SHEFFIELD can book their place in the Championship Shield semi-finals as long as they avoid defeat at Newcastle on Sunday (6.30).

It comes after Tigers secured maximum points over Redcar in two fixtures in the space of 24-hours on Thursday and Friday to take up a dominant position in their Northern Group.

The Owlerton outfit kicked off their campaign with a comprehensive 59-31 home win over Newcastle at the beginning of the month.

But Tigers team manager Simon Stead insists the Diamonds will be a much different proposition around their own Brough Park circuit.

"Newcastle is notoriously a difficult place to go to and they've already had a battling win there against a strong Scunthorpe side already this season," Stead said.

"So it will be a different kind of test for our boys to the one we faced when they came to our place a few weeks ago.

"We know we'll have to be at our best again and that it requires another solid team performance to come away with the result we're looking for.

"It is nice to have our destiny in our own hands so to speak, but we've still got a lot of hard work to do."

Sheffield again run rider replacement for Josh Bates while Newcastle have drafted in King's Lynn and Glasgow star Lewis Kerr in place of the injured Stuart Robson.

NEWCASTLE: Ludvig Lindgren, Tero Aarnio, Lewis Rose, Matthew Wethers, Lewis Kerr, Carl Wilkinson, Ashley Morris.

SHEFFIELD: Kyle Howarth, Todd Kurtz, Charles Wright, Josh Bates R/R, Lasse Bjerre, Jack Smith, James Shanes.