waiheke1

If it was a "real" test series i'd agree with the criticism, but given that neither side is anywhere near a full international team i can understand him not wanting to lose money in an international "b" series.

TWK - I think you are making the classic mistake of interpreting anti-criminalisation/pro-legalisation arguments, or arguments which point out the hypocricy of different laws, for someone being "pro drug." They are not the same. Certainly, I think there are a range of recreational drugs that should be legalised, put the profits into the hands of the gpvenment rather than the criminal fraternity, and allow that money to be put into the health and education system instead. It oudl also free up police to do "real police work" rather than drug activity. And I imagine if the young folk out on the town were doing pills rather than alochol, the social costs (drunk dirving, violence etc) would be markedly reduced. Sid - if you were to say you wouldnt want the mechanic down the road to work on your car while he was drunk would you be: a) a hypocrite hacing a pop at the mechanic c) Both of the above D) None of the above ah, the old "gateway drug" argument. If there is indeed such a thing, then surely alcochol is thhe main "gateway" drug. As for criminality - i think you are mistaking statistical occurence for causality. While a decent percentage of criminals may use weed, that is far from the same as there being a significant percentage of weed users who are criminals (other than breaking the law around pot smoking obviously).

I'll go a top 8 of: kk nki pawlicki x2 dryml bjerre sundstrom kildemand

I'm pretty confident ward will finish top 8. but if not he and holder are the only certain picks for next year.

I think hammock will finish top 8. holder will obviously get a wild card, i think gollob deserves one too (only a last season people were whining about pedersen getting one). Sweden will get one place, on form u would have to say Freddie should be given that - he,s never gonna bexworld champ but over last two seasons has shown he is a top ten rider.

yeah i got my addition wrong. went through heat by heat and at some point got something wrong and didn't check back that the swing made sense. end result still the same.

under the old tac sub rules i reckon the score would have been 43-47, assuming a 1-5 in heat 8 as result of double tac sub. so yes i think swindon would have still lost. As it is without the double point joker swindon would have lost anyway. though in both cases the psychological advantage of the point swing may have helped the visitors. Strggling to c your point sidney ?

rugby is constantly changing fundamental rules such as the tackled ball rule. every couple of years there seems to be quite a major changecwhich necessitates different tactics and skill sets. commentators, coaches and players often struggle to understand and or explain the rules. by contrast, id say the basics of speedway are unchanged. a fan who hsdnt watched speedway for 30 years could follow 99% of a speedway meeting today without any queries. rugby id say at least 25% of the game would be different.

Lindback 50 more ward 20 more hancock 10 more

Ward hancock gollob kk

1076 lindback 35k emil 34k hampel 35k hancock

If Harris is ruled out with injury then i'd give it to cook.

i did give my suggestion for that above also, though said hose rather than host. would either have to be timed around a gp in that country if this made it viable, otherwise prob held in UK (poole the obvious "home" track for aussie for example)

i basically agree with this. On point 2 i ould return to the system of having heat 17 as 4th highest scorers etc. trhough to heat 20 being a top scorers race. On point 3: no tac subs, but i ould retain the joker (though rename it). Only usable when 7 points down, or available to use in heat 20 to any team which has not used it prior. i'd envisage a "test championship" being held between the eading six nations (poland, Ozzy, Russia, Denmark, Sweden and GB) on a home and away basis over two years (so 5 matches per team per year which is probably all the calendar woudl allow), with a two legged home and away final at the end of the second year (or a one-off meeting hosted by the top qualifying nation). Use the classic 6 man team (plus two reserves) 18 heat format, though i'd add a heat 19 nominated riders race (happy for this raceto be double points, no other jokers or tac subs, though reserves can be used whenever up to max 6 rides). Oz might need to hose their home meetings at Poole, or timed in a bunch around NZ (or future Australain) GP as otherise travel likely to be prohibitive. I'd also throw in a world pairs, classic 21 heat format, but then add two semis (1vs 4, 2vs 3) which would earn addtional points using conventional scoring, top two teams on points after the semis would race off in a final, the pair wiith most points overall wins the meeting . i feel this avoids the issues of artificially finding a winner from "tied" knock out races (one team winning after a 3-3 in a semi or final doesn't seem right) and would mean one bad ride for the dominant team wouldn't neccesarily ruin their chances, at the same time potentially adding an exicting finish beyond that in the old format. Make the final double points if needed to allow a team to potentially claw back up to a 9 point deficit in the final. No reserves, its a pairs comp, if there is an injury that is bad luck.

i have no issue with posters such as yourself who have taken a rational approach to expressing your dis like for certain aspects and/or suggesting how it should be improved. Its when people start saying things like "all time low for speedway ", "farce" and "officially sanctioned cheating" when the fact is that back in the "good old days" there were rules which were no more equitable, that it seems people are going over the top in their complaints and looking only at the negative. Just my perception

