RoundTheBoards

No it wasn't. In the past averages were based on every league match in the season. They still should. Rolling averages should be based on the number of league matches in a season. 10 is too few to get a fair average.

Just James Pearson, Jacob Hook and George Congreve to start with. Maybe someone will be looking at Jake Turner during the season if they lose a heatleader to injury.

James Pearson signs https://twitter.com/TheAces/status/1634130512951361536

Getting himself match fit ready for Ipswich when the Russian's visa is denied?

In that case I would have thought he would be ok to do NDL, unless he's on some kind of permit/visa for his normal job that won't allow him to do any other work.

Assuming Hook is riding for Armadale (as seems to be the case), I can't think of any reason why MacDonald couldn't do the same and ride NDL on a similar basis. The only thing is without a CL team it's hard to imagine how it would be worth travelling to the other side of the world just to do NDL, and maybe there'd be work permit/visa issues coming over without having a professional job here.

Congreave has British patriality, and (allegedly) so does Dayle Wood. (and Luke Killeen etc) They come in the same as any other British rider on 3.00, unless they have ridden in a National state championship in which case they come in on 4.50 But that's the same as it's always been. Nothing to do with the new rule this year opening the league up to Commonwealth riders.

The only Commonwealth rider we know will be in the NDL is Jacob Hook, and he has a CL average of 4.00 and so will be 8.00 in the NDL. Can't imagine anyone flying in a Commonwealth rider just to ride NDL, so presumably any others would ride in CL too, and just double their CL average for NDL. But if anyone did come over for NDL only I can't imagine them being assessed at anything less than 8.00 anyway.

Don't think they ever staged Speedway racing at Rockingham. Wasn't it just cars, karts and road bikes?

Since we lost Peter Craven in 1963 and the first World Pairs Championship wasn't staged until 1968, it's hardly surprising that Craven's total number of World Pairs title wins exactly matches the total number of terminal cancer patients he callously insulted.

With the four riders already signed, I'm not surprised there's not enough points left for another four. Doubt they'll get away with an 8-man team!

Anyone else been watching this? Thought it was quite a disappointment and not worth the money to watch the BSN stream. Thought presentation would be better with it being America, but it was awful. A bloke playing the American National Anthem on what seemed to be his first guitar lesson, A scruffy chap doing centre green interviews while wearing a rucksack. Meeting introductions very untidy and disorganised. Racing was quite decent for the main test match considering the track was so small. But it was spoilt by the lack of helmet colours. BSN captions were all over the place. Full marks to Adam Roynon who did a brilliant job of identifying riders considering that he was commentation from UK and only having the same pictures that we had. The other commentator was clueless. After the main test match it's been a shambles. Took ages to do a presentation. USA riders wandered out randomly some without their racejackets. Laurence Riogers out there loving himself photobombing the winning team photos even though his country lost. We're now 2 hours 40 mins into the meeting and still trying to do the second half, no one knows who's in which races, but Adam Roynon still being a hero recognising riders.

If only 3 of those riders are still alive, and Eric Broadbelt and Ken Eyre are regulars at BV every week, then it seems it is only Collins who is being a bit of a prick about it. If the other 97+ people on his list aren't ex-title winning riders, then who are they? Wonder if his publicist and apologist can enlighten us?

With Mick Hucknall being a massive Manchester United fan, a link with Ipsich would seem as unlikely as Port Vale fanatic Robbie Williams supporting Stoke. There is a big article in today's Speedway Star over about 3 pages (I haven't read it yet) about this Weston Super Mare thing and the (now deleted) crazy Facebook posting. Someone at the Star seems to have gone to some time and trouble to speak to people involved and fathom out what it is all about, so maybe there's some explanation there when I get round to reading it.

Come on. You don't see that the Facennas owning Glasgow and also sponsoring the league is a dodgy conflict of interests?

Does seem a weird conflict of interests.

