Glasgow 2023

[Diamonds85]

1. Ben Basso

2. Paul Starke

3. Craig Cook

4. Danyon Hume

5. Tom Brennan

6. Connor Bailey

7. RS or 2.61

Based on a 41 point limit with rising stars or a 39 point limit without

[Cast1rn]

I think Ben at 1 would be outstanding but I genuinely cannot see him coming back. 
 

Cookie I’m sure is moving on but who else could be have at 1?

[cinderfella]

I'd like to see Marcin Nowak do a full season in the stripes and I think Paul Starke should be on the team sheet for next season.

He's been a good servant but I think Cookie will need a new challenge elsewhere if he is to keep any enthusiasm for the sport.

As much as it would be nice see Ben back I can't help but think he and Tom maybe have more ambitious plans for their careers and will both want to step up their level of competition. Maybe if Glasgow moved up a division they would stay but I can't see a change of race night being in the Promotion's plans.

Perhaps Glasgow can put their Australian  and Danish contacts to use and Fraser Bowes may be worth taking a chance on and perhaps there is some other young Dane on the edges of breaking through. I mean if we can help Berwick secure a good 'un we must be able to find another for ourselves. (Would be nice to see our asset Anders Thomson back but again I think ambition may be the obstacle).

 

Edited October 19, 2022 by cinderfella

[Paulco]

Think the fall out after the promoters conference could be interesting.  The rumour is that the points limit in our league will drop to around the 39/40 point mark . I assume this is to re-establish more of a gap between us and the Premiership rather than some misguided money saving exercise.  

The excuses levelled in the past at the amount of riders performing in both leagues was - " not enough riders " or " we need to be in both leagues to make it pay " . Well it looks like a good few of the Championship heat leaders will be forced to give up the second tier which won't go down well . 

[Fromafar]

15 minutes ago, Paulco said:

Think the fall out after the promoters conference could be interesting.  The rumour is that the points limit in our league will drop to around the 39/40 point mark . I assume this is to re-establish more of a gap between us and the Premiership rather than some misguided money saving exercise.  

The excuses levelled in the past at the amount of riders performing in both leagues was - " not enough riders " or " we need to be in both leagues to make it pay " . Well it looks like a good few of the Championship heat leaders will be forced to give up the second tier which won't go down well . 

The sport is a shambles ,no doubt admission prices will not reflect the drop  in wages they will expect the lesser riders to take.Self interest as usual.

The shambolic fixture list of this season will have to be sorted out for next year or crowd level will only decrease.

[Guest]

51 minutes ago, Fromafar said:

The sport is a shambles ,no doubt admission prices will not reflect the drop  in wages they will expect the lesser riders to take.Self interest as usual.

The shambolic fixture list of this season will have to be sorted out for next year or crowd level will only decrease.

Can attendances get any lower

[Fromafar]

1 minute ago, JohnHyam said:

Can attendances get any lower

Not much to be viable for a number of Clubs.IMO.Fans donations are keeping a few afloat.

[Fromafar]

The Promoters always seem keen on diluting the Championship,it’s going to backfire on them soon.IMO.

[Joseq7]

The attendance levels at Glasgow cannot be sustainable. 

I don't have access to the figures obviously but we must be losing a fortune every meeting.

When they said that the attendance at the GP Challenge was c2000 IIRC I remember thinking this looks multiple multiple times what we get on a weekly basis. 

Four times, five times? 

There's got to come a point when a generous benefactor will not risk their children's inheritance.

It's happened in other sports. 

We've seen, in the last couple of weeks, two top division English rugby union teams fold, one of them, Wasps, a hugely successful (on the field) club. 

Whilst expenditure running a speedway team isn't comparable it must be relatively comparable. 

Flying in guys from the continent, at short notice, must cost an unsustainable amount of money. 

[Fromafar]

42 minutes ago, Joseq7 said:

The attendance levels at Glasgow cannot be sustainable. 

