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I remember 1982 & how bad the Pirates performed. For me i vividly remember the likes of Pete Ellams being atrocious & more was expected of Kevin Smith and Andy Campbell. Scott Autrey was coming to the end of his career, Middleditch was as good as could have been and i think a lot more was expected of Davis too. He was the only rider in the top 26 not to have scored a maximum whereas Kenny Carter who finished top of the averages romped to 15 full maximums. The first league win was v Coventry on July 28th! But Pirates had recorded 6 League Cup wins prior to that & 3 challenge fixture wins. After the Coventry win we won just 4 more matches that season.

Interestingly Poole's top average rider was John Davis with 8.68 and was 26th out of 201 eligible riders in the final BL averages that year. An average similar last season would have placed you SECOND out of 74 in the final averages. It shows how watered down the league is now and how there are so few top riders in Britain now. Also in 1982 in the BL there were 10 British riders in the top 26. Last year there were 8. Not much in it really.

In 1982 there were 182 recorded full and paid maximums in the top 26 compared to 33 last season. Just some interesting figures I thought i would throw in.

 

edit..Erik Stenlund rode for Poole in 1983 and not 1982 season. For me the dullest ever Poole rider and worst by far was Claes Jensen.

The day our season went down the toilet was against Eastbourne when we lost Peter Prinsloo in a nasty crash and then the stadium floodlights kept going out. Peter Ellams got a high score that night of something like 8+3 and we thumped the Eagles.

 

Got home something like 11:00 that night because of the delays

I remember 1982 & how bad the Pirates performed. For me i vividly remember the likes of Pete Ellams being atrocious & more was expected of Kevin Smith and Andy Campbell. Scott Autrey was coming to the end of his career, Middleditch was as good as could have been and i think a lot more was expected of Davis too. He was the only rider in the top 26 not to have scored a maximum whereas Kenny Carter who finished top of the averages romped to 15 full maximums. The first league win was v Coventry on July 28th! But Pirates had recorded 6 League Cup wins prior to that & 3 challenge fixture wins. After the Coventry win we won just 4 more matches that season.

Interestingly Poole's top average rider was John Davis with 8.68 and was 26th out of 201 eligible riders in the final BL averages that year. An average similar last season would have placed you SECOND out of 74 in the final averages. It shows how watered down the league is now and how there are so few top riders in Britain now. Also in 1982 in the BL there were 10 British riders in the top 26. Last year there were 8. Not much in it really.

In 1982 there were 182 recorded full and paid maximums in the top 26 compared to 33 last season. Just some interesting figures I thought i would throw in.

 

edit..Erik Stenlund rode for Poole in 1983 and not 1982 season. For me the dullest ever Poole rider and worst by far was Claes Jensen.

The day our season went down the toilet was against Eastbourne when we lost Peter Prinsloo in a nasty crash and then the stadium floodlights kept going out. Peter Ellams got a high score that night of something like 8+3 and we thumped the Eagles.

 

Got home something like 11:00 that night because of the delays

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The day our season went down the toilet was against Eastbourne when we lost Peter Prinsloo in a nasty crash and then the stadium floodlights kept going out. Peter Ellams got a high score that night of something like 8+3 and we thumped the Eagles.

 

Got home something like 11:00 that night because of the delays

 

The day our season went down the toilet was against Eastbourne when we lost Peter Prinsloo in a nasty crash and then the stadium floodlights kept going out. Peter Ellams got a high score that night of something like 8+3 and we thumped the Eagles.

 

Got home something like 11:00 that night because of the delays

What - TWICE!!! :shock: :shock: :shock:;)

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1984 was a bad season for Exeter but strangely one of my favourite seasons

 

We struggled to attract a real number 1 as nobody wanted to travel to Exeter so ended up talking Ivan Mauger out of retirement, unbelievably for home matches only and went for a guest in all away meetings

 

Exeter switched from our regular Monday evenings to a Friday which was an unpopular move

 

The falcons also kept Robert Maxfield Keith Millard, Andy Campbell (who had a fantastic season beating most of the league's top riders at the county ground) from our national league team

 

