World Cup Final

[algy]

Always disappointing to see points gained by a "joker" or "tactical double" make the difference between winning and losing. Does nothing for the credibility of the sport. Jokers made sense in It's a Knockout and Jeux Sans Frontieres, every team have one. In a sporting event they're just a joke.

[Brummie Kev]

Who's stupid idea was it to have the Czech Republic seeded into the final, did someone seriously think more local fans would attend.

 

It was a joke, if the reason for seeding them through was to get more locals in, then its a massive fail for the FIM as plenty of empty seats on the home straight especially.

 

It should be the 4 best teams in the final that have made it there on merit. This year for me the World Cup has been totally devalued as a competition with the FIM doing that and also having it on such a poor track such as Prague. Really not enjoyed it this year, think its been great in previous years. Thank you FIM!!

[mdmc82]

Great win for Poland. Whole team Performance

[moxey63]

I feel again speedway has sold itself out for a cheap gimmick. In an attempt to keep people interested and perhaps serve a thrilling climax, the Joker robbed the most deserving team the chance of well earned victory, and not for the first time. Denmark were head and shoulders above all others and their honest attempt to try and actually look serious about collecting as many points as possible to win the trophy has backfired on them.

 

As with the Play-Off system in the league, perhaps it is best for any country in World Cup speedway to tootle through the early part of the meeting and fall enough ebhind to play a Joker. On the other hand, perhaps a team shouldn't allow its lead to drift over five points.

 

Whichever way, these double points have given the winning team a hollow victory and made the sport look about as serious as snakes and ladders.

 

Terrific climax though...

[Cliffeboy]

Loved the way KK looked down at his "faulty bike"......... "Hmmm what`s happened here?"

[bigcatdiary]

The actual final was fairly absorbing to see it played out, but the track was truly awful (as it is every year) and the referee was worse.

 

I thought the Danish team manager cocked it up with his choices for the last 4 races, dreadful decision to put MJJ in the last heat and not being on the ball to see what the consequences were in heats 15 & 16.

 

Crowd was better than the race off but still didn't look half full.

Edited July 20, 2013 by bigcatdiary

[salty]

I guess the 3 points Poland gained from the joker were counter-balanced by the Danes gaining when Bjerre should have got excluded and when he got a second bite of the cherry following Milik's fall.

 

Glad the Poles won just to shut up the multi-monikered one on this forum. MJJ's two last places were what ultimately cost the Danes victory.

 

Daft idea to take the WTC to Prague compounded by seeding the Czechs through. Didn't exactly pull in the punters did it?

 

Hopefully we can get back to the ttop 4 teams next year on a decent track.

[spook]

I feel again speedway has sold itself out for a cheap gimmick. In an attempt to keep people interested and perhaps serve a thrilling climax, the Joker robbed the most deserving team the chance of well earned victory, and not for the first time. Denmark were head and shoulders above all others and their honest attempt to try and actually look serious about collecting as many points as possible to win the trophy has backfired on them.

 

As with the Play-Off system in the league, perhaps it is best for any country in World Cup speedway to tootle through the early part of the meeting and fall enough ebhind to play a Joker. On the other hand, perhaps a team shouldn't allow its lead to drift over five points.

 

Whichever way, these double points have given the winning team a hollow victory and made the sport look about as serious as snakes and ladders.

 

Terrific climax though...

 

I hate to say it, but yes maybe the Danes should have. All teams face the same rules at the start of the meeting and the jokers should bring both an eye on how to use one tactically but also how to defend against one.

 

While the Joker rule is in play, a purists point of view is no longer significant...... but knowing the tactics surrounding them is essential

[Kirbs4]

Speedway sunk to an all time low tonight with the best team Denmark losing by 1 point because they were in the lead and could not play the joker. What should have been a showcase for speedway turned into a joke. The track was rubbish, extremely difficult to pass, and they could not even produce a track where you had half a chance from all four gates, gate 4 was a graveyard and at this level to produce a track like that was a disgrace. Who's stupid idea was it to have the Czech Republic seeded into the final, did someone seriously think more local fans would attend. If I lived near the track I would have watched on TV as it's much better to be embarrassed by your country in the privacy of your home than to do it in public, I would have thought they would get a better crowd with four not three competitive teams. I suppose a lot of people would have found the close score entertaining and perhaps it was if you just look at speedway as an entertainment because a sport it is not.

