E I Addio

It would be of even more benefit if you were to apply the old adage that if you have nothing intelligent to say then say nothing.

Ah yes that must be what happened. They probably made an announcement over the PA : "Er...we have suspicions that Darcy Ward has been at the Old Jollop again. If there is anyone in the crowd that happens to have a breathalyser with them would he please come forward and conduct a breath test" Sounds plausible to me.

You missed out Muddlo's Classic: " Darcy knows he did wrong...." I bet Matt and Darcy's lawyers loved that admission being broadcast.

Big balls has still got a bee in his bonnet about Ritchie Worrall and seems to want to keep having a go at Jon Cook about that, which is what Daytripper seems to be on about hence the reference to Worrall. Bigballs was going on about asking Worky fans what they thought of Cook but as between promotions there seems to be no real issue. Worky invoked a buy back clause which they were legally entitled to do after one season, although their early press releases seemed to indicate that they wanted him back there. Lawson is clearly happy at Lakeside though, given his rate of progress and a big hit with the fans. So basically sour grapes by Bigballs still going on about Worralll and trying to speak for Worky fans instead of just expressing his own opinion.

Interestingly, no sign of Sidney either. Do reckon he has got himself yet another ban for threatening another forum member ?

Is "internationally inexperienced " a euphemism for stupid ? To get to the top in modern speedway you have to not only be a good rider, you also have to be a good organiser , knowing before the season starts where you are riding ,what the travel arrangements are , wha t the money is, who is paying it and what bikes you will be riding. It has to run like clockwork. If these two can't even organise an off-season trip to Argentina it does't bode well for a busy international career. Amazingly they both see themselves as serious contenders for a Team GB place. No surprise nobody has even offered them an EL place yet and both are stuck in the PL going backwards.

To be fair to Gavan, this thread only got on to Muddlo because he blurted out a load of incomprehensible nonsense in Speedway Star about Ward so it was reasonable that various members commented on his outburst on this thread. Gavan, quite properly on this occasion confined his initial comments to Muddlo's rantings. If you check the thread it was Sidney , who not for the first time went off at a tangent and brought in Matt Ford and Poole. Quite frankly a lot of Poole threads do get expanded because of the off track antics of the likes of Ward and Muddlo. How often do other team managers or star riders put themselves at the centre of controversy by making inept comments or unruly or questionable behaviour? Hardly ever, I would say in relation to the comments and behaviour that emanates from Wimborrne Road.

To be honest Sid, I read Muddlo's comments in Speedway Star two or three times and I still can't work out his line of reasoning. He says some.thing in one breath then seems to argue against himself in the next breath. It really is most bizarre if you read the article .he is supposed to be a professional person speaking for a professional club but he is talking in a form of gobbledegook that would cause a 16-year old to fail their GCSE. I really wonder whether the bloke is losing his marbles. His public utterances have not been making much sense for at least 2-3 years and when you look at some of the childish things he was putting on Twitter last year, that doeasn't seem to me to be the behaviour of a normal adult. That's not having a go at Poole but read the SS article yourself and see if you can detect a sensible line of reasoning.

When I started going there were plenty of old timers telling me the sport was much better in the pre- war and immediate post war period periods when there was a variety of bikes and riding styles with leg trailers and foot forward mixed in the same races, and were of the opinion that it was boring seeing everyone on bikes that looked the same. The point is that like many experiences in life speedway usually seems best when you are young and it is new, and that is what skews our recollection of the past . It's not necessarily riders of the past that were great, it's our memory of them.

It's entirely personal preference of course but for myself I much prefer the 15 heat formula. I like to see the top men race each other more than once, but more importantly it gives a side more of a chance to get back into the match if they have a bit of bad luck midway, especially with the present scoring formula for league points. I find it keeps the interest if a side have a comfortable lead hat heat 12 but you know you still have to face the other sides big guns in heats 13 and 15 . Again speaking personally , I don't necessarily share Sidney's view of the past . I am probably enjoying the sport as much now as I have ever done. I think what has destroyed the aura surrounding top riders is so much televised speedway, in fact I haven't bothered watching the SWC for a couple of years and I probably only watch about a third of the GP's.and half the Sky meetings these days. For me, speedwáy is a sport you have to see live. The noise and smell creates atmosphere and the is not the same sensation of speed on the telly. Most importantly I don't think one sees the motorcycle skills the same through the lens of a camera. I know I keep banging on about Petr Karlsson but quite honestly I could enjoy watching him ride round on his own. I tend to look for details like the way he blips his throttle to find traction and the lines he rides. Matej Zagar and Mikkel Bech are others that have great control over their bikes that one doesn't appreciate on TV . Bomber is another one. People complain about him but I watch him a Lakeside where he always gets a bad start then he can ride inch perfect to get inside someone. To me these are all the signs of great riders in any generation but they are skills that don't really come across in TV broadcasts. So for me good riders are good riders whatever, their era. They all have two arms two legs and a head, plus a certain amount of talent. What I don't believe is that in the 70's we had a league of supermen who had an abundance of talent that modern riders don't have. To my mind though, the biggest threat to the future of the sport is the over exposure on TV which means that people can sit in their armchairs and watch a match almost every night of the week without ever going through the turnstiles.

