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At last! The end of a short, drawn out season. Best bit has to be Nikolai Klindt collecting a winners medal and the wooden spoon.

Will Poole retain their top 2 for 2027 of Paul Carrington and Michael Breckon?

For once, after all these years, maybe just make the team average match the team that finishes top of the table, pre play offs.. No dumbing down, let the team at the top keep the same riders if they want, and let the rest have room to improve... It is just another daft self inflicted "Speedway Anomaly" that means a team that is successful, who have built an affinity with fans, then gets broken up... Kids in particular love having heroes so if you want them to get engaged (which means an adult paying to get in), then stop peeing about with teams having to lose often one of their best, therefore most popular, riders.. Create an aspirational level to attain by having to "beat the best" the following season... I remember 93 when the Aces won the league and the following season they were nowhere near the same team given the changes.. In every sport the best should be the benchmark for others to try and better, but not by weakening the best..

Well done Belle Vue but I’m sure most people are glad to see the back of that season totally boring Title winners obvious from early on 2 under strength sides in Ipswich and Northampton Leicester weaker than last season Sheffield losing arguably the leagues top rider … and unfortunately in their case too late to get Doyle The 2025 season was so close and 4 teams that could have won it This season take out Doyle Emil Fricke and Holder from 3 of those teams and the other side kept all theirs was obvious where the league would go Let’s hope 2027 is more competitive

Me and my lad met up last night with eight others who also had only attended the PCMT and the GP's . All had the very same reasons for our non attendance... In no specific order .. We mentioned the lack of atmosphere at the run of the mill meetings due to the half full stadium... The lack of any threat to the Aces qualifying which renders the qualifiers easy to miss . Monday nights not great for many to attend... So few teams means zero variety... Jason Doyle riding for Sheffield to help them qualify and Max Fricke sabotaging Kings Lynn's chances by riding in the qualifiers for Sheffield were also mentioned, as was the glaring fact that Nicolai Klindt has zero connection to BV, as one said to me, "try and sell that to a major TV company"... (Well done Nicolai by the way, you Aces Legend!!😁).. What was interesting as two of us discussed the UK Speedway issues four people, two couples, stood behind us said they had been listening and said they thought the same!!! They too were at their first meeting of the season.. You would think some surveys would be carried out via club Facebook pages wouldn't you to get some feedback as to the main reasons why, and why not, close followers of the sport attend, or don't, as the case may be ... It was clear well over a thousand others were not regulars looking at the crowd size, with Sheffield having hardly anyone, (as is usual), there.. As for the night itself, all agreed the presentation was hugely better than we have previously seen, (is that a one off or is that the usual?), the PA system worked well where we were, the food and drink areas were quick and efficient, plenty of toilet facilities and the presentation kept momentum going in between races... It certainly looked like a lot of planning had gone into the night to ensure a good impression for those who were non regulars, hopefully it can pay off early next season.. For a Friday I thought there would have been more kids watching, so maybe a "family area" would help? Ensuring they all can watch together? One "pen" would do it. Maybe at a Special Offer rate for the Adult, (kids are free on the South Side) with someone doing giveaways, face painting etc. . In short, if they could deliver nights like this as "the norm" then UK Speedway would be wondering why they "only get 3,000", rather than it being a "bumper crowd" nowadays... Well done to the Aces, the engine room, once again, delivered, and Luke Killeen certainly showed some real potential to go forward in his career... Let's hope that far too long overdue reset is delivered this winter... The product can attract decent crowds, the infrastructure around it, not so...

He can come up with several, problem is he’s one voice in a sea of many and he’ll probably end up drowning in said sea.

Happy for belle vue winning on home shale in front of the fans. To be honest this has been a completely awful season for top flight speedway. It has really not got going. 6 teams is just not enough to run a league, especially when 4 of the teams are basically championship teams. With the team belle vue have had this year winning it doesnt feel like id hoped. Personally as a lifelong belle vue fan, ive completely lost interest in league racing. Big changes needed for next year to get the hunger back

This Jenkins chap you Pirates are all including in your teams? Is he the same Jenkins that is staying at Berwick in 2027?

Was in Lymm village this afternoon and came across the Peter Collins World Champion 50th Anniversary Exhibition:- https://www.lymmhic.co.uk/pc Free admission and PC is book signing on Saturdays in October. It was a little busy but will go attend again when it's less busy.

