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Which I why I agree the play offs are necessary. We’re not like other sports really because we’re solely reliant on fans attending to survive. If it were top team is champions and that’s that, a fair few teams would have their season ended early doors and gates would suffer even more. I still like the idea though that top team is champions no ifs or buts, top four contest the KOC.

Is the Official end of season not still the last day in October.? Think it used too be.

Noooo ... if you don't make playoffs your season is potentially over by mid August. Its short enough already.

I don't think it'd make a blind bit of difference to crowd levels, that's down to marketing and the entertainment at the event, not the rules.

A few years ago many people said the same for October, it'll be August next! Rain can happen at any time of year.

They worked their boll0cks off during the winter including Chris Louis himself no less, digging up the track and clearing every single drain to enable the best possible drainage. There is social media footage if you don’t believe it. Why do you lot do this? No wonder our sport is failing. What a bunch of wa*kers!

Seven teams, riding 12 home meetings meant eighty four matches in total.. If you started in April and finished by August end that is 43 Mondays and Thursdays combined.. 43 Monday and Thursdays on which to run... Take out the GP week and that leaves 41 nights for UK Speedway... Six teams racing twice per week, one home and one away meeting, (which is perfectly feasible given fixed race night priorty was the reason for having them), and that would allow a maximum 123 matches to take place during that 41 evening timeline, (3 matches Monday, 3 Thursday).. We needed to complete just 84 matches, not 123.. And that would still have left September completely free.. Given those munbers were so heavily stacked in their favour, and even with the KO Cup, (which starts at the QF stage), and Poland just using the odd Thursday whenever they saw fit, the optics of a "professional sport" not completing any league, let alone its "flagship league" doesnt look good does it? Some tracks went three weeks without a meeting, which, given you can make lifetime habits change in just 28 days, that is also a risk to its attendance numbers, let alone league completion... Loads of fixed nights on which to race, yet we will still have meetings potentially ran after the winners of the same competition have been declared..

Result of this! LOL. let’s have it right you’d never be winning this one.

Yes I know it was last week, if that’s the popular opinion then the BSPL should have no option but to move the play offs IMO. A sport that is a comedy show continues to become one when you don’t even finish your official fixtures. That’s why Poland laughs at us, and why we have no large number of fans… it’s nowhere near a professional run sport.

Agree,think poole and cov were two of the biggest culprits then,different and more desperate times now,I would have a 40 or even 38pt limit, championship averages, premier league averages converted up to championship level.Any rider full time in gp has a 12pt average fixed for the whole season.Im afraid speedway is now in a situation where the "weakest" need to be protected,has to be a competitive league.

Last night wasn't the original staging of the meeting, that was last week in August if you remember, and if it could have been ran Monday or Tuesday it would have been on, both days in September however Ipswich have planned today, in September Doesn't matter when you plan to run, it can rain in this country

100%..... And put together a fit for purpose IRR system and you could easily work around the rare occasion when riders get injured early in the meeting.. A fit for purpose RR system would also help massively should riders be missing, however, if five rider teams, then there should be plenty of "unattached" riders to temporary cover any gaps..

Oh sorry I thought last night was in September 🤦🏼 I must have got confused. The whole point is that you move everything forward so you have some slack weeks at the end of August for any rain offs.

Or he is ordering extra broom sticks for the commute😄

People used to complain that the season dragged on to October - even in "the good old days" some seasons ended with cancelled league fixtures. Indeed, when Ipswich won the British League in 1984, Belle Vue vs Swindon wasn't raced (they obviously didn't have drainage as good as the NSS 🤣) - thankfully the Aces were 3 points short of the Witches.

He must be getting a right contract to drop down?

How do you know if the Ipswich track has adequate drainage (let alone "adequate enough")? The huge amount of track work done in recent years has also included changes to the drainage - which is limited to some extent by whatever already there (a stadium built in the 1940/50s and a speedway track originally constructed in 1968. And, of course, the duration and volume of rain is a contributing factor. Trolls never let reason or facts get in the way.

I heard a similar rumour at lynn a couple of weeks ago

Id take issue with your statement of "as often happens" re injuries and withdrawals early in matches I have no data but I'd expect the number of times a side has lost 2 riders in a match is tiny So no different to running IRR now - certainly not the reason to reject a change that could provide far more positives than potential issues

I agree it worked back then so why not now as used to bring extra revenue from fans when it was regionalised. Cricket has gone the other way and they have changed it to much now but that is my opinion.

A big problem with 5 man teams is what happens when riders are injured early in the match, as often happens. One rider injured, would leave only 4 riders to cover the remaining races. Even worse if 2 riders from same team were injured, then only 3 riders to cover all the rest of the heats. This would result in riders having 2 rides in a row, meaning longer gaps between races, and supporters would soon get fed up of seeing the same few riders in every race. Much less variety than we get at the moment !!.

But the rain off was in August, so even if that was the last fixture there would still be an issue now !! I watch stock car racing regularly and I distinctly remember one 'summer' where I got drenched on all 5 Saturday's in August. No matter when you run the season there will be meetings postponed.

Depends on the financing situation i guess? If the deal is to split the home costs whatever then moving venue makes sense, if each home venue is liable for the home costs (and the meetings run at a loss) then i can understand why Rob wouldn't want to accommodate a switch. It might be that paying half a fine (haha) for non completion of fixtures is the better financial decision?

The Oxford v Leicester match tonight is off now.

If a PL & CL merger is confirmed, expect some CL clubs to be shafted when it comes to allocating riders, as has happened in the past in 1965 & 1995.