Kevin Meynell

Yes, but you'd only need to ship seven (or even six) riders around. I'd imagine that you'd ship the bikes and equipment around by van the same way that they do now for continental meetings. Furthermore, you could reduce travelling by combining two or more away matches on each trip to each country. I'd argue that by having less opportunities to watch the top riders, people would be more likely to turn-out and watch them when they did come to town. Variety is the spice of life, and one of the main problems with British speedway is that there's far too much repetition. We're so used to seeing the same riders over-and-over again, that fans have just become indifferent to watching them, whether they're the top riders or not. As for watching unheard of riders, I think some of the most exciting meetings used to be the World Championship rounds when unknown (in the UK) riders took part. In any case, if you had a proper European League, you'd soon get to know who was riding for the opposition.

I think you misunderstand. I'd prefer a standalone European League in which teams would compete exclusively (i.e. Wolves and Poole would only compete in the Euro League). The problem is that you'd need to find ways of reducing travel costs across Europe, not to mention keeping national interests alive as long as possible. That's why a group structure would be better than one big league. A group structure with an assymmetrical fixture list extends interest for longer because you effectively have as many title chases as you have groups. Furthermore, because teams would ride more often against their group opponents, it makes more teams appear more successful than they actually are (which obviously keeps spectator interest). All North American sports use a group structure for this reason, which is somewhat contrived for national competition, but would make sense for an international league. Yes, but it's unworkable in speedway because teams from different countries have the same riders. Whilst you could adopt a UEFA Champions League-type system, it wouldn't have a great deal of credibility because the team tracked in the ECC would invariably have to be different to the team that qualified from the BEL (in other words, teams would have to sign different line-ups for the ECC). You could run a ECC in parallel with the national leagues (i.e. teams ride in both), but I think it would have to be along the lines of permanent membership rather than seasonal qualification. In other words, teams might qualify for the ECC via their national leagues, but would effectively stay in the competition unless they were relegated out of it. If (say) you had 12 teams in the ECC, the bottom (say) four could drop out each season and be replaced by the respective British, Polish, Swedish and Danish league champions. Personally though, I don't think parallel competitions are a very workable approach because one competition would be perceived to be inferior than the other.

I'd favour teams exclusively taking part in a European league rather than as am additional competition along the lines of the UEFA Champions League. In other words, they'd only ride European League fixtures. You could regionalise such a league so that the majority of the fixtures were in your own country, but meeting teams from other countries a limited number of times. For example: British Division - Belle Vue, Coventry, Poole, Wolverhampton Polish Division - Bydgoszcz, Rzeszow, Torun, Wroclaw Swedish Division - Masarna, Smederna, Vetlanda, Jylland (combined Danish team) Each team rides every other team in their division home and away twice (12 matches), plus the teams in the other divisions home and away once (16 matches). The away matches in other countries could be ridden as tours, say two matches per tour which would only require four international trips in total (thus minimising travel costs). The winner of each division, plus one wildcard would ride in knockout 'playoffs', thus ensuring representation from every country at the Semi-Final stage.

Yes, but again, sport is not the same as running a regular business. Most people drink coffee, and usually do so more often than once-a-week. By contrast, it's not desirable for professional sports teams to compete with each other on business terms. The idea of sports franchises being granted an exclusive area is not a bad one, although clearly exceptions can be made for large population centres. I think the 30-mile rule is reasonable for most areas, although exceptions clearly have been made in the past. Obviously though, a couple of teams in places like London and the West Midlands could be complimentary.

Clearly a rider can only ride for one team in the same competition, and if it were to take-off, only way would be for participating teams to sign different line-ups for the European competition. They'd track one team in that competition, and another (perhaps with only slight differences) in their domestic league.

Sure, but there must still be plenty of people around who knew him and worked for him. He's continually referenced as one of the most influential promoters of his era, but there's almost no literature (at least that I've seen) about the man himself.

I'd have thought Mike Parker would also make an interesting article. BTW - what eventually happened to him?