We've just had a world cup final come down t a last heat decider and what do we have - floods of people telling us what a farce it was, rolling out the same arguments, it seems some people just love to complain. now to make clear: i don't agree with seeding hosts to the final, i don't like the joker in its current form and the track in Prague is never going to be conducive to superb racing, though MJJ in heat 20 for example showed that passing was possible (and if it had been Peter Collins doing that in a youtube clip from 1977 no doubt everyone ould be saying that you don't get passing like that any mor)... BUT, the final was no worse then many many preceeeding finals from"the good old days.", nor are the current rules.system any worse than what has been happily accepted at various points in the past. to address the main complaints: "the joker is mickey mouse/unfair etc" : yet it doesn't give as much benefit to the trailing team as the old tac sub did, and most people didn't/don't have an issue with that (to use a TMC like analogy, if the joker rrule is like allowing cricket batsman double runs in the next over, the tac sub rule was like allowing to tail end batsmen to be replaced by your best two). "Czech republic being seeded to the final makes it a farce": Did the same people complain it was a farce in 1980 when Englan won, when the qualifying system denied Denmark (one of the three orld class nations) a place in the final, instead two spots being filled by weak continental sides who had no chance of winiing, making it a two way contest for the title? Did they complain in 1989 when England won after bwing seeded to the final? "The racing as rubbish": It wasn't great, but there have been some pretty poor finals over the years even in the "good old days." it's a fact in all sports that finals can often not be of the utmost quality (the rugby orld cup final in 2011, or many ot eh football world cup finals ) as there is no way to guarantee that conditions/riders/platyers etc. will all come together to produce a great spectacle on any given day. What you hope for is if the quality isn't great that this is made up for by tension/closeness, and a last heat decider certainly gives that. Certainly improvements can be made. But it seems to me like this has been seen as just another opportunity to air the ususal grievances without looking at the positives from the meeting.

by replacing two weak riders with two heat leaders u could change a probable 1-5 into a 5-1 - so instead of a four point deficit a four point gain, an eight point swing. using a tac joker biggest swing u can get is replacing a likely zero pointer with a six pointer.

no, but you could get an 8 point swing in a single race from using a tac sub, as opposed to a max 6 point swing using a tactics joker. so it gave the trailing team a greater advantage, although admittedly you couldn't level the scores in a single heat.

so in 1982 my team - belle vue - won the bl . a number of their away wins came only as a result of using tactical rides after falling behind early. Without these "contrived" results it is quite possible that they may not have been champions. Was everyone similarly outraged, did everyone think this was a farce? when people went home after seeing their team win 40-38 away after using a heat 8 double tac sub to get an 8 pts swing did they go away feeling it was a hollow victory? i don't recall any such outcry (ps. i am actually in the camp that feels in sic there should be a reserve but no other tac subs, and there should b no joker or (my preference) any side which hadn't used it prior should b able to use in heat 20)

is it any different to a cricket match in which the batsmen decline to take a single so that the better batsman remains in strike?

fair enough, i didn't think it could be used in first four heats, however it appears i was wrong. That said im not sure i would have used It then. in some ways its a waste to use only as a joker (max 3 point gain) rather than a tactical joker with a potential 6 point swing. In hindsight yours would have been a better option, but i can certainly understand why middlo didn't do it

so, where would you have used the tactical/joker ride. Per my post above there were three options - which would you have used?

of course the result was worse than we expected. but can you specify what tactics you think were wrong? (i agree selections were)

so when would you have used the joker then? there are three options: 1. heat 15, which would have meant instructing harris in heat 14 to finish behind woodward, which kinda defeats the purpose of not replacing your second best rider dpoesn't it? 2. or heat 16, when he would ahve been up against hancock anyway, and would have meant him not having an extra ride? 3. or would you have harris for the joker in 14, meaning our strongest rider wouldnt have had a joker ride. which of these options did those criticising middlos use of the tac joker in heat 14 think was best? (and obviously with hindsight you can argue for option a, but how many actually though that at the time?) and i am NOT a Poole fan

i've posted similatly on the race off thread but: Middlo probably made some wrong selectoral decisions - most on here wouldn't have picked kennet at KL, and perhaps ould have picked cook/king over bridger/barker - but no guarantee that that would ahve resulted in a better result, as there is not much (in my opinion) between those riders at this point in time. i don't think he is great tactically BUT dobn't think he did anything wrong in his use of tac subs and joker, and for people to say his tactics were aful is off the mark in my view. i think he should be replaced, but don't think he is to blame for the result tonight.