Eastbourne Eagles ruthlessly swept Sheffield aside on Saturday to power through to the semi-finals of speedway's inaugural British League Cup.

There they will face old rivals Wolverhampton with the first leg on Wednesday in the Black Country and the return at Arlington on Sunday, October 12 (3.30pm).

The pairing of the Eagles and the Wolves at this stage of the competition is bound to re-open old wounds with Eastbourne co-promoter Jon Cook freely admitting this will be an opportunity to gain a measure of revenge for the club's defeat in last year's championship play-off final.

Eastbourne had put themselves in the driving seat for quarter-final success with a four-point win in the first leg in Yorkshire 48 hours earlier.

That lead was quickly cemented with three maximum heat wins in the first three races.

After that, it was a case of seeing how big the margin of victory would be. It turned out to be 59-31 and 106-74 on aggregate, a truly convincing win against one of the top teams in the Premier League.

One of the highlights of the meeting was the form of Eastbourne's young Dane Ulrich Ostergaard, who was recommended to club owner Terry Russell at this year's British Grand Prix in June.

The 21-year-old was introduced to the club's British League Cup squad and has improved every time he has ridden at Arlington. On Saturday, he looked stylish and assured in scoring eight (paid 11) from five rides, including an engine failure in heat 15.

Ostergaard started his evening in the right vein by coming from the back in the opening race to pass Sheffield's talisman and prolific scorer, Sean Wilson. That 5-1 set the pattern for the evening.

Eagles' captain David Norris dropped only one point and that after touching the tapes in heat six and just failing to reel in Chris Neath after starting the re-run 15 metres back.

Dean Barker scored a paid 12-point maximum, while Joonas Kylmakorpi took his second successive Arlington 15-point British League Cup maximum.

Add to that two wins and an engine failure for Adam Shields, and it is easy to see why the Yorkshire side were never in with a chance of getting back into the tie.

Cook told the fans there was a chance Nicki Pedersen could be introduced to the team for the semi-final home leg, and that could mean Arlington fans having the chance to hail their own world champion.

Pedersen is involved in a shoot-out for the title on Saturday. He is one point behind GP series leader Jason Crump going into the final round in Norway.

The team for Wednesday will see Peter Ljung replacing Matt Read, who is committed to riding for Somerset in the Premier League.

Eastbourne: Joonas Kylmakorpi 15, David Norris 10, Dean Barker 9, Ulrich Ostergaard 8, Matt Read 7, Adam Shields 6, Joe Parsons 4. Bonus points: Ostergaard 3, Barker 3, Norris 1, Parsons 1.

Sheffield: Ricky Ashworth 9, Chris Neath 8, Sean Wilson 5, Ross Brady 3, Andrew Moore 2, James Birkinshaw 2, Ben Wilson 2. Bonis points: Ben Wilson 2, Sean Wilson 1, Brady 1, Moore 1.