The play offs are such a dichotomy, on the one hand they can and often do provide great crowds for the finals BUT for the period between the season starting and then its a lame duck financially wise. The play offs are here to stay but they simply must find a way of making the qualifying matches actually mean something because one meeting is not going to pay for all the rest, and for those who don't make the finals, they are on a hiding to nothing. Maybe only meeting the other teams once would help? yep that's just five home league meetings but if your losing money every time you run, the answer is run less often, and if you run less often, people will make more effort to come because now your dealing with limited chances to watch certain terms and sometimes certain riders.

Let's not forget he had a nasty double leg break when racing in USA last winter. Probably partly explains his poor initial form at Ipswich?!

Max Fricke helping prevent his own team from qualifying was a close second .. Joking apart, if you had laid out several hundred quid to watch your team this season, and your best rider helped another team to prevent you from attending the play offs, but then rode in them himself, picking up a fair few grand in the process, you would be a little bit peed off to say the least wouldn't you?.. The sheer concept of it is simply laugh out loud ludicrous isn't it?.. Yet promoters seem to shrug their shoulders and mumble something about "necessary evil"... They must be crackers... At least there isn't any relegation, as Nicolai would have won the league and got relegated at the same time..

When the promoters realise that there are too many clubs trying to run full time professional speedway teams and those who can afford to run a loss making club as a hobby or are steeped in self interest step aside and let those with ambition & the vision to work towards profitably promoting the growth of the sport with one top tier league of eight teams.

feel exactly the same i wont be turning up for a six team league., to be honest cant see much improvement next season, just cant afford all the top riders, A big reset, is needed. Which is what a few of us were saying last year, i do hope Coleman can come up with a answer , but it is going to be a struggle. was a good crowed last night, and half decent presentation, but that wont be the case for ordinary league, matches.

Announcements coming thick and fast now..... Drew Kemp announced as returning to Berwick in '27....

Irrespective of the controversy on the the night,the Refs decision should have been respected.(it happens in sport)Some deep holes being dug(to prove nothing).

Still think personally although not ideal stick with six club top league next year stabalise it get all teams competitive, with a view to getting a support package together to get Eastie in from 2028.

Good to see that, as promised, this close season isn't going to be like the past others....

This issue here for me is that you get those like the comments above bemoaning the play off “qualifiers’ as non events with little riding on them, but a top team winning the league would be far worse in that regard so I’ve never understood this argument. If a dominant team starts to run away with it like Belle Vue this year, then what jeopardy is there for 99% of fixtures from mid-season onwards? Virtually every team in that scenario is riding for nothing. Lynn’s season for example would have been dead and buried with months of the season left (as well as everyone else’s bar Sheffield) but their season remained alive right up until the final week of the season when Ipswich defeated Leicester. There’s more meaningful league fixtures in a play off set up than there is in a “top of the table wins” scenario it’s as simple as that.

If you listen to 360 podcast it has David Howe on and he did say he thinks he pushed the SCB into making that statement and thinks they didn't want to make it 🤷‍♀️

If the Premiership had: - A genuine step up in rider level - A larger prize pot - A larger away following from fans Poole would move up.

1 Leon Flint 8.25 2 Assessed 4.00er 4.00 3 Chris Harris © 7.93 4 Anders Rowe 6.39 5 Dan Thompson 7.55 6 Freddy Hodder 3.31 7 Max Perry 2.52 39.95 I don't necessarily agree that this is the right way to build the team, but I'm guessing with the rumours, that Glasgow's team will look something like this? I guess if that 4.00er is VERY good and Freddy or Max finally kicks on, then fine... But they're two very big ifs.

Good question. By step aside, I mean, if they are unwilling to adopt the need for change, instead using their position within the BSPA to keep things as they are and thus hold back or deter new thinking by ambitious and visionary promoters. Then by all means stay in speedway, but run a team on a semi professional basis in a more suitable league. As for Sheffield, as with any promotion, if the numbers don’t stack up to make it viable in the medium term for current or potential owners, then there is little hope for their long term future. one of the issues Sheffield have is their stadium availability and more so the unavailability of the back straight terracing which severely restricts the possibility growing attendance & associated revenue.

Tom Brennan ditched this league a couple of years too early. He should have stayed and dominated for a while, built experience, confidence and some cash to go and tackle Polska.

AGM a little earlier this year so only a few weeks to wait and see what they come up with. All we can do is hope the likes of Richard Coleman can have his voice heard for change and they actually do something different. We know some form of change will happen because it’s being pretty much forced upon them by Poland so at least that’s a start, as is not having a winter of turmoil that we had last year with all participating clubs being fully prepared. Ideally an eight team league would be preferable, but IMO that’s the maximum number that should be in a top league here currently because there just isn’t sufficient quality to fill any more teams at the moment without leaving one or two being uncompetitive and cannon fodder. Less of a problem if more top riders come over rather than just recycling the ones we already have here, and the jungle drums have a few riders new to the league (and returning) who will do just that so we’ll have to wait and see.

