chunky

You can - but you refuse to. Like another forum member who refuses to accept a dual-World Champ as a top rider merely because he retired mid-season...

Obviously, Lee was more talented, and he achieved more, but a lot of people forget that Moran was 4th in each of his World Final appearances, and actually averaged 11 points in World Finals - higher than Lee's WF average. That's still pretty impressive...

The reason I say he was the biggest waste of talent because he had more talent than anybody else, and therefore more to waste, and his career was so short purely because of his own doing. I think that it is harsh to include Ward when his career was cut short by injury.

Actually, PM's on here SHOULD be the easiest - certainly if you disable those email settings. Seeing as I get hundreds of work emails every day, I do try to avoid recreational emails if necessary. Now, I have noted your email address, but you should do one thing IMMEDIATELY. DELETE YOUR EMAIL ADDRESSES FROM THE ABOVE POSTS! You should NEVER post your private email addresses on a public forum or page. Again, I don't send PM's to any email address, just your username here.

Okay, I think I found the culprit! While you are logged in go to "Account" in the menu. Then "Account Settings", and scroll down to "Notification Settings" (below "Other Settings). Click on that, and scroll down to the bottom where you should see a heading "Messenger". The tabs underneath will probably be showing green, which indicates that you will receive an email to tell you that you have a message. Disable those, and you should be good to go.

That's weird? The PM's on here should only stay as PM's on here; they shouldn't be connected to any email addresses. Unless there is a way to forward PM's to email addresses - which I don't know about? Many apologies, Bob, but I have never heard of such a thing! What I will do is look and see if there are any settings, which you should be able to set/undo. Perhaps anyone else reading this knows something?

Because they go by performances and results...

Dudek missing out could really have changed things, and honestly, I thought he was on his way out. Had he failed, I do think that he would have been out and replaced by another Pole. Everything I said about Lindback...

It doesn't matter; he was also the biggest waste of talent that speedway has ever seen...

Of course, and when we were arguing about Lee before, I myself stated that while I wouldn't place him above Collins, Woffinden, or Craven as far as "best" British rider, he was perhaps the most talented and potential-laden rider in the history of speedway. Unfortunately, some people can't differentiate between "best" and "most-talented", and the sad thing is that most of the really talented youngsters don't get anywhere near fulfilling their potential. That's not just a speedway thing, either.

I get what you're saying, but should we base World Championships on league averages? Again, I would personally have gone for Michelsen over Lindback, but that doesn't mean that I clearly believe that Michelsen is one of the top 15 riders in the world, or that Lindback isn't. Of course, it's all conjecture, but would Drabik or Michelsen have finished higher in the GP standings this year? Personally, I don't think so, which means that you can't really argue against Lindback's inclusion for 2020. Again, it shouldn't just come down to league averages. Three of the absolute best (highest averages) and most consistent riders in the then-strongest league in the world were the Boococks and Ray Wilson - and between them, how many times did they mount a serious challenge for even a rostrum place, let alone a World title? Taking Eric Boocock, a consistent 10.5/11.00 average rider in the BL over a prolonged period of time, and most of the time, he struggled to reach the latter stages of the World Championship. League averages can be used as PART of the ranking process, but really can't be used as a true reflection of world class.

Nah, if somebody is out of action for more than a month or so, just forget about them, they're done...

If only it were that simple... Speedway has NEVER been like that, despite what our memories seem to tell us. Problem is that everybody appears to see different things. There have been a couple of dire ones this year, and there have been some poor-to-average ones. However, while quite a few of us felt that meetings like Vojens and Cardiff weren't great, but were still enjoyable, others felt they were the worst things they had ever seen. Wroclaw was special, but if every meeting was like that, it wouldn't be special. And people would find something else to whine about...

That's what I thought...

Do you have any compelling evidence to the contrary?

You got that right... Nobody who saw Wroclaw could fail to get a buzz...

Firstly, Vaculik doesn't belong in this conversation; he is better than the others mentioned, and he finished fifth - comfortably. Lambert's performances tailed off after the injuries. I'm not saying he was top eight material, but he would have been much more competitive overall. I don't know too much about Drabik, and haven't seen that much of him, but I don't feel that Smektala is better than Lambert.

Thinking about it, my personal list would be almost identical, just switching Craven and Woffy.

Cant say I disagree with you, but that isn't the fault of the riders involved; qualification opportunities are there, but if nobody new is able to step up and qualify, then what can you do? The problem is that there are a small group of riders who (and this may sound harsh) aren't good enough to consistently challenge the elite. However, there is nobody out there better than them, so they usually re-qualify, or get the wildcards because there is nobody ready to take their place.

Quite honestly, I didn't either. It was only after looking at some of the alternatives I realised that he was even a contender. For some reason, there is quite a gulf between levels at the moment...

It's funny, looking at some of the comments on these threads (not just this particular one)... Some don't want Hancock because he's old. Some don't want Hancock because he's "boring". Some don't want Lindback because he's "never finished higher than seventh". Some don't want Iversen and Zagar because "they don't add anything". Some don't want Laguta because he is "just a gater". Some want a bunch of youngsters, just because "they are the future". The thing to remember is that this is the World Championship. Unlike the old system, the GP series is actually designed to include the best 15 riders in the world, and surely, that SHOULD be a goal of ANY world championship. World championships are designed to find the best right now, not those who will be competing ten years down the road. No, it's not going to be perfect, as nothing ever is. There will always be questions. Yes, personally, I would like to have seen Michelsen in place of Lindback, but can ANYONE state categorically that the line-up for 2020 doesn't include - or at least come damn close to including - all the best riders in the world? Steve

That is a fair point....

Just because someone doesn't ride for a year it doesn't mean they lose everything, and it doesn't reflect poorly on the others. Again, the problem for most people seems to be his age, which is actually irrelevant...

I don't dispute that age catches up with us, but fitness in sports these days is so different to what it was back in the day. The riders I grew up with were largely beer-swilling brutes who you rarely saw without a fag in their hand!

That's the problem with some of the older riders, particularly from the lower divisions. I'm sure you know Stavvy, and we talk about this on Facebook; nearly every photo he posts has Pete Reading in it somewhere! He really was a part of the furniture...