 

I wouldn't say all time low, Peterborough using two tax subs at Reading then even needing one at home before winning the 2006 EL Final was surely lower? Just goes further to prove that speedway buries it's head for too long before doing anything about ridiculous 'rules'

[XTC38L]

would a flexible dirt deflector really knock you off??

of course it would the front wheel runs over the rubber flap and washes the front wheel out. Just like someone pulling rug from under your feet

[foreverblue]

Yes bjerre got lucky then poland got lucky with nicki breakdown and dudek barging doyley but heyho I had 400 at 6/4 so im not complaining!!

 

[JT]

Thoroughly enjoyed my visit to the Marketa. A day of drinking Budvar in Prague may have helped, but me, my old man and a good friend had a great time.

 

To be honest, the stadium is so far from the Old Town and the throngs of tourists, this meeting was only going to attract die hard speedway fans, hence the half empty stadium. Still, tickets were cheap for a world final and it's hard to complain about £1.20 beers.

 

Agree the joker robbed the best team of a victory, but it did serve up a thrilling climax.

 

JT.

[ch958]

of course it would the front wheel runs over the rubber flap and washes the front wheel out. Just like someone pulling rug from under your feet

 

fair enough

[ytsejam]

An exciting and close finish yes, but the actual racing was pretty dire. Apart from some first bend "sort outs" there was virtually no passing at all for the remaining 3 3/4 laps of every race. Totally disgraceful for the Czechs to be in the final and for producing such a rubbish and non action track. Thank goodness the scores WERE close! WHY can't any country other than Poland see that if you actually put enough shale on the tracks, then you will get good racing and people who miss the gate still have a chance to overtake someone?

[TonyMac]

Argue all you like over the effect of one dubious exclusion, a rerun and a mechanical failure, the inescapable fact is that the WORLD CUP FINAL of speedway – the sport’s ultimate team event – was decided by the Joker rule, from which the Poles benefited by six points over nearest rivals Denmark.

 

Ironically, Denmark did sufficiently well throughout the meeting to be the only one of the four teams who did not get the opportunity to play their joker. How that must grate the Danes.

 

People have already argued tonight that the joker rule is there in the name of ‘entertainment’, to keep a dull meeting ‘alive’, but has dumbing down now gone so far that even professional sport has to stoop to ‘Big Brother’ level to keep the punters satisfied and interested? What does it say about the kind of live or TV audience watching? Aren’t we allowed to be ‘bored’ for just a few races, or half an hour? Christ, the times I drove 400 miles in a day to see Hackney thumped 50-28 away – I don’t remember the world coming to an end the next day because of it.

 

Shame if it has in speedway’s case. Why can’t we just all be adults and accept that there are inevitably winners and losers; the team with the most points is crowned champions and the side with the least points finishes bottom?

 

A joker (offering double points) might be just about accepted in prolonging the interests of a league season, as it has in the Elite League for many years, and, as Sky will tell you, to great effect. After a hard slog through months of the league campaign, there’s no better finale than a last meeting/race decider to thrill a live TV audience and get the turnstiles clicking. Champions should be rewarded accordingly but let’s assume that EL clubs benefit financially from such a contrived finale and give the BSPA the benefit of the doubt on this one.

 

But we’re talking here about the Speedway World Cup – not darts, stock car racing, nor WWE wrestling, where ‘entertainment’ is king and credibility is . . . well, let’s face it, none of them are sports.

 

No, we’re talking about the World Cup Final of professional speedway – the so-called top four nations in the sport going at it hammer ‘n’ tongs. Except, they weren’t the best four countries. The Czechs were there just to make up the numbers and hopefully boost the attendance figure. Oh, that didn’t work either, though, and it’s another rule that needs to be re-written or dumped.

 

So what we had, once again, during the SWC campaign were riders deliberately dropping points to try and manoeuvre an advantage for their teams when it came down to use of the joker – perhaps not so evident in tonight’s final, but in the two previous rounds, where gamesmanship was patently obvious. As it was last year. But don’t blame the riders or the team managers – they are just trying to manipulate the stupid rules presented to them by the FIM/BSI.

 

Can it honestly be right for so-called competitors, in any sport, to DELIBERATELY ‘throw’ points away to others teams? For riders to be desperately looking behind them to see where they ideally need to finish in a race (which only adds to the danger element)? Of course not.

