Eastbourne 2020

[woofers 467]

5 hours ago, Sings4Speedway said:

Taken from the club website "The club are especially indebted to Tom, who has arranged transportation to Germany immediately after the Eagles match v Plymouth so that he can ride for the Eagles." roughly translated as its possible to get to Germany after the Eastbourne meeting and we love Tom for doing it but Drew *doesn't fancy it/didn't want to/can't be ar$ed (*delete as appropriate)

Also taken from the club website “Another Seagull to be given a chance on Saturday is the popular Jake Knight, who stands in for Drew Kemp, who is riding in Poland.”

I guess you couldn’t be ar$ed to read the article in full.

[old bob at herne bay 828]

I am sure Edwards will find a reserve berth in another CL club to give hime more meetings that this year amateur NDL which runs so erratically. Good to see Ablitt getting a chance after Edwards sacking. I remember seeing Nathan

Surprised that the stadium owners (C. Dugard & Sons Ltd) ?? wont allow  double headers.  Seems they don't like speedway anymore ? Or maybe complints from their neighbour a mile down the lane. ?

[old bob at herne bay 828]

Whats going on down at Arlington ? never a fan of the track, but the presentation has always been one of the best.

This season the track prep has been given to " an inexperienced team" quoted by Trevor Gear one the the team managers. Botched attempts at rigging the start grids have been found out. The " announcer"  Kev Coombes who I used to rate highly seems to have become error prone.... and this week I read the starting gate wasn't tested and failed to operate delaying the meeting for an hour , followed by the tractor running into the safety fence.  Green Light starts. Amateur Hour.

Fixtures appear to be arranged every week to clash with one or more of the much heralded " home grown" Arlington talent  riding somewhere else. 

Coupled with rumours of a "new" promotion taking over next season ... and going premiership (on a midweek race day ??? good luck with that one), one wonders whether Ian Jordan has maybe decided to try something different....  things were never like this under the auspices of the late, great Bob Dugard.  Like him or loath him, he could prepare a track surface for the home side,  and didn't hit the safety fence in HIS tractor.

[GWC 495]

Same thing happened at Rye House as soon as Silver left the place fell apart and has now gone.

The loss of John Cook must have impacted the place as well.

[SuperSpeed 24]

2 hours ago, old bob at herne bay said:

Fixtures appear to be arranged every week to clash with one or more of the much heralded " home grown" Arlington talent  riding somewhere else.

In mitigation I think this is at least partly down to the truncated season, combined with being a weekend track - I think we've only had two weekends since the end of May without a meeting. If the domestic season had started in late March as usual then it may have easier to plan fixtures to avoid the clashes.

I'm more or less in agreement with your other points though.  Last night was the second time this season that the tapes have failed (although the first time it was eventually rectified), and they weren't rising evenly the other week although the meeting continued despite that.

Even when everything does work properly we seem to be getting ever greater delays between heats and protracted periods of tractor racing throughout the evening.  With the double header last week we got home gone 11pm, for a meeting that started at 6:30pm, and we only live 8 miles away from the track! 

[cityrebel 2,960]

The crowd levels must be a concern as well. From a very healthy start, they have dwindled away. Covid restrictions and dreadful weather haven't helped for sure.

[old bob at herne bay 828]

Read the match report on the Eagles website, and not a single word of apology offered to the spectators who stood around for “45 minutes” (Trevor Gears timing) , and the dismissive attitude re the tractor hitting the fence. Really exemplifies the poor customer service now being offered to paying customers.

We must do better would be nice to have seen written down. 

 

[woofers 467]

Saturdays fixture against Birmingham OFF. Full disclosure and statement on the website.

[HGould 2,213]

16 minutes ago, woofers said:

Saturdays fixture against Birmingham OFF. Full disclosure and statement on the website.

I did automatically think it might be linked to the Brummies future, as we all wait for some news.

When reading though its a very detailed explanation and not Brummies related at all

I have been there for a meeting v Somerset in 2019 on the trust of their weather expert which proved very accurate so have to take the early  decision at face value and the reasons.

It does give Brummies another meeting at home as our next Fixture  so a backhanded favour there for us hopefully.

