CB252

Wonder what excuse MJ scumbag will cook up for the re staging?

His reputation is irrelevant. He takes no prisoners, oversteps the mark occasionally, and usually gets excluded. The sport is knackered when he packs it in, since the others (excluding Smolinski) have the charisma of an old shoe! Speedway, thankfully, is a contact sport, and long may it remain so. The likes of Briggs, Mauger, Olsen, Nielsen, Penhall all dished out a bit of the real hard stuff on World Final night. People need to sit back and enjoy and stop being so shocked and appalled at everything they see.

A rider that, despite not being the most naturally talented in the world, and being told he'd never make it, has grafted his way to the top of his profession, been one of the most consistent riders of the last 10+ years, and won 3 world titles? Is that what Great Britain needs?

Could have moved it forward a day to the Thursday, but England playing in the snoozeball that night so not an option. Problem is, none of you turn up on an off night if they rearrange the fixture anyway. You've always got such brilliant excuses as to why Monday's or Wednesday's or Thursday's don't work for you!

Wouldn't really be sudden upturn in form though, since he's only dropped a couple of points in the last few home meetings, and only dropped one to the opposition from his completed rides at King's Lynn. Actually now top of the Bees Averages on this years figures alone I believe with bonus points included. And it's also better for Belle Vue to be without him for this one and free themselves of that crippling 3K guarantee that he picks up for every meeting.

The first twelve heats were dire. The woeful presentation of the company that film the Swedish League does little to help.

Yet the quality of the racing is consistently miles behind. That could be something to do with the tracks rather than the quality of rider. I get that Woffinden is only averaging 7.97, but don't think he's the only top rider struggling to score consistently under the new format. We could revert to the old format and he'd get a few more bankers against reserves and second strings which would inflate his average, but wouldn't necessarily indicate that he was riding any better than he is now.

In Sweden in a Home meeting on Tuesday Tai faced: Nicki Pedersen x2 Kylmakorpi x 2 MJJ x 2 Dudek x 1 Aspegren x1 In the UK, away from home to the League leaders he faced: Iversen x 3 Schlein x 3 Bjerre x 2 Porsing x 1 Lambert x 1 Looking at that, I'm not surprised he scored more in Sweden to be honest. Not a great deal of difference in the quality of his opposition, despite the constant wittering of some about the quality of the EL.

If you're going to have two reserve races, the logical solution is for teams to take up the option of naming a number 8 and ensure a junior is present, which will at the very least ensure that there are 4 riders in the second reserves race.

Fair enough. I can't remember the last time he rode at Coventry, so I don't see a great deal of him. I do think his relative lack of EL experience is costing him a bit now there are no easy races for heat leaders at the top level though.

Could it be that, despite what some will tell you about the apparent strength of the PL, he's just not up to 4 rides against EL heat leaders under this years format?

Enjoyable night at Perry Barr. Miles better than Swedish borefest the night before.

Indeed, they'll be queuing up to see if Jensen can better his pitiful 2 in tonight's Swedish League or his embarrassing elimination from SEC yesterday.

Question for Neil Watson: With Harris, Andersen, Garrity, Milik, Pawlicki and Janowski likely to be missing on the 20th, what are the chances of getting this meeting rearranged for a more sensible day and moving a Storm meeting to this date?

I love watching old footage of racing in the early 80's when the riders were rolling and nudging the tapes and you could almost feel the tension as it added to the anticipation and excitement of the race. The current 'everyone sit still' mehod is just sterile and boring and contibutes to dull Speedway. In the past your top rider might get caught out trying to get a flyer and have to pick his way through from the back. Nowadays, nine times out of ten, your top rider just clears off from the gate and that's the end of it.

My hope is that he'll find some commitment to the EL, given his poor form over the past couple of years, and try and halt the obvious decline in his career.

I suspect Schlein will be on one side and Danny King on the other.

Bomber is doing practice, he told a few of us after the match. You've got more chance of Zagar becoming the pope than missing a GP practice for a British League Match!

Pleasantly surprised with that performance. Everyone stepped up and Lambert did us proud. Great ride in 14 to steady the nerves. Looking forward to the saviour arriving next week. Shame Harris, Zagar and Cook will all be missing!

Indeed he would. I just meant that it's almost doubly frustrating as he's not actually riding anywhere tonight.

Missing Garrity is a huge blow. You'd expect him to comfortably have the measure of Morris and Jacobs in the reserve race but, as it is, 2 and 9 look to favour the away side massively. Add to that that Wolves top 2 are likely to eat ours for breakfast and the otherwise useless Proctor is usually a world beater at Brandon and you start to see this one getting tricky. I'd still fancy Wolves even if MJJ were riding. It's frustrating that the meeting Jason is missing this one for isn't until tomorrow in Germany and that Kyle is riding in both, but Garrity simply doesn't have the mechanical resources to be able to hop from one country to another.

Good news. Wasn't sure re: Kyle as thought he would be heading out to the U21 in Germany with Garrity.

Fisher. It's in the press release. I believe Simon Lambert replaces Garrity. Not sure re: Howarth. Andersen is entitled to the day off as well as per DMU regs 24 hours before Berwick. Expect a Wolves win.

Hancock is right. He is getting too old and over sensitive. He dealt it back to Pedersen in spades in the final, but thankfully Nicki didn't embarrass himself and managed to shake Hancock's hand at the end of the race. It's a World Final FFS. Compared to what Nielsen did to Tatum in 1990 at Odsal it was childs play. The top riders of the past used to deliver much harder moves than the guff we watch nowadays and the sport used to be all the better for it.

Fisher and Howarth to go please. Utter shambles.