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A think they might also sneak a point at Newcastle.

Ask Barry Bishop and Martin Widman to be in charge of bringing Speedway into the 21st century. They not only understand that these days you need to provide more than 15 heats of Speedway to make a night out but will listen to the ideas and thoughts of others. In fact they are so forward thinking that they were forced out of league Speedway in the UK!

Will be glad to see MotoGP back this coming weekend. What with Speedway GP Friday and Saturday as well it’s going to be a cracker.

Funny how the business commitments only came into play when Poole dropped a division.

Cook should be at 2. Would ride in 3 heats with the no1. "Easy" ride in heat 8 and then RR in heat 13. With Cook and King together in 3 heats ... must get 3 heat advantages for it to work But hey what do the paying public know.... Pressure now on Allen to score well... the rider who would be at reserve if Starke had ridden enough meetings for an average. Oh well.....

In my opinion promoters in general are just as much to blame for the sport going on such a huge decline as anyone. Its their product to sell each week and very few do a good enough job. Admittedly I have never been a speedway promoter and never will be, but I wouldn't invest in a speedway club and expect handouts to keep the club going. What I have seen recently is a couple of Championship clubs having the begging bowl out for money to help them through the season as well as threatening to close down because the fans aren't packing into the stadiums. And those clubs are clubs with new promoters over the last couple of years who have never promoted before. The value for money just isn't there. On average around two hours stood around watching 15 heats of speedway, overpriced food and drink, barely anything going on between the heats and more often than not being stood in freezing cold conditions listening to completely out dated music. Add that with poor stadiums that look older than the average pensioner and processional racing on track and its clear to see why there are no fans coming through the gate. I absolutely love speedway, admittedly no where near as much as when I attended Newport regular before we shut down and I moved to Aus, so I am not one that wants to see the sport fail and cease to exist. But I really do think that the sport has been driven that far into the ground (in Britain) that it is beyond a state of repair. It would take a miracle of epic proportions to revive the sport in the UK, IMO. I remember the beginning of the end being when Rickardsson quit Poole after a few meetings one season, I think it was the season they brought the grading system into the Elite League. Ever since, the quality has got weaker and weaker, prices have gone up and up and ultimately, crowds have gone down and down.

For those a little shy about wearing their speedway merchandise... Speedway t-shirt

Don't all fines go to the Ben Fund?

Totally irrelevant, Bob. With any simple points accumulating system, it is all about that - who gathers the most points, not who wins the most meetings. Same with F1, and most motorsports. If a guy finishes second in every meeting, and gets the most points, he deserves to win. Look at league racing in speedway. Your team may win 12 of the 13 races, and still lose... EDIT : Jack Biggs won more races than anyone else at the 1951 World Final - and finished third...

It is difficult to see what the answer is and I don't think there is a simple solution to the sport's problems. On a good night, live speedway is as good as any other sport in the world but it shoots itself in the foot far too often. The rules should be simple but they aren't. Guests and doubling up has turned into a monster that only benefits the riders currently racing but constantly squeezes out others and has made the fans feel like the riders aren't 'theirs'. And the stadiums are poor, there is no getting away from that. Racing wise, I've been going for 45 years and we all remember the classics. However, there were duff meetings in the 70s, 80s and 90s and not all meetings are going to be brilliant. I've been to 8 meetings at four tracks this season and would say that 2 were very good, 1 was poor and 5 were in the middle and still enjoyable. I watch Sheffield Wednesday quite regularly as well and would say that the ratio of good, poor and average games was about the same.

To be fair Premiership Clubs are generally closer to Poole and race mid-week, the Championship clubs are predominately northern and mainly race at the weekend.

Don’t get me wrong there is no one more frustrated than me that a guy who has a clean field can put such a shocking track in and then promote i go all over Europe watching this great sport and it breaks me to think my local track is such a poor example of this sport it’s ok saying xyz can ride but you need to have a presentation that the majority can excel on. Here is hoping one day I win the lottery I will sort for us all .

