Ipswich Witches celebrate first title for 27 years

Ipswich Witches team boss Ritchie Hawkins admitted to feeling "overwhelmed" after seeing the team win their first league title since 1998.

The Witches beat Leicester Lions 46-43 in the second leg of the Premiership play-off final at their own Foxhall track to win 93-86 on aggregate, as former world champion Jason Doyle top scored for them with 10 points.

It was the club's 11th major trophy since they were founded in 1950 and first since their Knockout Cup win against Sheffield Tigers two years ago, but the outcome was only decided in the final heat of the night.

"It's been so many years coming, it was a tough night," Hawkins told BBC Radio Suffolk. "We knew it would be a massive fight. I felt we needed to win [the first leg] at Leicester and that certainly took the pressure off a little bit.

"There's a massive expectation here. Six weeks after I took over as team manager we were bottom of the second division and three years later we were top of the top division - I'm proud of that but it took us another seven or eight years to finish top.

"Every week we have the best crowds in the country and we've got the best supporters, I love the club."

Ipswich held a four-point lead from the first leg in Leicester but Adam Ellis was injured in a crash during that meeting so they had Keynan Rew in the line-up for the re-match as a guest rider.

He contributed 7+1 points and Emil Sayfutdinov added 9+2 to his 11 points from the first leg on Monday.

"I've waited so long for this. We've been close a few times, we've made finals but always fallen short," said captain Danny King, who has been with the Witches since he was 16.

"We left it late but we got the job done. Leicester are a strong team who ride our track very well and they were actually outgating us, but we didn't give up, we just kept fighting all the way and got the result we deserved.

"It's the first time I've won the top league, it ticks a lot of boxes and to be able to do it with Ipswich, my home club as I call it, and to see the fans' faces and the emotion out there was amazing."

Among the crowd was the town's mayor, Stefan Long, who was also present when they won the title in 1998 - then only nine years old.

He said: "I haven't seen a crowd like this in a long time, I can only hope it's a sign of things to come in the future. There were nerve-jangling moments but we got there bit by bit and the result speaks for itself.

"The memories just came flooding back of 1998 and being here seeing the emotion in the team's eyes and [promoter] Chris Louis' eyes. An absolute honour, it's one of the highlights of my year for sure."

Promoter Louis rode in the last Ipswich team to become champions

"There's been a lot of blood, sweat and tears in the last 27 years before we got there again," he said.

"We made very hard work of it but I always had faith that they would have the grit to do it in the end."