Richard Weston

Simple...if a rider wishes to compete in Sweden, Poland, Denmark, or anywhere you care to name, let them. Fine, off you go. If you are a top level rider and wish to compete in this country's second division....fine, off you go. But, in both cases you wouldn't ride for me in the top league. If you sign for my club, our interests come first. Terry Russell said something similar in the Speedway Star. I don't always agree with what he says/does but on this point he was bang on. If you are an Aussie rider, don't expect a UK club to pay for you to come to Britain and then sign for a Polish club. Oh, dear rider: can't make a living? Well slope off to Poland and/or Sweden (good luck with that) or get a job and ride speedway part time, like most riders did when the sport was great. Let British speedway see what it has got in terms of riders come January 1, 2019 and go from there. Totally fed up with riders dictating.

Yes, just think what it would have been like it we were having a 'normal' summer

And it follows the worst start to the season, weatherwise, for many a long year. Make hay when sun shines

You could well be right: the late 1960s and 1970s were the days of big crowds, without doubt. I seem to remember in the 1980s sitting at home in King's Lynn (5 miles from Saddlebow Rd) at 7.15pm and still being in the stadium for the first race.

Is it raining or did Kent pull the plug far too soon?

Some of this recent stuff on this thread highlights what's wrong. We are discussing things from a generation ago. Has no relevance to what happens today. What the Sunday People did has no impact on today's audience

You must be very upset, especially as the cheer leader for the Bees on this site. BTW: knowing how things get out of hand here, calling you a cheer leader is a compliment. Keep doing your best and don't get downhearted in the face of adversity. I clearly am not a Coventry supporter but I support the continuation of this great club – so anyone who helps promote them is good.

The problem for Eastbourne and others in the NL is that the Championship is far too close in terms of costs/quality to the Premiership. In fact, you can look at some line-ups in the Championship and they are as good, if not better, than the Prem. Look at how good NL riders struggle when they move up.

Totally agree. On paper, it looked a lost cause before the start but Plymouth did well with what they had. Good choice of guest but you wonder if Ellis Perks might have gone through the card, although Ben Morley not far short.

Ben Morley and Richard Andrews were good value

Teams are on the Eastbourne website.

I was neither talking about the match, nor the make-up/age of the Kent team. My comment was all about how Kent reacted to this shocking episode.

Not sure Kent get it. Towards the end of a lengthy blow-by-blow match report, we get: "The circumstances of Monday left even the hugely experienced Kent co-promoter Len Silver astonished by the extraordinary unfolding events. "Never in my long career in Speedway have I moved from 'High' to 'Low' and back again in such a short space of time as I did at last night's meeting against Plymouth. By late afternoon, even with the unbearable heat, the track had turned out better than expected so, by 5pm I was on quite a high, expecting some good racing. "But by 6pm that turned to one of the worst "Lows" I have ever suffered as Steve [Boxall] arrived at the track and refused to take the drug test that was being administered by SCB officials. Steve's refusal came as a huge shock to me personally because, in all the years I have been closely associated with him, I have never ever known him to be involved in anything like so called recreational drugs or anything of that type at all." So, no condemnation of the rider, no apology, no explanation. This is 2018 and these issues have to be faced, immediately. Sorry Kent, a poor show from the club in the time of adversity and in the main text trying to play the "hard done by card" in linking the incident with the suspension of Stoneman on justifiable health grounds which are in force to protect the rider himself and others on track with them. Dinosaur stuff coming out of Central Park.

Drugs/alcohol testing now takes place regularly at UK speedway. I have seen the tester at Eastbourne at least once this season - he could have been more but I don't always go over to the pits before the meeting.

I'm sure we will have one soon. And once we start, there will be no stopping us.