Belle Vue fully deserved this championship for 2026. Strongest team by a margin. Nice to see them win at home in front of a full stadium! Fully expect that stadium full every week next year now that City fans will be looking for a new sport to follow 😂

I think you're the one getting confused, not me. When you asked why I continued to argue, you were quoting my post to Gavan where I challenged his and dontforgetthefueltapsbruv's unsubstantiated opinion that the white line belonged to the infield but you go on about the SCB ruling. As others have pointed out though, the SCB statement may be a fact but it certainly lacks substance. Anyway, it would appear that I was correct about the white line. The SCB have amended the wording even though, in my opinion it was adequately defined previously as being on the track surface, which would make the inner side of the line the boundary and that is now confirmed.... No apologies necessary lads 😁 Having just received my Star this morning I see that it says "the white line is part of track, meaning a rider is still legally on the track as long as part of their rear tyre is in contact with the line - however small that contact may be" It doesn't state a source for this ruling but if it's from the SCB we can consider it FACT! 🙂. It seems that one is now put to bed too so there's nothing more to argue about now regarding the actual rules, is there?

At least you've put it on the correct thread Dicks put it on last seasons thread.

He'll be winning more silverware now!

Wonderful announcement by Jye Etheridge, addressing the three or four forum fannies who consistently post negative comments about him .. "F*ck you, l'm back next year". Biggest cheer of the night!

Poole would probably not want him as he would be over 900 years old. Just a couple of years past his best.

If I was chairing the AGM then yes I would!!

I would say 2028 at the earliest.

Can only think they’re wanting to get a TV deal over the line first and that’s still ongoing. Gives them more time to get Eastbourne involved as well although I’m reliably informed that that has run in to issues that are proving difficult to resolve. Again, how long do they wait? Groundhog day 🙄

Just for clarity in your opinion, who are the 'new thinking, ambitious and visionary' promoters?

I guess if the number of Championship teams changes then the points limit would also change.

Hope plymouth can sort something out

From what I remember at the time it was a choice or Rickardsson or Gollob to stay at Foxhall in 99. John & Magda chose Gollob polish ties & all that. That then led to Rickardsson & Weston departing for Lynn Western had Swedish ties. Western then tried to take Chris too.

Sounds like Rob Lyon is a fan.

It's not just baffling. The SCB continue to paint themselves into a corner. They declared a breach of the rules and continue to fail to say how they came to that conclusion. The referee at the time and Poole and others continue to say there was no conclusive evidence. However the ruling body says otherwise. Simple solution. The SCB explain their "breach statement".

The wage Bill would be the issue though,it was the reason they dropped down.Where is all this support money going to come from.

Can’t argue with that. But for it to be possible then a significant increase in points limit and some creative signings would be required to make it possible. of the 2026 team, Dickson will most probably stick with Douglas, Morris & Dan Thompson. With one of Joe T & Drew Kemp being a possibility. So three places needed of which 2 will be under 21’s

problem is how deep are the customers pockets going to be next season..

I thought the 40 point limit was agreed for 3 years - '25, '26, '27?! Assuming the same number of teams. .

Cast iron certainty that Ipswich will be a different animal next year, and I’m pretty confident Northampton will be very competitive too from what I’m hearing. My biggest bugbear this year was that it wasn’t an even playing field and for all intents and purposes you ended up with a 2 team league and there were zero surprises that those 2 contested the final. No excuses for any team next year (unless Eastie come to the tapes late) so we SHOULD see something fairer, and much more competitive. Pretty disastrous year and all a bit unsavoury but it was all about getting through it which has been achieved. Upwards on onwards to ‘27.

Thanks for the updates tonight @Hilly

Do you want another try Lewi?

That's the strange thing though isn't it? The amended wording of the rule just confirms the definition of its breach to be the only scenario that they can't prove beyond reasonable doubt with the evidence that we & the referee saw. All the previous arguments I've seen that sought to justify the SCB statement had been based on incorrect definitions of the rule, but now they have removed all ambiguity that might have gone some way to justify their decision. It's simply baffling!

Honestly, what are the SCB doing. Two meetings left and they rush through a rule amendment to try and deflect more flak. Pathetic. That rule change - and probably an improved wording - could surely have waited for a few days.

Heard that one myself this morning, can’t see it personally. Our heatleaders are already sorted apparently.