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Quelle surprise - Gollob has now withdrawn from the meeting. Daily Echo report he is sad not to make it because other things have come up. Had a feeling this announcement was likely as soon as Poland went out last night. Shame - I was looking forward to seeing ride the Poole track again. He used to be awesome round there.

Headline on the back of the Daily Echo here "Middlo Wields Cup Axe" - confirms that Stead has been dropped and Chris Louis has been named for tomorrow. Middlo quoted as saying 'Simon has done tremondously well for me but sometimes it is a hard job being a team manager. You have to make tough decisions and this is one of them. Tonight Simon didn't make starts and at this level you can't afford to do that. Chris Louis is a trapper and hopefully he will show me that on Saturday". Hopefully the full story will be on the Echo site later.

So let me get this straight Shazzy...are you telling us that Loobie will definitely be riding tomorrow? Edit: now confirmed. Never doubted you shazz!

Blimey Paul..going to make sure I don't ever upset you matey! You're a man on a mission on this one. FWIW - as Hans said what comes around goes around (or is it the other way - can never remember) and Scotty has pulled a few hard moves in his time as well - neither are angels. Just lucky for us that last night it fired Scott up and he got the win. He has to use anything he feels over last night to make sure he beats Hans on Saturday - preferably fair and square with no need for retribution.

Forget to mention Jordan Frampton who had a few rides after KK pulled out. Looked very smooth and had a cracking last race, beating both Holder and Kerr. He's looked really good in the SAL meetings, but this race was ultra-impressive by him and he didn't look under pressure at all.

Another cracking, if drawn out meeting. Well done to the competitors for carrying on and not whinging like a bunch of girls - the entertainment afterwards proving the track was perfectly raceable and not just rideable. Sending out Chris Schramm and Shaun Tacey to test it for a few laps was an infinitely sensible decision. Some great racing and a few names there to catch the eye. Most people have mentioned Ricky and Klindt, but as Lazyrider says, Wilkinson rode well as did Suchanek. From memory Ksiezak popped up with a good race win later in the meeting and Kerr was mixing it all the way through. Disappointed with the turnout of fans - just goes to show the average fan is only bothered about turning up to see their own team and not racing generally. Bet most of them still watch every meeting on Sky though. Shame because yet again they missed a damn good meeting.

VV with all due respect I think (and would hope) that Middlo has more more important things on his mind like winning the run-off tonight, rather than answer your bitching.

But Holder is an Aussie... Not sure about this decision. It's going to put so much pressure on KK who will only have had 3 (if someone posting about him having 2 meetings for Leszno at the weekend was right) meetings back (and that's if he gets through tonight OK) before the race-off. Just hope his shoulder and his mental and physical fitness are up to such a pressure cooker situation. Walasek must have had engine issues in Poland, because any Poole fan will tell you how he's flying over here at the moment and his engines, as tuned by Boycey are doing the business for him (interesting scenario, the Aussie team manager doing the engines for one of his oppo number ). Plus on his recent outing at Smallmead he did OK getting 11/6. Of the two, I'd have gone for a fit Grzegorz rather than KK, even if just on his EL form.

Hmm..try Anton at Foxhall a couple of times - that might come a close second. To be fair to Toninho, his return at Reading was in the middle of that hectic spell of racing for him and he, along with Bjarne were looking pretty zonked by then. Reckon you'll see a different showing from him on Saturday. His performance last night was first class and I'm dead pleased that he was able to show just how good he is now as sometimes on the big stage he falls a little short still (lack of experience rather than anything else) - anyone who goes to Poole regualarly will have recognised that cut back and long straight move - he's not bad at it for us either. As for Millard - the guy should go. It was embarassing listening to him wibbling on about substitutions at the end of the meeting. Pearson is far more enthusiastic and knowledgable about the sport - throwing in random snippets of info about all the leagues and riders rather than the length of the track, what the start marshall does in his spare time etc. Who cares?!! The Pearson and Kelvin pairing from Sunday was pure quality. Definitely added to the spectacle with their whooping and whoaing!

