Cue Ball

It was a cracking night that! Seem to remember one of our reserves scoring zero and getting a loader cheer than Topinka who scored a faultless maximum

Jorgenson is injured I believe otherwise he would be a decent choice given the figure you have to play with and who is available. Jonas Anderson would be a good call if he is available based on his PLRC performance

It would be interesting to know if Peterborough would have been allowed guest facilities for those missing. Check in for FIM meetings is usually Friday when there is a practice beforehand and the Golden helmet meeting isn't an FIM meeting as far as I know and so the league meeting would have taken priority, so no guest facility other than an NL rider. In the absence of the riders having to be elsewhere to ride, it does seem Sheffield were correct to hold their ground. In response to the comment re income and the meeting being held a week later - continuity is probably the answer. You go for 3 weeks without a meeting, people get out of the habit and crowds go down as a consequence. there is also the point I made at some point that we have 6 weeks to get 3 potential meetings completed at a point in the year where the weather will probably start to play a part. As to Peterborough beating us over 2 legs, I would say that it's a distinct possibility given the team changes we have had to introduce. We are going from having a trump card of Bates (at home at least) at reserve to having him in the main body and also going from having a guest no.1 to having Aspergen

My heart says Sheffield, but my head says that Edinburgh have been outstanding and would be deserved winners - just can't see anybody beating them over 2 legs

One of the guests is due to injury, so not really relevant as to whether you ride this week or not. My point is why should we risk not getting all of the meetings completed before the end of season because Peterborough chose to sign 2 riders that they knew would be absent shortly after the play off window commenced. In any event, why shouldn't Sheffield take advantage?!? I wouldn't expect Peterborough to slacken off the pressure just to be nice to us - it's a business as well as a sport and by progressing to the next round it will get Sheffield another meeting and therefore make them more money

Why is everybody presuming that Peterborough will be weakened by having guests? If they pick well, it might actually make them a stronger side around Owlerton... Just a thought. The other fact to consider is that we have around 6 weeks to get in 3 meetings, given the way the weather has turned this last week, it's not an unrealistic prospect that we have 2 or 3 rain offs in which case we may struggle to get matches completed- lets just get on with it!!

Just listened to the talking tigers podcast - surprised nobody seems to have mentioned Birks saying that he is almost certain to take a year out. Sad to hear, but understandable given his injuries over the past few years

He just lost a championship that I imagine he knows he could/should have won, what do you expect?

He topped scored, he gated, he rode a great first bend, he won. Simples. He rode well and deserved the win. Can't believe Sheffield had 3 riders in the meeting and still couldn't win the meeting!!!

Some of the racing in the second half of the meeting particularly was very good - heat 15 was a cracking race between Garrity, Lanham and Bellego, all 3 riders deserved praise for close racing and for giving each other enough room to be safe. On the basis of this afternoon you do have to question why Somerset released Lanham. Think the fact that the result didn't mean anything to Sheffield probably paid a part in the early races when conditions weren't ideal.

Any weather updates would be appreciated please. Still tipping it down in Sheffield and bbc now seems to be saying rain in Scunny until 2pm

Not a bad meeting. Not too sure what it is about Redcar, but they seem to like our track for the first half of a meeting and then fortunately tail off in the second half. Wells did well (see what I did there) again, he's much better now that he is t riding the track every week...

Started the season with one big hitter and ending it with a team of 6 and 7 pointers. Interesting to see how we get on in the play offs. Glad to see Andre back

The video replays clearly showed that there was no contact between the 2

Josh didn't go anywhere near him. He chose his moment and made a spot on overtake / undertake. Think it took Branford by surprise and he lost control for a moment which sent him towards the fence, no fault of Josh whatsoever

Impressed with Zach in heat 2. Put under a lot of pressure but didn't give in and held his line well despite having a slower bike than Clegg and Branford. Off the pace in his other 2 rides, but a very tidy rider who looks like he could do well in the future. Was surprised at the result to be honest, it was nip and tuck early on but we seemed to have a purple patch mid meeting that saw us home with relative ease. Cracking ride by Bates to come from the back to beat Sedgmen, unfortunately to be followed by his pantomime act with/at Bellego.

From what I've seen this year, I struggle to see past Kurtz for the win.

Happy with Klindt. Will do ok for us I would imagine

Klimt - happy with that

Gutted for him - do we know what happened? I was stood on the 4th bend at the time, but couldn't really work out what happened as I was more or less head on to it

Thanks

Any news on Ben Wilson after tonight's crash?

I wouldn't mind people having a pop at clubs signing riders from abroad if there were any British riders that were worth signing instead. Personally prefer to have a punt on a foreign rider than sign somebody just on the basis of their nationality regardless of whether they have talent or not.

A lot of good riders who have done hundreds more laps of Owlerton than Paco have put themselves into that fence, let's not be too harsh on the lad just yet

Given the amount of kickings the Monarchs have given you over the past few years, surprised that you want to ride against them at all 😛