The Cheese

Good news. Hopefully they can promote it well and build up a solid fanbase.

We must surely be approaching the point where they say it's too late to get this done. This waiting isn't fair on the riders, it's not fair on the other clubs who have declared they're running but can't get properly organised, and most importantly it's not fair to the supporters who can't be blamed if they decide that after the farce of this winter it's finally the time to walk away from the sport. I hope Northampton do start. The circumstances in which it happens isn't ideal but it would still be exciting to see a new track enter, and wouldn't it be great if we were all here in 7-8 months time looking back at a successful first season. But you can't keep everyone waiting around forever, there has to be a deadline.

Simon Stead has stepped down as joint-manager of Team GB to spend more time with his family.

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I genuinely had no idea who she was before reading this thread so can't comment on that side except that it would be interesting to know how they came to the decision to choose her for it. It just looks so amateur though. Cameo is to wish people happy birthday or see who's dumb enough to say hello to Mike Hunt, not for what should be a serious competition in a professional sport. You even have the final two sides picked out at the same time! Getting 'a name' to do the draw is a solid idea but surely there were better ways of going about it. As an example TNT commentator Darren Fletcher has some history with the sport, could he have been asked and maybe got someone like Ally McCoist to help out, if I remember correctly he's mentioned Glasgow on his radio show in the last year or so.

If you're changing to one league then that has to be prepared for well before the end of the previous season so at this stage there's no real alternative. Only 5 teams is clearly not good but it was obvious to everyone that the problem was coming so they only have themselves to blame. They just need to somehow get through this year now whilst getting a proper plan in place for 2027 and hope that it's not too late. They've missed several opportunities for a reset and they won't keep coming, time will run out eventually. Planning for a KO Cup with 5 sides doesn't give any confidence they're capable of it though, at the very least you would think they could come up with a fresh idea to replace that.

Can't blame any rider for not hanging around waiting, it was inevitable really that they would start to look elsewhere rather than wait until January for any guarantee. Hopefully not the last we've seen of Doyle over here, but if it is then thanks for the 20 years or so he's given to the sport in this country.

It's fairly obvious that if you go to one league now then essentially all signings made so far are void. There are a few others along with Pickering who you would expect to prioritise a current Premiership side and no doubt several more amongst those agreed but not announced. And for all the criticism of the Premiership being selfish etc, it's clear that the bulk of the Championship will have no intention of allowing those five clubs in for that reason.

Disappointing news. I thought Louis was one of the few promoters that had the ability and professionalism to help dig the sport out of this mess. Big loss to British speedway as well as Ipswich.

Exactly that. All this 'your league' stuff is the reason there will never be any progress. You can't have the two competing against each other, if they can't work together then they're all doomed.

Rather than asking what is there to gain for clubs attending this, maybe they should be asking what is there to lose? At the very least you would think that the costs should pretty much be covered by sales of merchandise. Hand out some free/discounted tickets for next season. Your track might be miles away but we're heading into the time of year where people will be travelling to see family, maybe they have relatives close by who haven't attended before. They might have a friend at work who holidays in that area every summer. And who knows, maybe there's a potential sponsor there or someone who could introduce you to one?

Might work for anyone interested in trying to cop off with a senior citizen.

If they want someone with links to Sky then they've probably got the wrong Redknapp involved.

Betting on points scored by a rider is there now so in theory you could already have fixing. Realistically it's probably such a small market that anything looking even slightly dodgy would be flagged immediately.