deanr1

£18 is expensive but the reality is there is no money in British speedway, it costs a lot to run a meeting and with only small crowds that means the entry prices have to be high to make it anywhere near viable. If Mick charged us all £15 we would probably not have a competitive side or worse than that no speedway at all.

I think Woodward will do alright, he was a heat leader most of last season riding in a crap team that had virtually no away support and was expected to lose every away meeting. I think a change of scene and being in a team that's looking to win something will do him good, he will have easier rides at number 4 and if he gets dialled in to Brandon the way he did Eastbourne we will have a very good second string. Hansen was absolutely dire last season, even getting beat by grade 2 reserves, Woodward will be a big improvement.

Good signing... King & Woodward at 3 & 4 is much better than any combination we had in those positions last season, even when MJJ was with us. At least now we have a proper 3rd heat leader and we have got rid of the disaster that was Hansen, Woodward will do better than him. So it all rests now on the number 1 & 2 positions as to whether or not we will have a competitive team, hopefully it won't be Andersen & Summers like many are predicting but I think it may well be. We will do well throughout the season and make the play offs if we go with Andersen/Summers, but will come unstuck against the sides with a big top two like Poole & Lakeside when it really matters because we will be lacking anyone capable of beating the very best EL riders, Janowski, Holder, Jonsson, Bech etc.

Has the "only 2 riders over 7.00" rule been confirmed? I've not seen it anywhere official. Unsurprisingly that would suit Poole rather well with Pawlicki on 6.75... 😳

I hope we don't go for Summers, he's a decent lad who always gives his best and under the old format he was a good reserve, but he's not good enough to be a second string in this league especially now there has been a points limit increase and he will be up against even better riders. Fricke would be a good shout, plenty of improvement in him and that is what you need.

There wasn't a lot wrong with this years team, I would hope to see some fine tuning rather than wholesale changes. We had the same problem from start to finish really which was only briefly addressed while MJJ was with us and that was the number 3 & 4 positions. We spent most of the season without a capable third heat leader, and Hansen was probably worse at number 4 than anyone would have predicted. I would like to see Garrity back, I'm not sure it will happen though. I think we will struggle to sign riders on a permanent basis with all the uncertainty around the club and I think we will see a similar team to this year and use of our own assets wherever possible. The third heat leader position is key and probably the trickiest to resolve with the low points limit we have these days. We have plenty of possibilities for a number 4 as riders like Barker & Fisher would do ok in that role, the problems have come about when expecting them to ride as EL heat leaders which they are not. Put them in the right team position and they will do their job. Fricke or Garrity would also be a good shout but I'm not sure they are likely. Here are my thoughts for the 2015 Bees: Something like... 1. Andersen 2. Howarth 3. Danny King maybe? Mads K? Needs to be a proven heatleader. 4. Fricke, Barker, Fisher, Garrity, Summers? Take your pick, it could be any of them but more likely one of them that is our asset. 5. Harris 6. Sarjeant 7. Greenwood or Nielsen Get that middle order right and we will have a competitive side again.

I've now got quite a collection of emails telling people's Brandon stories and why they object to the stadium being redeveloped. If anyone else would like to send me theirs then please do so, I will be using your stories and letters of objection to show everyone just how much the stadium means to so many people and why it should stay as a speedway venue. The email address is savecoventrystadium@hotmail.com All contributions are much appreciated!

I've now got quite a collection of emails telling people's Brandon stories and why they object to the stadium being redeveloped. If anyone else would like to send me theirs then please do so, I will be using your stories and letters of objection to show everyone just how much the stadium means to so many people and why it should stay as a speedway venue. The email address is savecoventrystadium@hotmail.com All contributions are much appreciated!

My next step is to join the stock car forums and drum up some support there, but there has been quite a lot of posts on the FB page from Stox fans already so yes I would say they are very much on board! :-)

Hi everyone, can I just repeat Pete's request on the FB page that you email your Brandon story to savecoventrystadium@hotmail.com, basically telling us how long you've been going, what the stadium means to you, your best Brandon memories etc, along with your reasons for objecting to the stadium being re-developed. I will then print them all off and hand them in as letters of objection at Saturdays meeting. For this to have the impact we want I need as many responses as possible, so please get emailing people! :-) This is aimed at fans of other clubs too, I'm sure no true speedway fan wants to see Brandon Stadium die so please get involved no matter what club you support, if you've enjoyed visiting Brandon as an away supporter in the past and want to see it continue, email us and tell us why! Thank you in advance for your support!

It's in the EL section now, I asked for it to be moved as it wasn't generating much interest in SGD. I agree it's pointless having 2 threads going about the same thing and is detrimental to the cause.

Excellent work speedybee, I'm sure I speak for all Bees fans when I say thank you for the effort you are putting in!

