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Time to sack Phil Morris?


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I, like a lot of supporters stopped going to live matches several years ago. I started going to speedway in 1964 when we would travel from Canterbury to  Wimbledon. I then supported Canterbury missing only a handful of matches and going to the majority of the away matches. When Canterbury closed I would travel to Reading,Coventry,Oxford,Eastbourne and Ipswich. 

When Arena Essex moved up I went to all of their meetings but lost interest when Poole called off a meeting due to Chris Holder being injured, I had booked a day off to go as Arena had won there a couple of weeks earlier. Then the shambles of a meeting at Belle Vue where Tony Steel allowed Poole to get the six points ahead then called the meeting off as unsafe,it should never have even started.

With all the grand prix riders suddenly turning up for play off meetings it made a farce of the whole league programme.This started a few years ago with Linback and Hancock among the first. I said farewell after all this and I cannot see a return soon. The powers to be who allowed all of this are to blame for the state of british speedway and everyone knows the main culprits.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited by macky
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so after tonight's result you get 2 different play/off semi-finals which are the true correct ones sheffield/ipswich which is what they always wanted and Aces / Leicester for the sake of 2  days morris should have waited and got the right outcome and kept what integrity is left in the sport 🤡💩

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What was Morris going on about saying the NFL did the same last year in their playoffs as British Speedway are doing this year? 
Totally incorrect & misleading. 

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3 minutes ago, 1 valve said:

What was Morris going on about saying the NFL did the same last year in their playoffs as British Speedway are doing this year? 
Totally incorrect & misleading. 

I don't follow NFL at all but I suspected as much... he probably got mixed up with wrestling

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1 hour ago, iainb said:

I don't follow NFL at all but I suspected as much... he probably got mixed up with wrestling

I follow American Football and Phil means College Football , not the NFL which is decided on the teams record    W-L-D 

The College Football Playoffs are selected by a committee rather than by a simple win-loss record because college football teams play such different schedules. 

The committee, made up of athletic directors and former coaches and players, ranks the teams based on their play on the field and considers conference championships, strength of schedule, head-to-head competition and comparative outcomes of common opponents.

Florida State were controversially excluded from the play-offs despite going 13-0 through the season. They lost their QB through injury and the committee decided not to include them in the play-offs. Many believe that the Broadcasters were influential as a team with greater support / following would of missed out and Florida State without their star player would not of been competitive. 

 

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15 minutes ago, Hackett said:

I follow American Football and Phil means College Football , not the NFL which is decided on the teams record    W-L-D 

The College Football Playoffs are selected by a committee rather than by a simple win-loss record because college football teams play such different schedules. 

The committee, made up of athletic directors and former coaches and players, ranks the teams based on their play on the field and considers conference championships, strength of schedule, head-to-head competition and comparative outcomes of common opponents.

Florida State were controversially excluded from the play-offs despite going 13-0 through the season. They lost their QB through injury and the committee decided not to include them in the play-offs. Many believe that the Broadcasters were influential as a team with greater support / following would of missed out and Florida State without their star player would not of been competitive. 

 

And do they change the rules on the eve of the pay offs? :D

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9 hours ago, iainb said:

And do they change the rules on the eve of the pay offs? :D

Neither the NFL nor The NCAA changed anything which PH was less than accurate in stating. 
The truth is that TV requested the dates to be fixed for the playoffs before the season had finished. 
Just difficult to understand why this was not stated from the outset. 
So much for clearer communication to the fans!
 

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On 9/3/2024 at 9:26 AM, 1 valve said:

Neither the NFL nor The NCAA changed anything which PH was less than accurate in stating. 
The truth is that TV requested the dates to be fixed for the playoffs before the season had finished. 
Just difficult to understand why this was not stated from the outset. 
So much for clearer communication to the fans!
 

Of course they didn't... it was just Mr Morris trying to justify the unjustifiable.

If they'd stuck to the original cut off date and just called it at that point, I think most fans would have accepted it and just thought well that's what you get when you allow KL to do what KL did with all their call offs, also it wouldn't have been the first time that pay off places had been decided with outstanding fixtures to complete (I think). But somebody said no, we're going to switch the league table around and rig BV vs Sheff & Lions vs Ippo... and that is just totally unforgivable! 😠

Like you say if they'd also said at the outset that the top 4 will be decided at the end of the season by the management committee, again I think most fans would have accepted this. But no, we've all been to a load of matches since a team's top 4 place was secured for absolutely no sporting reason whatsoever.

Edited by iainb
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I previously tried to defend Phil Morris, but his performance to camera yesterday made it 100% clear Eurosport has dictated the playoff schedule. 

If this is put within the context of what he said in the recent podcast, the priority is now, by far, to please Eurosport, other broadcasters, and other sponsors. Doesn't seem like there's any option for anyone else, promoters, riders, supporters, except to accept that situation. 

 

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42 minutes ago, Hamish McRaker said:

I previously tried to defend Phil Morris, but his performance to camera yesterday made it 100% clear Eurosport has dictated the playoff schedule. 

If this is put within the context of what he said in the recent podcast, the priority is now, by far, to please Eurosport, other broadcasters, and other sponsors. Doesn't seem like there's any option for anyone else, promoters, riders, supporters, except to accept that situation. 

 

If my understanding is correct the issue is the number of normally UK based OB units out of the country and although Eurosport knew the dates, the issue was they wanted to know where they were expected to be on the dates they were given.

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2 minutes ago, W9 Lion said:

If my understanding is correct the issue is the number of normally UK based OB units out of the country and although Eurosport knew the dates, the issue was they wanted to know where they were expected to be on the dates they were given.

Didn't they not show both legs of the pay offs live last year? Still doesn't answer the question of why rig/fix the fixtures as they have?

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1 hour ago, Chris116 said:

The simple solution would have been to agree the dates each team would run their home meeting on, which means TV know where they need their OB team to be and then sort out the opposition in accordance with the rules. 

Exactly! And Morris should have simply given the rationale as being the situation with the OB units. But that would have been considered as being too risky of negativity about Eurosport, which is an absolute no-no, and so we have been treated to this charade instead. Complete cockup which was made much worse by the entirely erroneous reference to the NFL. And it would not surprise me if the NFL get their lawyers involved.

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Whilst I fully expected us to be defeated by Sheffield during the play off process, this rigging of the fixtures now sees us lose out on potentially £80k+ of supporter income. Coming on the back of the SON it’s something the club could have done without. 

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1 hour ago, ouch said:

Whilst I fully expected us to be defeated by Sheffield during the play off process, this rigging of the fixtures now sees us lose out on potentially £80k+ of supporter income. Coming on the back of the SON it’s something the club could have done without. 

How do you make that one out? Surely you've got (another) BV vs Sheffield now and a possible final whereas if it hadn't have been rigged you would have had Leicester and possibly no final 

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10 minutes ago, iainb said:

How do you make that one out? Surely you've got (another) BV vs Sheffield now and a possible final whereas if it hadn't have been rigged you would have had Leicester and possibly no final 

Ok. 

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