I'd imagine it's always been that way, but at least the riders generally used to turn for meetings unlike now. We clearly need to revert to a league that stops using over-committed journeymen, even if it means a reduction in so-called quality for a few years. You've been a promoter so would know better than me, but I suspect the two-tier approach would create a perceived inferior quality product in terms of the 'National League'. Fans would go to the Elite fixtures, but not bother with the second division fare. I'm quite sure that many fans will attend anything provided it's regular, as advertised, and well-presented, even if the riders are of 'inferior quality'. The journeymen should be booted out, and British-based riders (who do not necessarily have to be British) promoted from the lower leagues to replace them. It may be necessary to change the meeting format to help the upcoming riders, but over time new stars will emerge. Provided all the teams are in the same boat and the competition is fairly balanced, people will still come. You only have to look at Twenty20 cricket which started with hardly any of the top players at all. It still managed to attract fans in their thousands (most of whom couldn't distinguish between the cream and crap of the players anyway) because it was attractive and exciting.

The reality is trying to find such a person willing to do the job. I agree though, that an appointed (by the BSPA) commissioner or commission is required to handle the day-to-day running of the sport. Nothing really wrong with the KOC or Best Pairs, provided the advertised riders turn-up. I think I'd turn the Riders Championship into a season long competition linked to a revival of the traditional open meetings held at each track. You need guaranteed rather than potential meetings in speedway. I'd think 30 meetings would be the minimum, so in addition to the 22 league matches, you'd probably need to have a league cup of 3 x 4 teams (6 matches) or even 2 x 6 teams (10 matches). That ruling applies to 'home-grown' players rather than players of a specific nationality. In other words, players who have come through a youth academy in the country concerned. BTW - there is still a good chance that even this may be ruled illegal.

Sure, the exact details would need to be worked-out. You could also define an established rider as one who had ridden for so many seasons, although I'd say all riders under-21 should be considered juniors (which wouldn't preclude older riders being juniors). There are a couple of problems with using average reductions instead of points limit increases. The first is that it skews the averages for the purposes of determining the reserves and guest/rider replacement etc.. In effect, you'd need to maintain two sets of averages (one for team selection and one for team line-ups) which is confusing. The other problem is that you'd run into problems with the minimum average. I rider with (say) an average of 3.2 would only get a reduction of 0.2 instead of 0.5. Even if you allowed them to have an average of 2.7, it would then cause complications if you had to replace them with a No.8 or guest.

It's madness to have developing riders forced out of a team because their average doesn't fit. All such riders should stay at the minimum average until they've become 'established'. I'd allow teams to build to a higher limit for each rider retained from the previous season (say 0.5 points per rider). Therefore a team retaining all seven riders could build-up to 3.5 points more than the basic points limit. If they retained just two riders, they only be able to build to point higher. This system would still force very successful teams to release one or two riders, but wouldn't penalise up-and-coming mid-table teams. It would also provide more of an incentive for riders to stay with the same teams, whilst still retaining a degree of team equalisation.

The Bosman ruling actually only applied when moving between countries, not within countries. However, it effectively ended the domestic transfer system in football because it was obvious intermediary clubs could be used in other countries to circumvent any domestic transfer rules. Ironically, speedway was already Bosman-compliant, as there were never any restrictions on riders competing abroad. This said, previous legal challenges in football suggest that any domestic transfer system would likely be ruled illegal if it were ever challenged. In principle this is fine, but we perhaps want to get away from money changing hands completely. Even at the top-level of speedway, the tracks do not have riches of football clubs, and money would be better spent on improving stadia etc.. It would be surely be better, for all tracks as a matter of course to have to develop their own riders. Therefore any system should primarily reward this, and penalise those teams signing-up talent from elsewhere.

Although the current asset system is just an exercise in getting signatures, tracks do need some protection if they go to the trouble of running development programmes. There's no inherent reason why every track can't do this, and it's unfair to those that do if another team can come along and simply sign-up the riders they've given BCL or second-half rides to.