We used so many different riders throughout the season, Sean Willmott,Frank Anderson, Michael Coles, Steve Bishop Louis Carr, Buddy Robinson, Leif Wahlman, Stefen Desser, Kevin Price, and that doesn't include any of the guests we used some of which were Gugliemi, Scwartz, Shirra, Moran, Ermelenko, Crump, Bargh, Petersen, Cox, Jolly, Kennett, Tatum, Davis, Smith and Bear

 

 

Exeter finished 2nd bottom above Newcastle. Getting to watch the likes of Hans Nielsen riding the county ground was brilliant, even though we lost most weeks

 

1 season only, then back to national league and Monday nights

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Scunthorpe 1977 when Bob Dugard didn't deem them an attractive enough proposition at Eastbourne and charged half price admission!

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The worst Newcastle team (result wise) I've watched was the 2004 team. Not helped by the fact we weren't allowed to sign Matej Ferjan (his average deemed too high) at the start of the season, we brought in Mario Jirout and also didn't sign Kenny Olsson, but signed Scott Smith (the Aussie one) instead. The Premier Trophy was a disaster (14 matches 1 win 13 defeats. The win a 49--47 home win against Workington). The League campaign was later boosted by the signing of Jason Lyons, but the final table had us bottom after 28 matches, after we'd won 8 and lost 20.

 

Riders used: Jason LYONS, Richard JUUL, Kristian LUND (who made way for Lyons), Kevin LITTLE, Lee DICKEN, Lee SMETHILLS, Jamie ROBERTSON, William LAWSON, Scott SMITH (Aus), Lubos TOMICEK, Carl DOWNS (1 match), Danny HUGHES (4 matches), Mario JIROUT (axed after scoring 13+5 in 5 matches), David MELDRUM, (4 matches), Jesper OLSEN (came back in August and rode in 4 matches, but injury against Glasgow ended not only his season, but his career) and Mike PICKERING (1 match).

I was there that night , Jason Lyons and Jesper were on an easy 5-1 and inexplicably rode into each other on the 3rd bend

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From an Oxford perspective, probably the 2007 EL team before it went t*ts up. Massive and depressing home defeats to Coventry, Poole and Swindon.

 

The 2007 season started on a massive low with the EL team, then we had a CL team which was like a phoenix from the flames and was hugely enjoyable and included one of my favourite meetings of all-time (the sheer drama of the play-off semi vs Plymouth), then the bombshell in November after the season ended.

 

All the best

Rob

Edited by lucifer sam
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From an Oxford perspective, probably the 2007 EL team before it went t*ts up. Massive and depressing home defeats to Coventry, Poole and Swindon.

 

The 2007 season started on a massive low with the EL team, then we had a CL team which was like a phoenix from the flames and was hugely enjoyable and included one of my favourite meetings of all-time (the sheer drama of the play-off semi vs Plymouth), then the bombshell in November after the season ended.

 

All the best

Rob

Was that the same season you had Rickardsson " testing engines " or was that earlier ?

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From an Oxford perspective, probably the 2007 EL team before it went t*ts up. Massive and depressing home defeats to Coventry, Poole and Swindon.

 

The 2007 season started on a massive low with the EL team, then we had a CL team which was like a phoenix from the flames and was hugely enjoyable and included one of my favourite meetings of all-time (the sheer drama of the play-off semi vs Plymouth), then the bombshell in November after the season ended.

 

All the best

Rob

The Oxford 1982 team when we finished bottom...the team make up seemed to change every week!

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Was that the same season you had Rickardsson " testing engines " or was that earlier ?

 

That was one year earlier in 2006.

 

Glad when we kicked out Rickardsson two weeks early and brought in Todd Wiltshire, who actually wanted to ride for us and was willing to help out the rest of the team.

 

All the best

Rob

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The idea here is to put down the 1-7 of the team you follow that was the worst that was on track over a season. We all have a team that really was shocking.

 

My team is the Poole side from 1982 the first year I started following the sport at 13 years of age.

 

Scott Autrey, Vaclav Verner, John Davis, Peter Prinsloo, Danny Kennedy, Neil Middleditch & Mikael Blixt/Erik Stenlund.

