ARENA Essex got over the disappointment of Friday's 44-45 home defeat against Sheffield and Monday night's rain-cancelled fixture at Exeter by staging a remarkable recovery in their away match against the Trelawny Tigers on Tuesday, snatching a last-gasp 46-44 victory.

The home side led 34-26 with just five of the 15 heats remaining and looked odds-on to take the league points, but the determined Hammers, led by Kelvin Tatum, stormed back to level the scores with two successive 5-1 maximum heat advantages in heats 12 and 13.

With the match all square at 39-39, Czech Pavel Ondrasik headed home the Arena pairing of Lee Herne and Scott Courtney in the re-run of heat 14 after the home side's Steve Masters had fallen in the first attempt to stage the race.

And so it went to a last heat decider where it was Tatum who led from start to finish, just ahead of home skipper Harris.

The Hammers' celebrations were well and truly set off when Leigh Lanham slipped past Emiliano Sanchez on the third bend to go on to claim the vital third place to give Arena their first away league win of the season.

July 11, 2002 12:00