jgl07

Signed him at 15 did you?

To be honest, Big Lee has not looked up for it since the match at Armadale on June 4th. I don't know if the drop to reserve will do his confidence any good. He doesn't seem able to beat opposition reserves at the moment.

Very mysterious. Conspiracy theories could run riot with this one!

Glasgow have previous for this. Didn't their former promoter (Dougie Hope?) do a runner with the original Scottish Cup after Glasgow won it in 1995?

A good job you have those floodlights then.

Ben you should realize how protective Tsunami gets if anyone slags off Tomicek.

Not even he would post something as dumb as that.

The obvious answer is to have them made by Chimps.

Shades of 1984 and Animal Farm. John Campbell is trying to rewrite history. I can't say it surprises me much. The background on the Official Edinburgh Website is as follows: I was recruited by David Murray in 1997, who ran the first Monarchs' Official website, to write match reports. Along with Mike Hunter, Geoff Chandler and Davis Murray |i helped with the site until David Murray took ill and updates stopped in mid season. We decided to produce an unofficial Website for the 1998 season but were approached by Alex Harkess and Mike Hunter to run an official site. We inherited most of the content from the David Murray site including Geoff Chandler's Round the Bend archives and Mike Hunter's collection of images of programme front pages. Geoff continued to contribute to the site for another two or three years before his interest in speedway waned. Over the six seasons from 1998 to 2003 the term Official Edinburgh Website was used and was never challenged by anyone. From time to time I was asked to 'pull' or rewite articles that other promotions did not like. Mr Campbell has a very selective memory. Pehaps he can't remember how he voted at the conference?

Well he is being more forthcoming than the Edinburgh Promoter who is hiding behind the "such things are confidential" excuse when asked about how he voted on this issue Well Edinburgh's own Monty Burns defended the stupid rules so vehamently I would be very surprised if he didn't vote for for them. The same promoter has been quick enough in the past to blame the Southern promotors for unpopular rules.

I am not against change. We have demanded change for many years. The problem is the incoherent way in which changes are made lurching in one direction and then another. Take the doubling up/doubling down fiasco. You could argue that these are steps on the way towards a Swedish style squad system. After a tentative start the doubling up doubling down policy was embrassed big time in 2003. As it happened they also chose to launch a major inter-League competition in the same year. That was a reciepe for disaster. Now the BLC has been scrapped the BSPA are clamping down on doubling up and knocked doubling down on the head completely. Another lurch was observed with averages. The so called rolling averages were introduced and then scrapped after a decent interval. Now they intend to change this again. What price they will move in a completely different direction next year? Guests seem to go into and out of fashion. Last year they were being allowed for practically every position including senior reserve and even PL second strings in the BLC. Now there is a clamp down. The BSPA continues to behave collectively like a headless chicken going off at various tangents without any apparent overall direction. It all appears to be the product of a beleaguered group with a siege mentality who are increasingly out of touch. Add in promoters pushing their own ill thought-out hobby horses while others will back any idea if they see their their track gaining a short-term advantage. I wonder if we know the half of it yet? Usually unpleasant decisions do not become appartent for weeks or even months after the Conference.

There is only one way to stop this nonesense. That is a boycott. No season tickets to be purchased at this stage to give the buffoons time to reflect.

I have gained the impression that the Pl promotions are lining up on this issue something like this. In favour of 45 points: Glasgow, Edinburgh, Newcastle, Workington, Sheffield, Arena Essex(?), Reading, Swindon(?). In favour of a reduction: Exeter, Newport, Somerset. Have I got anyone wrong? Can anyone fill in the gaps?

How is that a problem for the BPL? It is a well run and competitive league which tracks have been queuing up to join in recent years. It is a problem for the BEL which has been mismanaged since its inception and tracks have been more noted for trying to escape than get in. The BPL is the future of British Speedway and should not be sacrificed to try and prop up the unsustainable monster that the BEL has become.

The starting point was 41 points but that increased to 45 for team building purposes when the first averages came out. This was very early in the season after the completion of three home and three away (Premier Trophy) matches. In many cases teams were able to be strengthen up before they even started their Premier League programme. Thus teams like Berwick were forever chopping and changing their team. Three point riders were recruited and dumped at the first opportunity. I think that Freddie Stephenson upped his average from 3.00 to four and a half but was still dropped. A number of teams started with two heat leaders, two second strings and three reserves. The secret was to be crap in the Premier Trophy and push down your average and enable the team to strengthen up. Fortunately in 1999 three teams (Sheffield, Newport and Edinburgh) did a good job with inital team building and dominated the league taking most of the silverware between them.

No I think that the top two would have to go in Edinburgh's case: If you attempted to keep just Frede, Rory and Magnus the team would have to be stuffed with three-pointers. This is the best I could come up with on 40 points using Edinburgh assets: 1 Rory Schlein 7.97 2 Derek Sneddon 4.88 3 Theo Pijper 6.61 4 Christian Henry 5.67 5 Magnus Karlsson 7.69 6 Matthew Wethers 3.78 7 New rider 3.00 Total 39.60

Add in the bonus points and it comes to 46.6667 for a seven man team. I can demonstrate this using probability analysis if anyone doubts this. In practise the aggregate average may be slightly higher as the better riders will tend to get more rides though tactical substitutions and reserve replacements.

Highly unlikely. There are plenty of Swedish and Danish riders who might be keen to have a crack at PL racing on a 9.00 point average. There will always be riders squeezed out of the EL who could drop down. The whole thing looks like a cock-up attempt by EL apologists to try and undermine the PL and 'bounce' tracks into moving up to the EL. It will not work.

Not it would be nearer 47 points because bonus points are included. Yes it was tried year after year in the late 1990s with figures of 41 and 43 points. It had no noticable effect on the strength of the Premier League. What it did produce was average fiddling with teams leaving out middle order riders and stuffing the bottom end with no hopers. When the first averages were issued and certain riders had massaged their averages down, out went the three pointers and in came middle order reiders from the out of work pool. The PL was very unatable at the time with lots of uncertainty about which tracks would run often until just before the season started. The PL had around 13 or 14 tracks at the time. Since the decision to fix the points limit at 45 the PL has had stability and has also become financially more secure. This has been reflected in its growth to 18 tracks. The Pl has become too big. A few tracks dropping down might help the likes of Mildenhall, Wimbledon and Boston to create a third division.

Yes Rory Schlein has got it right with an end of season average of 7.97. That dropped chain in heat four will have worked wonders preventing him from ending on 8.05. Peter Carr got it totally wrong ending the season on 9.07. Had he failed to score in heat fifteen this would have dropped to 8.99.

Alan Hartley rode for Berwick in the late 1960s under the assumed name of Bjent Muudgaard who was supposed to be Finnish.

Don't joke there are some gems here: http://www.britishpathe.com/index.cfm

The point is that promotion and relegation can only work if the gap in standards was small. It will never work between the PL and the EL but it could work between a PL Div 1 and a PL Div 2. Then it would be a matter of changing one or two riders to move up or down. One contribution might be to scrap the current retained system and all the transfer fees and loan charges. That would make if easier for a team to adpat to a new environment. It's all total unlawful anyway!

Well what about the infamous Oxford 'sun off'? What about the Eastbourne v King's Lynn fiasco when the visitors refused to ride after a guest was ruled out because his average was 0.001 too high? What about the Arena Essex v Peterborough BLC match and the earlier Stoke v Belle Vue BLC match called off because the home promotion didn't like the look of the visiting team? What about the Peterborough v Rye House(?) BLC match that was called off because one of the home teams' Conference League riders was injured appearing for Somerset. I could go on!