Big Al

Suffered from a dearth of racing opportunity last season especially towards the end. He's in that no-mans land; over-qualified for the NDL and not yet good enough to get any interest from PL. Hopefully with a suitable team next year with the increase in league matches to help boost confidence, he can come back to Leicester in 2021 "oven-ready" as someone says.

I think they need to be in the higher level now. Both have a style of riding which is neat and controlled (mostly!), the mishaps, and the near-mishaps, they have suffered have been caused in the main by other NL riders of lesser ability losing control or making misjudgements, together with Joe and Dan trying to make manoevres which have left them at times susceptible. Hopefully this will not be so much of a factor at the CL level. Having said that I am a bit disappointed that Danyon Hume has not moved into the CL side.

I hope that Proctor can get his shoulder properly fixed this winter

Presumably on a nice little deal!

If I've got my sums right, the new Championship format will mean 16 home league matches, as compared with 10 in 2019. And what about the Shield, KO Cup, playoffs? So if a club has a successful season, getting everything done by end of October could be a bit of a stretch. No surprise that one reason given for SN's departure was that Leicester's need to run home matches on GP Saturdays will be likely to increase. At one stage of the season (July?) there is a GP on three successive Saturdays, which can't exactly be a very welcome thing for Saturday GB clubs. But doesn't it also bring into question the feasibility of also running a third tier side in 2020? I suppose that could depend to an extent on how big the third tier is, next season. And could there be the possibility of the number of Shield fixtures being reduced a bit, going with four groups of 3 teams for example, or even opting out of the Shield altogether in order to leave enough dates for the Cubs to operate.

Heres a long shot: Dakota Ballantyne

Looks like it's just a case of two main leagues evolving side by side, increasingly indistinguishable, apart from which evenings they operate on, and the number of teams taking part. I think that Poole's decision underlines that, and over time I would expect further such adjustments to happen as the difference disappears. It solves all kinds of problems, not least that of the supply of riders which prohibits the One Big League from being feasible.

Maybe one of them will be brought into the side part way through the season, if team changes are needed.

They should take Sam Masters' recent experience into account and be wary of thinking that the door is open for them in Poland, I think it's a hard nut to crack and with the quantity of riders their system is producing now, will only get even more difficult to break into. Maybe better opportunities will crop up in Sweden during the season especially with top riders staying away from their top tier? On the question of replacing Scott Nicholls, who is there to bring in the same level of know-how to the team, be a captain, is available and can fit within the points limit? (and increase his average).

There is one change I would like to see from 2020. Scrap "golden heats" as the way to decide tied scores after two legs of a playoff match. If the two matches produce level aggregate scores, the winner is determined by the league place the teams finished the season in.

Probably the best decision for all kinds of reasons apart from the BT Sport thing. Think back to Joe Screen at Glasgow, there are some similarities I think and maybe Dickson has that in mind too. It's a real shame the Lions didn't get Scotty Nicholls on board many years ago, I'm sure he would be leaving now with the club having been better for his prescence over a longer time period.

I think Bateses/Stead have had enough of Lasse Bjerre, but Stewart Dickson's his own man when it comes to team building. Doubt he would take the chance though. Great news that Watling JCB is continuing the support, a loyal sponsor is like gold these days, but the club has to put in the work to keep the goodwill relationship. A far cry from the Hemsley days when relationships with sponsors were, I think, a bit turbulent. So that's one up on Poole already. Next up is Dickson v Ford on the team building. Bring it on!

Wouldn't begrudge Scott Nicholls moving back to Eastbourne, they have a lot of good young riders who would benefit from his experience. It wouldn't surprise me if Howarth is with Leicester next year, Lawson I can also see (and with Sheffield - I expect Glasgow would require a full transfer!!). Douglas - wouldn't surprise me if he goes with Sheffield....... ....do you see a possible pattern emerging here??

Ok then, will do. I look forward to supporting a whole 1-7 of foul-mouthed oiks in 2020, bring it on!!

1. Lawlor 2. Proctor

Fair point!

There is one rider, maybe two in the current side, who I wouldn't touch with a 50-foot bargepole

If I've got things right, Leicester decided not to purchase Palovaara, were only interested in having him on a loan basi but Glasgow didn't allow it. So he was available to be re-employed by Glasgow, had they been able to accommodate him. I'm not a Glasgow expert, so I presume they either decided he wouldn't improve the side, or just couldn't fit him in. If they had done, maybe it would have changed the outcome of the league title, but as I said I'm no Glasgow expert and have no idea if he could have been accommodated.

Real shame for you that Victor Palovaara could'nt be brought in to replace him.

Ditto. All 4 lines!

You put in a pairing in heat 15, who don't ride together, and possibly in the wrong gate positions, it's going to give a few percentage to the opposition. Looked like the Lions pair left half the track open for Vissing and he took the open goal especially with the dirt having gone to the outside by then. You can't beat having two riders who are used to each other in that situation, or if not then two who have the experience to make the first turns difficult for their oppoenents.

Didn't just win it but worked his balls off to do it with an overtake on the last lap, on a track which wasn't allowing much chance.

Heat 15 was a killer, and it will probably prove to be when the final was won and lost

A taste of things to come next season perhaps? A team or even teams made up of freelancers taking part in the league with no home track, to try to keep the league going? I think something similar happened in one-day cricket some years ago, seem to recall the team was called Unicorns. In fact that could be a very apposite name.

Couldn't agree more, and with a track they could race on and under (albeit a bit underpowered) lights, it had all the best ingredients including some incidents, and of course it wouldn't have been complete without another howler from the ref, who failed to notice that Joe Lawlor had taken third place off the last bend. Even the Redcar supporters couldn't believe that one. The near-calamity in heat 15 brought back chilling memories of July 1976 and Doug Underwood lifting on the city bend at Blackie Road and clattering into Ray Wilson, with both leaving the stadium by ambulance. Scott Nicholls performed a miracle in not only getting back under control and avoiding a similar accident by a fag-paper, but also retaining third place. I saw him on the BT coverage from Ipswich last night and I'm sure his hair looked to have gone a bit more white since his previous appearance on TV