marko

I don't about a lot of the Non GP Polish riders but Torun look strong, so +2 makes me cautious about placing a bet on them.

Actually Paul is 45, I know this because his birthday is almost the same as mine and he made his debut in1991 aged16, I was 19 at the time.

I would replace Batchelor now, if he wants to lower his average fine, go do it for someone else, Sheffield no doubt pay him good money regardless of what he scores on the night, they are entitled to better. He is ripping Sheffield and the fans off and will then go back to Swindon next year on a nice reduced average.

Wolves didn't use Sam Masters in heat 15 so I felt robbed on him scoring over 10, then I logged in and found out I had hit the wrong button and selected Sam to score under 10, Happy Days

Throwing a lot of eggs at Masters tonight, first to outscore Craig Cook and 2nd to score more than 10, but Sam is a man on red hot form. Ostergaard +5 was tempting but number one is a very hard number to score points from.

Can Nigel even work for BT Sport, he is also a Talksport employee, BT Sports is aligned with the BBC (the competition)

Only too happy to support the objection, no speedway is Essex and I doubt we will have again, same with London, got to protect this place, also made mention in my objection that it will affect local businesses, such as in my case Harlow, as they have some stores that are not in my area and I won’t visit them unless I am in the area.

By getting his average down I assume he is throwing wages away too? In not then no wonder the sport is in trouble. By that I mean a rider is getting paid for 10 every week regardless, so if he only scores 4, it’s no skin off his nose, and his average goes down to boot, meaning the next club will get the benefit too, it’s all wrong.

Yes Cityrebel and pre internet you could understand it to a point, but once the internet came about there was no excuse for just being honest, it was a meeting at another track, Ronnie had nothing to lose by being honest with the fans, instead he caused resentment which may have affected his home gates moving forward. I personally would still consider going to a meeting if a promoter was open and honest up front, the promoters do not like the internet because it spoils their ability to fleece the fans and exposes all their wrong doings. They would rather tell a lie and say sorry than tell the truth and seek sympathy.

Back in the 80% and early 90s I used to rely on the speedway star or speedway mail for news on upcoming meetings but in those days and until the late 2000s I would go anyway. But even the internet isn’t always helpful, I recall Arena Essex going to Swindon in the pairs final in 2003, a load of fans went and when we got their found out that Joonas Kylmakorpi wasn’t there and was never going to be there, Mr Russell kept it quiet much to everyone anger.

Nothing new unfortunately, I can recall many seasons within the last decade where you get to the school holidays and Lakeside might have two home meetings during the time over the six weeks.

Many years ago I ran an online speedway fantasy league (called Tightlines) I had a guy called Dale Allitt in it at one stage, might not be the same Dale that is now TM at Lynn but it’s seems probable, anyway he didn’t last that long in the game as he was thrown out for lack of participation lol

I was not there but remember hearing about it, for some reason the name Lew Stripp springs to mind but it could have been any ref from that era

I put 12 on Toruń +2 at 5/6 but according to other thread it’s been called off

Gutted I had a few Bob on Toruń thinking they would probably get a good away win

The same Chelmsford born, Arena Essex rider Chris Mills?

Something else which is seldom mentioned is with crowds going down so is the likely effect of lack of volunteers, and that is something speedway depends a lot on, back in the 80s there seemed to be more track staff than there are now, (using Arena Essex as an example)

Someone posted about losing interest yet still being involved, it’s so true, Arena finished 3 years ago and the current first division is something of a joke but I still love the sport, I get my fix from clips on YouTube both current and old. Someone even posted the recent Witches vs Wolves meeting, is that Kevin Long still doing the MC on the centre green? Sounded like him, one of the better ones given my 30 plus years of following the sport.

Great news, as an Arena Essex/Lakeside fan the only match I can recall at Cowley was when Christian Heffonbrock went through the card helping an away win, probably the only time we won at Oxford although I don’t think we went there much as often in different divisions. I have enjoyed the meetings posted on you tube of Oxford in the late 80s/90s with Hans Nielsen.

Regardless of points limit you have to be competitive in order to retain the fan base, most fans expect their team to win at home, maybe the odd narrow defeat but not losing by big margins, this has been the case for decades. Lynn though has always been a track that most riders like so maybe not so much home advantage. Rider shortage and lack of interest in non British League riders coming over here, will hurt any team struggling, imagine what a NKI type rider could do for this team if swapped with a second string or reserve.

Anyone know what sort of viewing figures Eurosport are generating? Sponsorship exposure is important, but if few are watching it amounts to nothing. Equal share of coverage has to be there, but I do wonder whether sometimes a promoter would rather it wasn't, it means a reduced crowd and the chances of someone watching who is A: an unconverted live fan and B: within reasonable travelling distance to that track, seems quite low. Where is the gain? the sport has had tv coverage for years, it all seems to do is bury the product rather than put it over as something people should go out of there way to experience.

Poland seem to have it right, but they have not always been in that position, that country has a history of being held back and yet still they have risen our sport to levels far exceeding our own, there must be lessons we can learn from how they turned that around. We have a massive rider shortage, 75 odd years I recall a story of clubs especially Wembley having mass try outs to find future riders and stars, that is what we probably need to do, invest in getting new riders to the sport, but you have to get other things in place first, the equipment needs to be more standard and cheaper to run, it needs to be more viable for new riders or grass track/motocross riders to get involved. As it stands, one "big" league will happen eventually anyway because clubs will continue to close because what we have is unsustainable, our leagues are going through the motions continuing to be bleed money.

And they make it even worse but carrying on with the 4 team play offs, only in speedway could a team finish in the bottom half of a table and still be league champions. If play offs were going to be kept with 7 or less teams, it should have been top two straight to a final

Bjarne at +5 over Holder looks to good to be true, am i missing somthing? has Holder dropped to reserve? Always nervous about betting on race days when rain is about, can change the tracks wiping out all home advantage

Or the fans