Heat 13 was certainly a cracker... people used to use the expression worth the admission money alone... before it was 17 odd quid

It very much depends on what you're looking for from your speedway, quite a few people are happy to watch strung out poor racing as long as their team are coming home with a 5-1, for me that's not speedway but I understand and accept that others enjoy that sort of thing.

If I were under threat of redundancy from my employer, who announces they might not last the season, not sure I would be feeling like giving it 100% ????

Delighted to see that after x-rays Jye Etheridge has no broken bones but is obviously very battered and bruised.

I was told that when they checked his DNA it came back as the same as that of Marmite. Does that help.?

Think u spoke to soon her son.. If teams are watching the only person they want to sing is Jason Edwards. All have been poor.. Spoke to some Leicester Fans and said every time Morris and Shanes rides you will get 4-2 or 5-1, they said Na your having me on, I said nope piss poor. And yet again they have tonight. We all knew paco will win heat 2 and then not show up. They all better turn up Wednesday, if not will be folding

It’s a farce. Just set a half decent points limit and let teams build accordingly

Excellent meeting all round. How many people are aware of the absolute nightmare they had getting riders there? On Wednesday, Wightlinks new and largest ferry Victoria was put out of action due to a mishap. Almost every rider booking had to be changed, some being switched to Lymington Right up to about 4pm, there were still problems. Fortunately, everyone made it in time. Even on the last ferry back, we were all sat round chatting. Barry? Going around everyone thanking us for coming etc. 28 races on just over 3hrs, including a track repair hold up and 3 x ambulance visits Something for everyone. A complete contrast to your 'normal BSPL' meeting of 15 Hts...... now go home. KIds were involved from start to finish. Barry even apologised that due to holdups, he couldnt hold the kids running race. They are working their socks off to produce something you dont normally see. Breaking the 'established mold'. They are succeeding and Im sure the BSPL are watching everything very closely. Long may it continue.

Doing very nicely at the moment it seems. A friend of mine - who has been going since it opened on the Island - said last night's attendance was the biggest he has seen for 'a very long time'. Anyone else fancy dumping the BSPL....................

Crutchlow replacing Morbidelli for Austrian and UK rounds. Will do well to get in the top 10 on that bike. Dani Pedrosa also on a wildcard at the Austrian round.

TBH your Team Manager (aka "Calamity Clown" ) lost you this match. Instead of trusting messrs Cook, Jensen, Nicol & Wells to cover Ostergaard's programmed rides, in comes a highly dubious choice of guest which spectacularly backfires! Hard to imagine Stewart Dickson would have made such a blunder in a derby match when he was at the helm

Good luck to Luke Harrison, every time I see him at Monmore he seems to get steadier and faster, future wolf I hope

Include Youth Speedway? Some upright engined bikes races? Some of the 'oldies' riding round on their Rudges, Japs etc? Maybe a 'devil take the hindmost' where the last rider drops out after a mad one lap dash of racing? Two riders starting at opposite sides of the track similar to the cycling pursuit? With the "Grand Finale" at the end of four or five hours of entertainment... Get the merchandise stalls there so fans can dip in and out of the racing... Include some of the usual face painting, bouncy castles, beat the starter etc for the kids.. Maybe hook up a PlayStation too? Something for the older generation and something for the younger including teenagers.. Raffle off some 'season/however meetings left tickets' for the club at say a fiver a ticket or sell some set amount of meetings tickets in a block eg next five matches, at discount special offer rates.. And probably most important of all, get some names, emails, mobile numbers, etc etc of those in attendance to target market them post that day.. Maybe even give everyone a club car sticker or a pen as a memento for them to take away too to a) get your name on a fair few cars locally, and b) those in possession of the items will have a tangible reminder of their day which they will see often.. As they start from so a very low base marketing and promotion wise, there is really so much which could be done..