SteelShoe

in these two very close meetings especially the Workington v Plymouth meeting I think there are grounds for his overall performance to be reviewed re adherence to the rules and judgement.

Absolutely he should have. He made even bigger mares reffing the Worky v Plymouth meeting, All his decisions penalised Worky , the ones against Plymouth without doubt cost the Comets the two points.

Close meeting throughout with never more than 6 points between the teams . Comets managed to take it to a last heat decider. I was hopeful going into heat 15 only 2 behind with Cookie and Jonas coming out that we could get something from the meeting. Unfortunately we missed the gate in the rerun and with Flint and Howarth on the outside line we were never able to challenge. Well done the Tigers. There were some positives notably Cookie showed that he still has great bike control. The pass on Bomber coming off turn 2 in heat 10 was top drawer. Young Max done great in winning the duals with Sam Hagon subsequent to heat 2. Tate gave a strong performance, it was good to see his confidence continue to return and the fact that he wasn't phased going out into the dirt. For the second week running I find myself critical of ref Graeme Hunter. Heat 5 the tapes appeared to rise faster on the infield side, Flint shot away and we were expecting the red lights as we thought it was an unsatisfactory start, they never came.

Most if not all UK sports run a squad system so have replacements of similar ability. UK Speedway does not. Having to use weaker guests because of the paucity of suitable replacements inadvertently penalises a team as a consequence of injury. Having a reserve rider Simon Lambert in this case sitting at home when he more equally matches the injured rider (Vinnie) in terms of ability simply because he has an higher average biased by his home performances doesn't sit right. I'm not advocating making teams stronger through injury just prevention of making them notably weaker over longer periods. Shrewd selection of in form guests and the ability and willingness of clubs to pay said rider demands often allows teams to be stronger because of injury now. Finding suitably able replacements working within the current average limitations at reserve appears to not be easy. Certain clubs have been able to fit riders in based on averages fitting. Grmek at Plymouth comes to mind following the injury to Tobias Thomsen. I think it highly unlikely you will get a non GB Rider to take a guest booking at reserve especially bearing in mind how much that could cost.

Agree the system isn't fit for purpose. When teams are inadvertently penalised simply because a rider is unfortunate enough to get injured really isn't in the best interests of the sport. There is scope to increase the the headroom on averages certainly for reserve replacements especially when the number of suitably competitive replacements is so limited in British Speedway at the moment.

Yeah I was a bit surprised at the gate price increase tonight when we rolled up.

I thought that was Batch's poorest performance of the season to date.

the referee was the same one who made the errors against us against Plymouth. I had a bad feeling as soon as they announced his name and it proved correct, should have been an unsatisfactory start, couldn't believe it when he let it go.

Worky have struggled persistently to get guests at No 6 who have scored what Vinnie Foord probably would have. We had to use Mickie Simpson again tonight against Glasgow for the second meeting running and predictably he failed to score. At the moment Mickie is not Championship level. Simon Lambert's average (4.78) is more representative of Vinnie's (3.89) and the points he may well have scored but because it is higher we couldn't use him. The zero points that we registered from No 6 tonight bearing in mind Vinnie scored 7 in the corresponding fixture last season contributed to us getting narrowly beaten for the second meeting in succession.

Tigers probably got this at reserve, Vinny scored around 7 last season and went well. Haven't managed to adequately replace the points he is capable of especially at home. Another tough competetive meeting for the Comets. Need everyone contributing in the top 5. Track should hold no fears for Max but will his equipment be fast enough, he was certainly underpowered on his home debut. Hopefully we have no mechanical failures this weekend can't afford to gift points to the Tigers if we are to keep it close. UTC ! Like Glasgow Comets only have 7 home fixtures left and season only started ☹️

Should that be 'I paid him some ££££££££ '😃

After looking into this further I now believe the referee made a mistake . He could not have noticed Grmek had accidentally detached his kill switch otherwise he should not have started the race with a dead bike at the start. Once he started the race and Grmek wheeled his bike off the track it should have been treated as a retirement due to mechanical failure. I actually raised the kill switch issue through the open door of the refs box at the time, the refs reply was that Ben Barker had already committed an earlier tyre warming offence. Once he started the race I believe Grmek should have been excluded/ disqualified also.

There is something called the National Speedway Stadium in Manchester, heaven only knows why it was called this. Touted as one of the best race tracks in the country and pretty central why oh why aren't the Pairs and CLRC being staged there. British Speedway is just exasperating.

To be sure I think someone would need to look at the stream. The way I perceived it was the ref had noticed Ben Barker was illegally warming his tyre by spinning his wheel in the dirt at the start ( I noticed him doing the same in one of his earlier races ). This is a disqualification incident that allowed him to go off a 15 metre handicap. However, the ref started the race with all riders at the tapes. Anze Grmek accidentally pulled out his kill switch at the start and wheeled his bike off the track.The race got to the third bend if I remember right before the riders noticed the race had been stopped. Under the rules Barker was allowed to go off 15 metres for tyre warming. Also under the rules if a rider accidentally pulls out his kill switch before the race has started it is deemed to be an unsatisfactory start and the rider is allowed back into the rerun. Both things did happen. What I can't understand was why the ref started the race when he knew Barker was warming his tyre and allowed them to go 3/4 of a lap.

Unfortunately there are question marks around what exactly is the situation re Craig . We have been here before as have many clubs over the years. Perhaps only the management know the true story, it is up to them to do what is in the best interests of the business, the team and the fans.