 

Apparently 6 of the 7 rode in 1981 and looked pretty good unfortunately they only won 3 fixtures in the BL. To make matters worse I missed the wins over Coventry and Halifax.

to be pedantic, Blixt rde only 4 meetings in 82 and Stenclund none. You missed our Kevin Smith. Tbf, there have been far worse sides than that one, which was really just an extra HL short of being a decent side.

 

I can remember the days when four or five Riders averaged over 10.00 in the same Season.

and in fact some would average over 11. But, that doesn't tell you anything about the strength of the league. The Polish league now is far stronger than the BL used to be, and only a couple of riders normally average over 10. In Britain, the key factor is the change in heat format. The introduction of heat 15 alone is likely to knock 0.5 off the average of an "old 10 pointer" and a point off an "old 9 pointer."

 

 

Interestingly Poole's top average rider was John Davis with 8.68 and was 26th out of 201 eligible riders in the final BL averages that year. An average similar last season would have placed you SECOND out of 74 in the final averages. It shows how watered down the league is now and how there are so few top riders in Britain now. Also in 1982 in the BL there were 10 British riders in the top 26. Last year there were 8. Not much in it really.

In 1982 there were 182 recorded full and paid maximums in the top 26 compared to 33 last season. Just some interesting figures I thought i would throw in.

 

 

The league has been watered down, but those figures in no way prove it (tight conclusion, false argument). The main driver is the much tougher heat format in use last season. That is also the driver behind the reduced number of macimums.

 

I think it was either 85 or 86 when Lynn went through the whole season without winning a single home meeting and only won one away. Vaguely remember them spending big on Mark Courtney and Paul Woods for that season and both being crap.

Courney and Woods are both interesting cases. Both had superb "breakthrough" seasons in 1983, where they became true HL abnd England internationals.

Courney had an ok 84 season for Belle Vue (great at home, pretty rubbish away) and then faded badly thereafter - recall an Aces programme in 84 bemoaning his lack of application.

Woods from memory had an awful 84 season, and retired at one point? Returned, but like Courtney never got close to repeating the form of 83, depsite being pretty young at that stage.

The shrinking of the BL to 11 teams may have been a factor, top HL maintained their averages, but a lot of others dropped markedly (thinking of the likes of Woods, Courtney, Campbell, Andy Grahame), I would say at least in part due to the talent being "condensed."

 

To me, the two weakest teams I saw were the Eastborne and Swindon teams of 83. Certainly the Eastborne side that year was (on paper) eve weaker than the 84 side which Aces thumped 64-14.

 

Weakest Aces side I saw in my years attending Hyde Rd was proably the 86 side - Morton was still a good number 1, Blackbird had a great season, Mckinn was solid, and Eccles impressed at reserve - but PC dropped over 2 points off his average, Andy Smith missed the whole BL with injury (eplaced by a lacklustre Courtney) and Barry Ayres was out of his depth - think the Aces finished 2nd bottom?

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I was there that night , Jason Lyons and Jesper were on an easy 5-1 and inexplicably rode into each other on the 3rd bend

 

I was on the centre green that night (in the days when I was Dalbers' "runner" going between centre green and pits when either side were operating R/R) and I remember Jesper's wife Carol coming across and just saying with some acceptance (for the want of a better word) "What's he done now?"!!!

Edited by Steve Park

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That was one year earlier in 2006.

 

Glad when we kicked out Rickardsson two weeks early and brought in Todd Wiltshire, who actually wanted to ride for us and was willing to help out the rest of the team.

 

All the best

Rob

Didn't Todd have a falling out with one of the team? Seem to remember some hassle but can't recall who the other rider was.

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That was one year earlier in 2006.

 

Glad when we kicked out Rickardsson two weeks early and brought in Todd Wiltshire, who actually wanted to ride for us and was willing to help out the rest of the team.

 

All the best

Rob

Glad I didn't witness Rickardsson as a 'Cheetah' personally.

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Glad I didn't witness Rickardsson as a 'Cheetah' personally.

A great Rider - but another one who never did it for me.

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A great Rider - but another one who never did it for me.

maybe you're too fickle ;)

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