I'm sure the BSPA would explain it away by saying it applied to ACU-licensed riders rather than British riders. Furthermore, there's not so many foreign riders trying to ride in the BPL that they're being put out of work, which means there's less likelihood of a legal challenge. The BEL is entirely a different kettle of fish because of the sheer number of foreign riders involved. Start introducing artificial restrictions, written or unwritten, and someone could well get disgrunted and take the BSPA to court. The current average reduction for British riders is probably illegal, but it's so insignificant that it's just not worth anyone trying to make a case out of it. Equally though, it does little (if anything) to encourage the use of British riders.

Of course, but collusion to deliberately exclude them would be illegal as well. In any case, unwritten regulations aren't worth the paper they're written. It would only take one promoter unable or unwilling to track the requisite number of British riders, and the whole system would come crashing down. Sorry, but we need to find legitimate ways to encourage British riders. It can be done if the will is there.

I can't really see the point of the requirement for one rider to be Wales or Scotland. We compete in speedway as Great Britain (and have done for 25 years, despite what the BSPA might claim), and it's hard enough to get teams to include British riders as it is.

But this is not possible because of EU regulations, which sport has to work within the same as every other industry (and rightly so I might add). It might be possible to specify that a certain number of 'home-grown' riders (e.g. those who started riding in the BCL) must be used, but even that concept is being challenged in football. In any case, actual nationality is much less of an issue than developing a crop of UK-based riders. I can't really see that it matters hugely if a few Aussies or whatever come through as well, because the system would largely be Brits anyway. I can't see that these competitions have much value. British riders will generally get more rides and a higher standard of competition in the BEL/BPL.

It's not so simple though. Unfortunately, market forces don't work properly in sport, but presumably we want to take transfer fees out of the equation because the system has become a farce and is of questionable legality anyway. I'd therefore suggest that some protection should be given to teams who develop riders, and one way of doing that is allowing such riders to ride on a minimum average, but only if they stay with the team that brought them on at particular level. That would hopefully reduce the incidences of chequebook speedway, but would not preclude them advancing to a higher level if they were proved goof enough. Whether they stay at reserve or not, is neither here nor there - some riders might benefit from moving-up into the main body of the team. The important thing is to ensure that they have a place in a team, and are not sacrified at the altar of the points limit if they happen to improve their average by .01 or whatever. The theory is fine, but the problem is that the British leagues are in competition with other national leagues. In addition, I think you want to encourage tracks to take responsibility for developing new riders, and being able to reap the benefits if they do. I see little sense in rewarding crap teams who make no effort to find or develop new riders.

Unfortunately, it's the politics of envy. No promoter wants to take the chance that another promoter chances upon a good reserve, and is able to run with them on an extended basis. Now whilst I do believe that some sort of team equalisation is necessary, I'd say the encouragement and advancement of UK-based prospects (which does not necessarily mean British talent) is a far higher priority if speedway is to have a viable future in this country. I'd simply allow all under-21s, or any rider in the first 3 seasons of their career, to ride with the minimum average (which is 3.00 these days). However, the proviso would be that they'd have to stay with the same team, or else move to a higher league. The idea would be to encourage tracks to develop their own riders, and give them some protection from predatory teams with big cheque books. A junior rider would still be allowed to move teams if they wished, but their actual average would then apply.

I saw them playing on a North Sea ferry a few years ago. Not my era, but quite entertaining nonetheless!

I think that philosophy went out of the window a few years ago.

The problem is that a draft system only really works successfully when there's a single top league that provides good incentives for competitors to join. The NFL and NBA are the only major leagues in their respective sports (although the CFL used to compete with the NFL), so aspiring talent really has nowhere else to go. Speedway has three major leagues competing for the talent, and there's no guarantee that drafted riders would agree to ride in a given league. In addition, the relative lack of money (compared with North American) sports would surely increase the likelihood of 'hold-outs'; drafted riders refusing to ride for certain teams.

Poznan airport is modern and excellent, and is only 6 kilometres from the train station. As I recall, the taxi fare to the centre was about EUR 8, although there was also a bus for nominal amount.

Yes, it's a bit laughable isn't it?

I think they've pretty much given-up on the SWC. From quite decent start, it's now back to the way the old WTC was, with every round held in a different country, and Finals held in the middle-of-nowhere (more-or-less).