Newcastle Diamonds travel to Sheffield on Thursday night with the comforting knowledge that if they score just 29 points from the 15-race Knockout Cup quarter-final second leg meeting they will be through to the semi-finals.

Considering the Diamonds managed to get 40 there in last month’s league defeat, it should be a mere formality as six of the side that slaughtered the Tigers 62-28 in Byker on Sunday are raring to go again.

Only No 1 Steve Worrall, who is racing for parent club Belle Vue in an Elite League match at Swindon, is unavailable, so Diamonds’ team manager George English is bringing in American star Ryan Fisher (Edinburgh) for his third Newcastle guest appearance this season.

English is naturally fairly confident that the Diamonds will qualify for the semi-finals and a meeting with the winners of the Berwick versus Rye House tie, but says he will be reminding his riders that they are not there yet.

“I’ll be telling the lads that the job is only half done at the moment, and we’ve had too many hidings at Sheffield in the past to take anything for granted,” he said.

“We were missing our two Swedes, Ludvig Lindgren and Victor Palovaara, last time we went to Sheffield and we still hit the 40-point mark thanks mainly to Robert Lambert and Matej Kus both getting into double-figures, so with a full seven-man team, we should be able to get through on aggregate at least.”