"Taxi for British Speedway!" https://britishspeedway.co.uk/cab-direct-championship/cab-direct-to-sponsor-championship/

Even the stuff that these Walter Mitty Somerset Superdome builders posted about Michael Jackson was cobblers. They said "you can see we are working on the same ethos as we did for Exeter City Football club who were in financial difficulty over 20 years ago. They were out the League, no crowd, holding boot sales to raise money. One visit from Michael Jackson, who didn’t even sing & a Match against Man Utd, they were back in the league & financially stable for a few more seasons in no time." Actually Michael Jackson did visit Exeter City in June 2002. It was arranged by the infamous bender and well-known spoon-nonce, Uri Geller, who was an Exeter director at the time. (Is Geller behind the Weston-Super-Dome?). The season following Jacko's visit, 2002-03, Exeter City dropped out of the Football League for the first time in 83 years, and took another 5 years to get back. As for " We have done this in the past for Stoke city with Robbie Williams". That sounds equally unlikely since Williams is a lifelong fan and shareholder in Stoke City's local rivals Port Vale.

The whole thing sounds like a wind-up by some Walter Mitty on a fantasy trip. there's no way any of this happened. So the council turned down a planning application for a multi-million pound entertainment arena? A planning application that doesn't even exist in the real world? A music festival arena for 25,000 people. That's going to cost £15M - £20M minimum (And I'm probably way under there), and sorry you just don't pop up a 25,000 capacity arena by registering a company at companies house the day before with former junior rider Greg Daniels as sole director, and sole shareholder with one £1 share. But this multi-million pound arena can be funded by one appearance from Michael Jackson, Robbie Williams, Simply Red and The Killers..... erm, OK. Then we look at some of the gibberish posted. "Un-vailing"? And what are "bonified" contractors? Is this some kind of fossilisation? "All domains both .co & .com are registered with companies house." No they're not! Companies House register and regulate Limited Companies in England and Wales. (Like the one Greg Daniels has a whole pound invested in). They're nothing to do with any register of internet domain names! Then we're expected to believe that this whole multi-million pound project to bring global music artists to Weston Super Mare has been brought crashing to the ground by a few phone calls with Neil Vatcher and Roscoe? A Speedway club using the facilities isn't some massive money-spinner. It would be bringing in chicken-feed compared to a Rihanna concert. Whether Henry Atkins can have a skid round on his bike isn't going to matter much to Bruce Springstein and Taylor Swift. No way would the lack of speedway derail this project. Sorry, but it's all Billy Bull****

That theory doesn't hold water. He was assessed on 4.00 for Championship. So he should be 8.00 in NDL. If he had British credentials he'd have started on 2.00 in the Championship like Connor Bailey did at Glasow.

Absolute joke if true. No objection to Commonwealth riders coming in to strengthen up teams, but a 4.00 Championship rider is 8.00 in the NDL. A 4.00 CL British rider would drop into NDL on 8.00. Should be the same for a foreigner. Why on earth should we be giving advantages to foreigners over our own?

Bickley and Hook are nailed on doubling up at Armadale. I'd like to see Rothery give it another go, but don't know if he can be tempted. Embleton and Lyden will be at Armadale unless they've had an offer from either Belle Vue or Berwick. Phillips is at Berwick. The Millars have packed it in.

The championship is the problem. The Championship should have a workable Rising Stars scheme so that all these riders "too good for the NDL" can be accommodated. It's correct that Dan Thompson shouldn't be in NDL as he's too good. But he's only got his PL place. So do I blame him for clogging up a place in the NDL? Absolutely not! It's not Dan Thompson's fault in any way. It's the Championship which is wrong.

You're correct. The Ochiltree family (Midland Sports Stadiums Ltd) owned Brandon and Blackbird Road. They sold Leicester to Barratts for housing in 1984. They sold Coventry Stadium to Avtar Sandhu (Coventry Stadium Ltd/ Coventry Greyhounds Club Ltd / Coventry Racing Club Ltd) in 2002 Around 2013 there were rumours that Coventry City FC were buying the stadium, but also HMRC put a block on Sandhu selling the stadium as they claimed Sandhu bought it with the help of a criminal business partner who had been convicted of money laundering and organised crime. Sandhu eventually sold the stadium in 2016 to a Jersey company Brandon Estates Ltd. (I have no idea who is behind Brandon Estates Ltd - someone must know) Mick Horton was trying to lease the stadium for Speedway from them to continue in 2017. I think Sandhu tried to lease back the running of Greyhounds too. This fell through and Sandhu apparently broke into the stadium and allegedly stole fixtures and fittings. Brandon Estates Ltd contacted the police and claimed no one could now run Speedway or Greyhounds at their stadium as it was an active crime scene. That's how I remember it.

Indeed, but does no one still know who is actually behind Brandon Estates Ltd?