I don't have access to the figures obviously but we must be losing a fortune every meeting.

When they said that the attendance at the GP Challenge was c2000 IIRC I remember thinking this looks multiple multiple times what we get on a weekly basis. 

Four times, five times? 

There's got to come a point when a generous benefactor will not risk their children's inheritance.

It's happened in other sports. 

We've seen, in the last couple of weeks, two top division English rugby union teams fold, one of them, Wasps, a hugely successful (on the field) club. 

Whilst expenditure running a speedway team isn't comparable it must be relatively comparable. 

Flying in guys from the continent, at short notice, must cost an unsustainable amount of money. 

Glasgow is one of the better attendances I have seen at Championship tracks recently.IMO

[cinderfella]

9 minutes ago, Fromafar said:

Glasgow is one of the better attendances I have seen at Championship tracks recently.IMO

The sad fact us with the cost of living and fuel prices increasing it is only a question of time before visiting supporters become a thing of the past.

When you consider what it must cost for fans of say Plymouth or Poole visiting Glasgow or Edinburgh and vice versa especially since 'tours' seem to have all but disappeared it is understandable that crowds are falling and at this point in the season play-offs and Mickey Mouse Jubilee meetings may be seen as extra income to promoters but there is a limit to how many meetings fans will want to attend.

 

I know its said on a daily basis but speedway needs a major restructuring but promoters seems to be the only ones willing to accept that and it is only a question of time before speedway is only a ride at the fairground.

[Nickinho]

2 hours ago, Joseq7 said:

 

It's happened in other sports. 

We've seen, in the last couple of weeks, two top division English rugby union teams fold, one of them, Wasps, a hugely successful (on the field) club. 

 

"Wasps attendences dropped by over a quarter due to the lockdowns and never regained their previous level"

I think the same thing has happened with Glasgow with many not returning after the 2020 and 2021 seasons were curtailed. Even this season started late and ended up all over the place by August and the fans are simply fed up and along with all that is the uncertainty over money at the moement because people are really starting to struggle to make ends meet. The lockdowns really hammered this country and whether or not you were pro-lockdown or anti-lockdown the fact is this country is so screwed right now. I've never known a time when the government were paying people's bills for them but even they won't stretch to a Glasgow Tigers season ticket for everyone. I can't see many sports surviving apart from the English football leagues.

[Nickinho]

1 hour ago, Fromafar said:

Glasgow is one of the better attendances I have seen at Championship tracks recently.IMO

Some of the last few meetings at Glasgow only attracted around 300 fans with the Poole play-off pretty low as well. I thought it would be mobbed like the GP Challenge thingy but it was very sparse. 

[SlicktrackSandy]

Pretty sad really that we are in this state at present. Clearly some riders are going to be left out in the cold depending on their GSA for 2023.  If the limit does go down to 38 or thereabouts - it makes the Championship so diluted that it is certainly not an inspired vision which will attract new spectators or indeed retain existing ones.  As some have already suggested maybe the 3 leagues will become a thing of the past and maybe the plan is to just to have 2 - i.e. a "big" league and a "wee" league with the latter being an NDL/Championship hybrid -  and that seems to be the direction the Championship is heading at present.  As per usual at this time of year fans are continually left in the dark and speculating what fantastic new ideas are going to be trialed for the following season - which almost certainly will be discarded in time for the next one. After years of being stuck in this same pattern of "Wtf next ?" -  together with Covid complications and the adverse economic climate it is enough to make the most ardent die-hard weep with frustration.   When the sport starts to hemorrhage die-hards, as it is in great danger of doing, it soon could well be in s**t creek territory - minus the paddle !     

[Joseq7]

2 hours ago, Fromafar said:

Glasgow is one of the better attendances I have seen at Championship tracks recently.IMO

I'm not doubting what you're saying. 

I myself haven't travelled with Glasgow for about 4 seasons.

