DC2

Not for me. He loses too many races to be compared to Leigh Adams.

Thanks. And thanks for all of your posts, which are usually very helpful.

Apologies, I mis-read that. So a typical wage per match would be (£4K CL), £6k PL or £10k for a top PL club with big crowds?

Neil Watson has just suggested that a Championship side pays about £4K per match to its riders and the Premiership about £10k, but each home fixture has to cover an away fixture’s pay too. So the CL needs £8k per fixture and the PL £20k. Quite a surprising difference.

Frankly, if I were a foreign rider able to earn sensible money on the continent, there’s no way I would bother to disrupt my life and fly into the UK in the hope of earning a measly £15k. So your suggestion that we’d lose only 15 to 20 riders is miles out IMO. We’d lose at least 30 foreigners and see half of the UK riders retiring.

Nope, mine’s attached to my neck.

Kennet was the bigger disgrace.

It won’t be a long list.

But that’s for the top riders in the league! It might do Ellis Perks but I couldn’t see any other Swindon rider accepting that. You’re proposing an NL standard league.

Unfortunately, British speedway can afford to pay no more than £40k to £80k per rider. Which is about the same as the footballers of Swindon Town FC, which has crowds of £6,500.

Agreed. Totally bonkers. £26k would give a top rider next to nothing when you take out the cost of repairs, tunings, van hire, workshop and petrol.

Hmmm ... is that former Lakeside manager, Neil Vatcher? Would he be impartial?

You’re probably due another good match now then. Speedway may be only 15 minutes of action but every start to a race is like a penalty and every close race is like a goal mouth scramble.

Hmmmm ... Millwall 1 Preston 0. Scintillating.

It doesn’t make any sense though, does it? You’d imagine that all home fans would be keen to see Glasgow when they come to town? It’s your team’s biggest test.

Does any away team ever bring more than 100 fans (other than in the play offs)? All clubs need a core home support of 800 and the ambition to double that, either by marketing or by improving the product (with a better track and better racing or with one league giving a more attractive variety of opponents).

Swindon in one league might have something like: Rasmus Jensen Ellis Perks Stefan Nielsen Josh Pickering Tobiasz Musielak Mikkel B Andersen Anders Rowe Quite an entertaining side. All have CL averages apart from Musielak. The 1.5 ratio is obviously rubbish. 1.25 is about right, making Musielak 7.95 and the team 42.15 (CL).

Is that because more Brits/UK Aussies can now double up due to the PL and the CL having different races nights?

There are about 30 double uppers so that’s about 96 current different riders in the PL and CL plus another 25 or so who have ridden this year but who are currently not signed by anyone (Bellego etc) and another 20 who rode in 2018 but have not returned (and have not retired), so that’s 141 possible riders without taking into account foreign newcomers.

I can follow your first five sentences and then it all goes pear-shaped. You should start with finding out how many riders currently ride in the PL and CL and then take it from there. There’s every chance that one league of 16 or 18 teams would have two NL riders at reserve and I’m sure most fans would accept that. Speedway has to live within its means if it is to survive.

Yeah, I think it was your groans that caused PK to fall off in heat 13 when he and Freddie were about to be 5-1’d!

I did it last year and I can’t be bothered to do it again. Just count the number of different riders who rode in both leagues. I recall it came out sufficient for 17 teams, so about 120 riders.

There are plenty of riders. We went through that last year. There might be fewer riders this year because there’s no longer a clash of race days between the PL and the CL and consequently more riders might be doubling up.

You constantly say there isn’t enough riders when in fact there is.

Possibly a 60:40 chance of One League according to this promoter: https://www.eastbourne-speedway.com/ian-jordan-reveals-the-ingredients-for-success/