I was talking about pre-1980 So where does that take the discussion ? It seems to support your argument that the 70's BL was ,very competitive at the top end but weak in the lower regions hence a fair number of riders were on high averages and that would only be possible if others were on an particularly low average. That's what I would say from memory and apparently from statistics.

I think they were referring to the way modern tuners anre getting more and more power from the engines resullting in an increasingly narrower power band. The new silencers undoubtedly make the situation worse because of the way the power comes in suddenly,but I am pretty sure modern chassis ride better , especially if set up properly. Undoubtedly modern engines are more difficult to set up and, even the smallest adjustment can make a big difference to performance either better or worse, and that was at the root of a lot of Peter Karlsson's problems last season. He changed engines even chaged tuners but nothing worked. The other side of that coin though is that if an inferior rider gets his set up right he can beat much better riders. A classic example of that was Ben Morely at Lakeside who, once he got his home track set up sorted was beating some decent riders at Lakeside but he never really cracked it on away tracks needing different set ups. I think modern tuning is one reason why it's very difficult to seriously compare riders. Greg for example has a terrific pit crew around him and does very well on it but I am not convinced he would ever be world champion in a previous era. Fascinating discussion but nothing's provable so one can only say a rider was good in a particular era and enjoy them while they last.

Is that a fact? I stand to be corrected but I am sure I have heard a number of riders say the uprights were harder. I think modern engines are a problem because these days they have a very narrow power band, but the chassis surely have to give a better ride with lay down engines giving a lower centre of gravity and modern leading link forks being less prone to twisting.

Track preparation is not better today. Apart from the fact that it was not as critical then as it is with modern machinery, the quality lol shale was much better then, but so many of the pits producing good shale have closed over the years. Decent shale is very hard to come by today a nd very expensive. Modern bikes also churn the trades up much more which adds to the problem of decent track preparation.

Difficult to disagree with that Sidney, except that Briggo could, also be on hell of a gater when the mood took him. One of my most outstanding early memories is when I saw Briggo win the last of his British Championships at West Ham. In a field that included Mauger, who was to go on to win the World title that year Briggo was completely dominant and not even Mauger could get near him off the gate. Briggo was absolutely stunning that night. When we talk about racers I wish I had been around to see the great Jack Parker. He contested the British Match Race Championshiip 21times and won, I think, 18 or 19 of them . Must have been some racer.

Same places that Jason Crump, Chris Holder, Darcy Ward, Troy Batchelor and Jason Doyle gained their international experience. Nobody gave them a free lunch or a FTDR place or an easy pass into the GP!s. They had to drag themselves up by they bootlaces.

h That is incorrect. What happened before and after has a lot to,do with it. There is a whole raft of case law on what constitutes consent. Stacks of it, but you are choosing to dismiss it in making that comment. If it was a simple case that both did or both didn't they would have been charged jointly but they faced separate charges even though they were tried together. The fact that they were separetely charged always allowed the possibility of separate verdicts. One of the reasons for separate charges was because in some area their evidence contradicted each other. We can argue the merits of the case until the cows come home but your argument is based on the premise that the Jury, the trial judge and the four appeal judges that looked at it were all in some way corrupt or incompetent . There is a possibility that Evans own legal team were. Incompetent and possibly his new legal team may get somewhere on that point, but the fact remains that on the evidence before the court Evans has been found guilty, and the jury did hear the entirety of the evidence, not just what has been summarised in the press. I don 't think many forum members have absolute blind faith in the legal system but there is no particular evidence at this stage that the total of 5 judges involved in the case were corrupt, yet for your opinion to stand they must all have been corrupt or incompetent. That surely is the point. All of us only really know what is on here. The jury had the advantage of stitting through the entire evidence for several days, and their decision was unanimous. One must give 12 people some credit for being reasonably intelligent even if individually some are not as sharp as others. That is why we have a jury system.

That absolutely hits the nail on the head. If you are only seeing riders twice a year quite often their reputation goes before them so they have this kudos about them before they even get to the tapes. Absolutely right about .he GP's . Familiarity breeds contempt and when you are seeing the real top stars every couple of weeks you tend to take them for granted . Add to that we get things like the SWC televised it takes the edge off the drama. I think heat 15 had had a big impact. It's very difficult to string 4or 5 good starts together. Quite often we see a rider with 10 orv11 points after 4 rides which would be very impressive on the old format but after 5 rides he still has 10 or 11 which is less impressive. FWIW I think there are plenty of riders today who are every bit as entertaining as in years gone by. I am struggling at the moment to think of more than one or two riders who compare with Peter Karlsson for example, one of my all time favourites. Few riders of any generation can compare to his ability to think a race out , and to be on the right part of the track at the right time.. Riders like Peter Collins and Briggo couldn't do that but they were totally different types of rider that had different skills and an all out full throttle style that PK doesn't have.different types of rider from different generations. They have to be appreciated for what they are. You can't. Really compare on to another.

