broke his hand in Poland, scheduled to be back in the saddle at the end of this month, Monarchs will definitely be at full strength for their play-off campaign – they need only win their remaining home fixtures to qualify – and their KO Cup semi-final ties against Ipswich Witches in October, and what a massive boost this would be in their chase for silverware.