 

As for using the rules to help contrive a closer result than might otherwise have been the case, the 2013 SWC final has plumbed new depths of farce. For a while, those involved and most of us watching on TV will be happy and content that the meeting produced a thrilling finale, in that the result was in doubt until the last race. But when the excitement and drama of Prague has worn off, let’s remember the facts:

 

Without the ridiculous joker rule that offers double points, Denmark – whether they deserved it or not is not the argument here – would have been three points clear going into that last race, the title theirs.

How ridiculous is the joker? An earlier poster on here was spot on when he/she compared it to the infamous and farcical It’s A Knockout TV nonsense, which may have entertained millions but not in a remotely serious way.

 

Well, imagine the following scenarios happening in the mainstream sports that the media takes very seriously…

 

TENNIS

 

Theory: Murray goes two sets up and under LTA rules, they give the 3rd set to Djokovic in the interests of prolonging the Wimbledon final. No matter that Murray is dominant and deserving of a 3-0 sets victory.

 

Reality: Murray goes on to stuff Djokovic 3-0 – GSM.

 

CRICKET

 

Theory: England have a 500-plus run second innings lead over Australia at the start of the 4^th day at Lord’s, but because the ICC wants to keep the Ashes series ‘alive’, it has decided to DOUBLE every Australian run scored in their second innings, to enhance their chances of a fightback and to extend the game into a 5^th day. Last thing the public wants is for the series to die a death and England to go into a 2-0 lead, with three tests remaining and lots of expensive corporate hospitality packages to sell.

 

Reality: England will easily go 2-0 up at Lord’s, quite possibly before the end of day four (Sunday), and win the series comfortably anyway.

 

FOOTBALL

 

Theory: Spain take a 2-0 first half lead against Italy in the final of Euro 2012, but to avoid another ‘boring and predictable’ runaway victory for the world champions, FIFA introduces a rule that if Italy score the next goal, it will count double. (FIFA are mad enough to actually consider doing this, but not yet.)

 

Reality: Spain went on to win 4-0, underlining their class and superiority as deserving Euro champs.

 

GOLF

 

Theory: Tiger Woods takes a 6-shot lead from Lee Westwood in the fourth round of The Open, but the cunning organisers at Muirfield have come up with a crafty way to keep this interesting for the Brits in the crowd and the BBC, who are covering it (badly) live. If Tiger drops a shot, that same shot is added to Lee’s score, and those of all the others in the chasing pack. That will keep it interesting until the 18^th green of the last match tomorrow night.

 

Reality: The man who keeps his nerve and cards the best score over the next 18 holes will be declared the 2013 Open champion.

 

No gimmicks were needed to keep alive the fascinating contests or determine the winners of any of the above marquee events or matches, so why does the FIM/BSI persist in trying to conjure a contrived tight finish to its top level team speedway classic?

 

When speedway, especially in Britain, is struggling to retain its credibility for all manner of reasons, this joke of a joker rule is a nonsense the sport should do without.

 

Tony McDonald, Retro Speedway

Edited July 21, 2013 by tmc

[longlivefrankie]

Excellent post, I think speedway needs to decide whether it's a sport or an entertainment

 

When I started watching in the sixties there was a certain air of it being an entertainment re the likes of johnny Hoskins & the visiting bad boys etc.

 

It changed to a more professional sport I would guess somewhere in the late seventies early eighties due in no part to the likes mauger & Olsen but has descended in between over the last decade or so I think in no small part to sky involvement

 

Jokers, play offs etc & now seeding to a World Cup final?

 

And I think the general publicl if they watched , we wish! Would Suss the artificial ness pretty quick

 

For a so called World Cup final to be run as it was last night leaves ne in despair for the sport I once loved

 

Sadly no more

 

Someone needs to sort it from the bottom to the top

Edited July 21, 2013 by longlivefrankie

[Midland Red]

Why wasn't Matej Zagar riding for Czech Republic?

Or couldn't he have guested for Great Britain on Thursday?

[BluPanther]

Had non speedway friends round, and they found the joker thing quite amusing, said they could never take speedway serious if that's the way its run. I had to agree....

[mothorsen]

They've finally removed double points in the GP, which is fair. You get plenty of bonus points just making it to the final. Time to bring fair play in to the SWC aswell.

[fullbore]

Had non speedway friends round, and they found the joker thing quite amusing, said they could never take speedway serious if that's the way its run. I had to agree....

 

Speedway appears to be the two wheeled version of the WWE!

 

Niamh

Edited July 21, 2013 by Niamh