szkocjasid

Nope, Glasgow are well over the points limit.

It almost seems Premiership sides can do that i.e Pearson, but Championship clubs can't (once riders race 8 matches they become an asset).

No chance, would have to make a multitude of changes & would certainly lose their strong reserve

Tbh now (some) riders are slowing up to avoid race wins, it makes sense to include bonus points again, apart from fairness also for safety, as a rider shutting off before the line could cause a collision.

I'm not sure it's Plymouth's decision not to use a guest for Barker, in the last couple of weeks Berwick, Edinburgh & Redcar have all used r/r for heat leaders as they've not been able to get any guests

So these rules mean when Rew had a 5.00 assessed Prem average, he'd be available on a 5.00 ave in the Champ? But when his Prem ave dropped to 4.00, his Champ ave would rise to 6.00? Can someone explain the logic of that?

Especially useful if the spare points allowed them to sign a 10+ rider for Morris

Where has that news come from?

Replacing who?

Glasgow are well above the points limit, even signing Boughen to replace a reserve doesn't give them spare points to use to replace Nowak.

I can't imagine who can fit him in, surely Oxford won't drop Killeen, or Glasgow drop Pijper? Plymouth aren't gonna drop Trigger. Berwick are almost finished so no point Boughen replacing Coles. Scunny must be happy with Ablitt, Redcar waiting for Mulford to get fit again, but seem content to use Harrison till he returns? Poole have be just signed Joe T & Hagon is doing well for Birmingham. Only club that makes sense to me is Edinburgh?

Is Glasgow being "desperate" for the title supposed to be an insult? Why wouldn't they want to win the league, shouldn't every team? Ignoring the fact that they wouldn't have chosen to drop Marcin imo

That would be a 5.00 Prem average. So converted to 7.50 for the Champ.

His average would be far too high!

Lambert's average being different than last year confused me greatly

I didn't realise Lambert couldn't guest, as I didn't know his old average counts as an assessed average.

Cooks average is his 2023 Champ ave converted, but will become a rolling ave in September!

Maybe it is, despite four clubs being terrible, they've all had a realistic chance of the play-offs going into their final few matches. In a "normal" season they'd have been well adrift in their own.

It just dawned on me that Lambert could guest for an injured rider in the play-offs. He'd be especially useful on a 7.81 average. Of course you never want to see a rider injured & hope he won't be needed, but I can almost imagine the reaction if a Belle Vue rider got injured & Lambert guested for them against Sheffield to win the final!

But if the other team in the group is also expected to win home & away to Edinburgh/Birmingham then Poole / Oxford's away win over 6th is cancelled out! So it's then important to pick a second opponent you are confident of beating on aggregate.

There's always 2 sides to a story & I can totally understand Connor not travelling to Latvia (at his own expense) to potentially not get a ride (I do feel the riders should get their travel expenses paid at least, even if they ride for nothing). But also feel if everyone thought like that no team would have a reserve! If travel expenses were paid then even if a rider doesn't get a ride, they'd have got out in track for practice, so could treat it as "free practice" at least?

I'll dispute that, to "deserve" play-offs you have to finish 6th of 9. There's no requirement for you to be any good!

If Poole "fear no one" should they pick someone more local than Edinburgh?

Don't quite agree with that, for example you could be excluding a very good 22 year old (Brennan / Jenkins) because at 22 they're now considered "too old". Could also have seasons where the best juniors have gotten too old & the next lot are still NL reserves (unlikely I know). Another thought is, what about Simon Lambert, who scored 9 points in the British final & has never been wild card or reserve. Not fair to exclude him solely on age (discrimination) imo. One downside of picking riders based on who goes abroad, is how will Bailey ever get back in? Harris & Brennan have been travelling for these "lesser" events for years, so have gotten these places sewn up apparently, now Jenkins has gone abroad, he's probably next in line. If they only pick the same riders till they retire (get too old for certain events) there's not much chance for anyone else to get a look in (like Bailey)

I'm sure Jordan Jenkins travelled abroad for a pairs meeting & didn't get a ride, what's worse is the result was decided before GBs final heat, so he clearly should have been given a ride.