I would regularly travel away to Edinburgh, Berwick, Newcastle and Workington.

Perhaps that there is an obvious reason why attendances have dropped significantly. Less away fans, even within our "northern" neighbours. 

IIRC didn't the Facennas, or perhaps it was Dick/Dickson/Pairman promotion, who stated a break-even figure of around 750?

As has been speculated by fellow posters, we must be averaging about half that.

[Jaizer]

23 minutes ago, Joseq7 said:

I'm not doubting what you're saying. 

I myself haven't travelled with Glasgow for about 4 seasons.

I would regularly travel away to Edinburgh, Berwick, Newcastle and Workington.

Perhaps that there is an obvious reason why attendances have dropped significantly. Less away fans, even within our "northern" neighbours. 

IIRC didn't the Facennas, or perhaps it was Dick/Dickson/Pairman promotion, who stated a break-even figure of around 750?

As has been speculated by fellow posters, we must be averaging about half that.

There's way more than 375 people on a regular basis. I'd probably say as a rough figure we've been averaging 7/800 this season at least.

1000 is the figure I remember banded about but think that was in the pairman era I'd imagine bit more now

[Joseq7]

6 minutes ago, Jaizer said:

There's way more than 375 people on a regular basis. I'd probably say as a rough figure we've been averaging 7/800 this season at least.

1000 is the figure I remember banded about but think that was in the pairman era I'd imagine bit more now

I was going to say 1000 but I really wasn't sure. 

You'd honestly say as many as an average of 800? I don't have any official facts to contradict you. 

It might be deceptive, the stand is always pretty full. 

How many do we think the stand holds? 

The rest of the ground, for me, looks pretty sparse. 

[Jaizer]

1 minute ago, Joseq7 said:

I was going to say 1000 but I really wasn't sure. 

You'd honestly say as many as an average of 800? I don't have any official facts to contradict you. 

It might be deceptive, the stand is always pretty full. 

How many do we think the stand holds? 

The rest of the ground, for me, looks pretty sparse. 

I don't have any figures just a guess based on what it looked like in the days said we were getting about 500. It's busier than that. 

Stand must hold 4/500 maybe? The shed on 4the bend usually pretty busy too 

[Joseq7]

28 minutes ago, Jaizer said:

I don't have any figures just a guess based on what it looked like in the days said we were getting about 500. It's busier than that. 

Stand must hold 4/500 maybe? The shed on 4the bend usually pretty busy too 

I genuinely hope that you are correct. 

If the stand does hold 400, let's say for arguments sake, then maybe 150 in the shed on a good night, and another 150 around the rest of the ground would be 700.

There isn't a magic wand to get more punters in. 

It's a fringe minority sport. 

I do genuinely think if more people could be exposed to it they'd become fans, supporters, attenders.

We need to do something about the length of a meeting, on a fair weather evening, ideally 90 minutes with 120 minutes max being the exception. 

Do we think meetings are artificially prolonged to increase bar and concession income?

Oh I'm very cynical in my old age....... 

[Jaizer]

6 minutes ago, Joseq7 said:

I genuinely hope that you are correct. 

If the stand does hold 400, let's say for arguments sake, then maybe 150 in the shed on a good night, and another 150 around the rest of the ground would be 700.

There isn't a magic wand to get more punters in. 

It's a fringe minority sport. 

I do genuinely think if more people could be exposed to it they'd become fans, supporters, attenders.

We need to do something about the length of a meeting, on a fair weather evening, ideally 90 minutes with 120 minutes max being the exception. 

Do we think meetings are artificially prolonged to increase bar and concession income?

Oh I'm very cynical in my old age....... 

I think it was extended with kids race etc as new people felt 20quid for 15 minutes entertainment wasn't good value. Tried to make it more of a day out than just 15 heats of speedway.

Now, you and I I'm sure very happy to live without it all but I'm sure a lot of homework would've been done on this and Glasgow does have a far younger crowd than most tracks I've been to