With all due respect I think the reason for this meeting is to cast an eye over at least some of the riders with a view to next year and possible EL reserve berths. I think the likes of Auty and Tai W, whilst talented wouldn't really fit into that category just yet. I'm well happy with the line-up - last year's meeting was similar and a cracker and the likes of Klindt showed up very well. Expect to see him over in the next year ot two. KK is using the meeting to get back to race fitness after 2 and a half months out, he might have ridden last weekend but I'd think he's grateful to get as much tracktime as possible to get back to full speed. Certainly I'll be pleased for him to have some laps on the Poole track prior to a league meeting.

Slight flaw in the plan, that would actually mean VV socially interacting with someone in the real world. I don't think he does personal contact...not with other people anyway.

That's one happy fan in this household after I've just shown him that!

If it's anything like last year it should be a cracker. Turned out to be one of the best meetings of the year.

They did seem very aware that they'd been written off. Either they've been reading it Middlo has passed it on. Whatever it was, it worked. Just have to convince them they can do it on Thursday now.

Think Middlo will use a horses for courses selection. If there's anyone who's a Smallmead track expert i'd say they were in contention and that includes Birdy. Sorry Tiggers fans but Middlo isn't daft and if he thinks Danny could be a trump card he'll be called up. Wonder if Loobie might get a call for Reading - he has flown around there recently. Is he in the absolute squad..I got lost in all the bickering about his exclusion from Rybnik.

Nice one Trees. If Middlo's reading this - congratulations to the lads. Did us proud and will do again on Thursday. More of the same please!! Getting straight through to the final is over-rated anyway.

Aah RobB but one of our guys was leading one heat with Crumpy 3rd when that race was stopped. Anyone can count back as much as you want with ifs and maybes but it's what actually happened that matters. Sure the Aussies won tonight but they don't look invincible. you make your own luck and I think the Reading track will be quite a leveller rather than a big pacy Polish track.

Absolutely cracking meeting with some brilliant racing. Special mentions to Gollob - the guy is a legend when in full flow. Tonight restored my faith after some fairly boring recent GP and EL meetings. The SWC usually doesn't disappoint and tonight was no exception. Wow!!! I loved Nigel pearson and Kelvin's commentary. Totally partisan but added to the whole thing. Think the criticism from the fans etc writing off our team has cut deep - but it worked and fired them right up. Great to see and pleased for Middlo after some of the recent crap on here. As Scotty said - we can win this!! If Tuesday is half as good I'll be pleased.

It does seem a relatively uninspired line-up admittedly. I don't know who has been behind getting the line-ups together...but it looks like Holta has bitten the dust now that he's not in the Polish SWC team and there's a smattering of Poole assets making up the numbers. Very strange. Like you Tabby, I'll be on duty there. Just relieved it's a team event. Didn't fancy another individual meeting and the work it entails - next weds will be bad enough! I might just get to see Gollob do a few laps this way! Don't think my other half is impressed at having to pay extra to go to this though - his first comment was 'it doesn't exactly shout it's worth an extra 3 quid'!

OK, so this will please SCB - not. The line-up for TRick's farewell has appeared in our local paper today. Its is: Poole: Tony Rickardsson, Bjarne Pedersen, Antonio Lindback, Krzysztof Kasprzak, Craig boyce, Jonas Davidsson, Shaun tacey Rest of the World: Tomasz Gollob, Jason Crump, Leigh Adams, Chris Holder, Nikolai Klindt, Jason Doyle, Steve Johnston. So there you have it. Discuss and no doubt, dissect.

So we basically need a single millionaire with no business or other commitments who can devote himself completely to running the national team. Applications on a postacrd to...

I just had to double check that I was actually still reading the 'Rickardsson Farewell' thread and not another 'Oxford fans Bickering Amongst Themselves' topic. Give it a rest guys - we all know who is for Oxford and against them this year but it's spilling over into too many threads.

Really sorry to hear that about Brendan. Best wishes to him for a very quick recovery - we'll miss seeing him doing his laps at Poole.

Just had a text from BobC to say that Brendan Johnson is currently nursing a badly swollen right wrist after his heat 2 crash. He's been given the all clear to return home providing he goes for an x-ray. According to the Poole Updates he actually hit a member of the public, such was the momentum he had after going through the fence. Thanks to Bob for keeping me up to date and best wishes to Brendan for a speedy recovery and track return. Well done also to George Piper. Third in the semi - good achievement after what must have been a difficult couple of weeks with Steve being ill.

Looks they have both justified their inclusion in the SWC five with good performances.