Not much that can be said about McDonald. He was not found guilty so I don't have a particular opinion on his conduct. I certainly haven't described him as despicable, and come to that I don't think Charlie Webster, who the thread is about has said anything about him, so he is not really up for discussion. All I know about him is that he claims his career has been affected by the case but whether it's that or whether he is just a rubbish footballer I don' t know. Come to that , I don't really have an opinion on whether Evans should play again. That's purely a matter between him and the paying fans of whatever club might think about signing him. My only point really is that he cheated on his girl friend, he put his career on the line and he only has himself to,blame if it all blew up.

Everyone in the UK has not taken a vow of chastity BUT his own description of what he did was "an act of infidelity " towards his girlfriend so in Evans own terms there was an implied agreement of chastity and/or fidelity between him and his girlfriend, and by his own standards he cheated on her and he, again by his own standards would expect her show fidelity towards him. If all this had not blown up he would have kept quiet about so deception comes in as well , so that's where the scumbag bit comes in. Of course many of those condemning Evans now might have done the same thing but Evans was the one that got caught. So even before we get to the rape bit he is in many people's eyes, and according to his own definition a scumbag and a cheat. As to the rape itself it was not in the same class as laying in wait in a dark alley with a knife, but as others have pointed out his public stance has done him no favours. Like a lot of things in life it is not black and white but shares of grey. Bill Clinton got away with cheating on his wife several times. Public opinion is a fickle thing, but the bottom line is that Evans chose to be in the public eye and chose to play fast and loose with. a complete stranger,so only has himself to blame

He is free to pursue his career if he can find a club but you can't force the paying public to accept him. In a similar way disgraced MP's like Chris Huhne , Elliot Morely and Jeffrey Archer are free to stand as MP's again if they wish once their sentences are served but you can't force people to vote for them. As far as Hartlepool are concerned though I understand the local MP put his spoke in and opposed Evans being signed but don't see what it's got to do with him, so to that extent Evans has suffered from busybodies jumping on the bandwagon.

The exception that proves the rule. She stands out as the only dowdy spinster in stark contrast to most of the others who spend a fortune on image, including all kinds of plastic surgery to try to fight back the advancing years. Plus Susan Boyle would never have made it on her own merit without the right media packaging that came with Cowell and the X-factor. Generally speaking fickle public opinion demands looks ahead of talent.

As Orion has already pointed out its not the rape it's the way he went about it. Call it what you like, prudish, hypocritical, double standards , fair, unfair, or whatever, the bottom line is that ultimately the public pay his wages and they decide, however fsir or unfair that decision is, and anyone who serves the public needs to keep on the right side of public opinion. Even his companion , McDonald who was found not guilty is complaining that the trial has adversely afected his career. These people are happy to accept the accolades when public opinion puts them on a pedestal , they can't really complain when the public knock them down . Fair or unfair doesn't come into it. Evans himself said that playing professional football is a rare and exceptional privilege. If he doesn't keep his nose clean and keep out of trouble he only has himself to blame if he gets on the wrong side of public opinion. On the other side of the coin, I was walking through the underpass at South Kensington station a couple of years ago and I heard this woman busker singing with a really fantastic voice. She was far better than the dross on X-Factor but she wasn't very photogenic and public opinion says female singers have to look a bit sexy, so there she was busking while better looking worse singers earn a fortune. Not fair, just the way public opinion goes.

It's not the British justice system that's stopping him working its public opinion, which can be very fickle and inconsistent. Lots of people in the public eye have lost their careers because of some misdemeanour, be it serious or minor. On the other hand if it had been some pop singer doing exactly the same as Evans, he would probably have been soon forgiven. In one sense I can see why it can be argued that he has had a bad deal, but as you say he had behaved like a scumbag so I won't lose any sleep over him.

Sid, let me give you a quote from Ivan Mauger. He said several times that if there was no BarryBriggs there would be no Ivan Maugef. What he meant was that great riders learn from those that had gone before. Ivan said he spent years working out how to beat Briggo because he thought Briggs was the best there was and if he could work out how to beat him he would be best. Eventually Ivan did beat Barry (albeit when Briggo was slightly past his best) but no sooner did Ivan get his triple crown than along came Olsen, mimicked Mauger and moved on a stage. Olsens expertise went on to the other Danes, and so it went on. What I am saying is that good as Gundersen and Neilson were modern riders have learnt from them and upped it a stage. The Greg Hancock today is not the Hancock of 20 years ago. The bikes behave much differently today and Hacock is one that has moved with the times. When I talk about the also rans I was thinking of last season when Richard Lawson went to Poole and beat Darcy Ward twice. That doesn't make Darcy less of a rider it's just that in the moden sport even second strings like Rich Lawson have a great deal of knowledge and professionalism that years ago would have only been in the hands of people like Mauger and a few others but over the years there has been a trickle down effect. I am not knocking past riders . Briggo is IMO opinion the most exciting rider I ever saw, and Inonly saw him towards the end of his career so goodness knows what he was like at his peak, but it's a different game now and. I do think the likes of Gundersen and Neilson would probably have to work harder for their points.