Totally agree, Sandhu doesn't give a stuff about the Bees, even if he wanted to build us a new home it would be very hard for him to get permission. The end of Brandon will be the end of the Bees so let's turn out in force at the meeting and see what we can do to stop him getting PP granted for his housing estate. I'm disgusted with Sandhu, he's a sporting man himself and knows the heritage of Brandon, speedway has been there since 1928 and is set to be wiped out just so he can add a few more £££ to his already bulging bank balance. If only there was someone within the speedway world with the finances to buy him out.

Hi Speedibee, it's only been applied for, there's no guarantee they will get it. As you say though the writing is probably on the wall for the long term and has been for a while, I'm not sure any meeting of supporters beforehand would have made any difference to what is happening right now as much as I wish it wasn't happening. You're local to the track aren't you? Will you be going to the meeting? I wouldn't mind going but I don't know if it's open to those of us who live further away? Maybe we could get some supporters along to that... By the way if any mods read this thread it really needs moving to the Elite League section, a lot of Bees fans won't see it here which probably accounts for some of the lack of interest previously.

Really enjoyed that meeting, well done to all the lads... Andersen the only one slightly disappointing but hopefully he can redeem himself at Swindon! Fair play to Dak North & Simon Gustafsson for clearing the track when they could have stayed down, and to Greaves and Sarjeant for putting Friday night behind them. Could go either way in the second leg, might have to make my first visit to Blunsdon for about 20 years.

If I recall correctly he pulled out of our meeting at Belle Vue to ride in a Swedish league match? So they gave him the boot and replaced him with Barker who did 3 rides then got injured leaving us only able to use PL guests as EL heat leaders.

I think away at Leicester we would have done a lot better with MJJ, with the new format riding at number 3 is very unforgiving and while a rider like Summers or Robbo could certainly get a good score on his day riding at 2 or 4 against riders of a similar standard, there are no easy rides at 3 and it is too much to ask of them. Especially against Swindon with 2 excellent heatleaders in Kildemand & Batch and Gustafsson who can be very quick if he makes the gate. I remember looking at my programme at Leicester and struggling to see where Summers would score a point, it's a tough job for him.

Certainly looks that way, we've gone back to the problem that we had early on in the season and the reason Fisher was released, we have no third heat leader. When the problem was resolved by signing MJJ we looked a very strong side, it's a pity as I think we would have won the league with an MJJ / Kenni Larsen standard of rider at number 3. No disrespect to Summers or Robbo but they are ok second strings not EL heat leader level, even Barker is more of a good second string than a heat leader.

Some nice ideas there mate, I'm not a fan of the north / south split though personally, I want to see more different teams and riders rather than less. One big league could work nowadays. Hopefully something better will be sorted out for next season as the EL has become a farce, I get fed up with all the guests and seeing Rory Schlein riding against us every week for a different team. It has now become about who can book the track specialist guests as Poole did on Monday with Dak North & Richard Lawson, whenever a team is visiting Eastbourne and they are missing a rider they book Bridger etc. I just want to see my 7 riders every week, I wasn't even interested when we beat Kings Lynn the other week as it was just a team of guests and RR, to me it wasn't the Bees, so much so that I didn't bother going.

And would most probably have been world champion this year if he hadn't been a silly arse!

I have a £10 entry ticket to use, bearing in mind this would effectively be a £7 discount for a normal meeting I am guessing I can use it tonight and pay £18? Can anyone advise me if this is the case?

Well done to the Robins, they look strong all the way through and will take some stopping for the title. An excellent performance. We have no chance of winning anything with Hansen in the side I'm afraid, since the home meeting against Lakeside he has scored 10 points in his last 5 meetings combined and is being beaten with ease by reserves. Worse than that is the manner of those defeats, Josh Bates left him for dead round Brandon and Max Clegg beat him by miles at Leicester having also led him for a couple of laps earlier in the meeting. It's sad to watch, he looks totally out of his depth, I've never seen a rider suffer such a bad loss of form.

If he beat Tom Stokes 3 times and scored 3 points that's a 6 point swing in Coventry's favour, which could make a big difference.

Not KL's fault at all, Priest is not a fast track rider so why should he be allowed to ride? Fair play to them for protesting, at least their management understands the rules unlike ours, but then ours thought more of their fans would turn out to watch a team full of poor quality guests on a Thursday than their full strength team on a Friday. I'm glad I didn't bother going as I would be asking for money back if I had gone.

Almost laughable isn't it? Except it's not funny, our famous old club with all it's years of history now seeing out it's remaining time being run by absolute clowns. I don't even care about the result, I care about the Bees and tonight's team is not the Bees. I would have been really looking forward to this fixture if it was our full team taking on the league leaders, instead it's turned into a circus.