 

[old bob at herne bay 828]

Saw the very early call off - and there were rumours of this call off heard on Tuesday evening at Kent. 

They must have mystic meg as  a weather forecaster, and whilst a contributory factor, the more likely major reason is the clash with the Speedway Circus at Lublin. Really calls into question the wisdom of the fixture planning of Eastbourne  running agaisnt the SGP. Coupled with a next to bottom Brummies team not being the most attractive opposition, any dodgy weather will persuade all but the die hard fans to stay at home at watch the SGP on BT Sport. Sundays were/are an alterntive race day for EB and one wonders why they haven't put on meetings on alternative days to avoid the SGP?

Lets not forget that EB entertained another near bottom of table team last week with some dodgy weather arround, with allegedly their  lowest crowd of the season, who endured a much delayed evening's entertainment with green light starts.... which is unlikely to attract any new fans back. 

Its ALMOST as boring as supporting English Test cricket in the bad light and rain.

[Midland Red 2,383]

https://www.eastbourneherald.co.uk/sport/motorcycling/tough-times-for-eastbourne-eagles-boss-explains-challenges-as-birmingham-fixture-is-called-off-3335982

[SSL84 541]

31 minutes ago, Midland Red said:

https://www.eastbourneherald.co.uk/sport/motorcycling/tough-times-for-eastbourne-eagles-boss-explains-challenges-as-birmingham-fixture-is-called-off-3335982

What does this mean moving forward for eastbourne? 

[HGould 2,213]

9 minutes ago, Trackerman48 said:

What does this mean moving forward for eastbourne? 

First of all credit to them; I had purchased tickets online with family to go down to see Brummies and I got an email to say the meeting was off, with options to transfer ticket or use at the restaging or request a Refund and I got a Refund within 10 minutes of asking for one as I'm unlikely to be able to make the rearranged Fixture if indeed Brummies are still running which we all hope they are.

That doesn't suggest any of the immediate problems at Eastie similar to that Brummies and Diamonds have made very public.

Looking at their remaining Fixtures it seems they avoid any more GP clashes and seem to have deliberately avoided them from the original GP schedule most of the season by riding on Sundays.

I think the point made is that when GP dates can be changed very quick from the original schedule, as they have last year and this year, there is little they can do at short notice especially when the weather looks so grim. Aren't UK League Fixtures agreed in February, probably based on the original Speedway GP draft that has been shreaded and changed massively.

The argument as to whether they have made the decision too soon or not has been discussed on other threads but at least they have stuck their mast in the  ground and explained it which is refreshing in some ways. As someone elsewhere pointed out they will have saved a considerable sum by making an early decision too.

Maybe the 2 Promotions agreed this too in order to give Brummies Management a few extra days to consider their future, we won't know until Brummies make a formal statement after calling Wednesday "make or break" and with Lee Kilby involved with both Clubs  that may be another factor

Hopefully Brummies and Newcastle will get through this and all other Clubs

[ruckerroo 792]

On 8/1/2021 at 6:53 PM, cityrebel said:

The crowd levels must be a concern as well. From a very healthy start, they have dwindled away. Covid restrictions and dreadful weather haven't helped for sure.

June and july are summer now in england, clubs have had 2 weeks to race with proper crowds, the scunny match was moderate crowd size too.

I think they are bang on not risking this weekend, could do 3 or 4 grand and the match be expunged from records in a fortnight if things go awry elsewhere

[Sings4Speedway 3,246]

24 minutes ago, ruckerroo said:

June and july are summer now in england, clubs have had 2 weeks to race with proper crowds, the scunny match was moderate crowd size too.

I think they are bang on not risking this weekend, could do 3 or 4 grand and the match be expunged from records in a fortnight if things go awry elsewhere

I think you are right, Brum and Newcastle look very costly meetings for the host clubs should either side not see out the season and i can see other teams ready to call off with far better forecasts than there is this weekend. 

Sadly Eastbourne are more representative of a successful UK speedway club and if they are facing financial difficulties and strong dependencies upon the number of people attending then it really is time to sit down and look at how the cloth can be cut accordingly for all clubs.