ouch

There is a rule that says “ No facility is permitted to replace a rider, who although included in a re-declaration has not made an appearance for that team since being re-declared. Yet if a declared rider decides he’s got a better offer abroad and bins off his UK team, a facility WAS allowed. As Superace says, “rules will be changed to suit”, some. Whether rules exist or not is purely incidental for some teams.

There’s no rule that a rider can come back on an assessed average (say 8.20), doesn’t turn a wheel then the the next season comes in on a lower average (say 8.00 this time) due to the fact he didn’t fit otherwise - but it happened. As Superace says, “rules will be changed to suit”, some.

It is black and white. Emil completed a foreign league meeting then failed to attend an official fixture in the UK so going off past implementation he will be banned. Do I think he should be banned? No, as he has 100% more holes in his arse than is the norm and the Poles don’t give a monkeys. I like Emil so think he shouldn’t be banned, if it was a rider or team I disliked then I’d say ban him. I think that kind of thinking makes me ideally placed to be the next SCB arbitrator, from a consistency point of view.

We’ve bucked the trend and trotted out Aces all season. Technically Antti & Jake were guests for two meetings plus Harris guested once, which I believe is a contractural obligation of all clubs so we’ve not done so bad. The racing is great at home too.

Do clubs still buy riders off other teams? I wouldn’t. I’d offer a team place to a lad and if things got in the way I’d move on to the next.

Nobody had a choice, if the rules were used. We’re not talking about how it should have been, we are now talking about how they rigged it.

Looking at the form guide as we enter the play offs, the Lions are looking good. 6 wins out of the last 7 meetings with super wins away at Birmingham & Ipswich and a disappointing loss at Kings Lynn. The Aces on the other hand look vulnerable. 5 wins out of the last 7 meetings with fortunate wins away at Birmingham & Ipswich and an expected loss at Kings Lynn.

Anybody that thinks Belle Vue choose Sheffield and the financial effect that has as opposed to picking Ipswich need to give their head a wobble. This is up there with “we’re changing the rules and you cannot use Lambert to replace your injured rider”. Do we really need to haul someone in from outside to ensure the rules are adhered to? I thought sticking to the rule book was a given.

3000 x £25, plus programme and bar/food from a play off final. If we’d had a chance to “fix” it we would have gone with Ipswich (definite win) or Leicester (maybe win, we’ve done it once this year). The last team we would have picked is Sheffield who have defeated us on aggregate 3 times already in the last 5 months. Sheffield picked us as it’s a definite win for them and they will get a bigger crowd for the semi than for the final as we bring the most fans. The extra fans we get with Sheffield being near is marginal when compared to Leicester and a good 20-30 more when compared to Ipswich. Just hope this latest BSPL stunt doesn’t sink us.

If it’s an unwritten rule will have to wait till they don’t write it again to know if it’s changed.

It could have been but for the corrupt nature the sport is run. Just sorry you got caught up in the usual BS we have to deal with.

Ok.

Whilst I fully expected us to be defeated by Sheffield during the play off process, this rigging of the fixtures now sees us lose out on potentially £80k+ of supporter income. Coming on the back of the SON it’s something the club could have done without.

If any rider continued to ride for their foreign club whilst missing UK meeting I would expect action taken. Maybe we should set up a thread called if’s, but’s & maybe’s as there’s not enough wrong with the sport so we (and the SCB) have time to pick on riders who have done nothing wrong - just incase.

Expect we’ll get another weird SCB statement. “We just want to say that Brady’s done nothing wrong but if he does in the future we’ll have ’im. There’s been lots of injured riders in the past that just returned to their UK team following injury without comment but we felt it important to try and associate Brady with rule breaking, even though he’s broke no rule. The SCB thanks the BSPL for their help and assistance with this statement about Brady being a wrong un, even though he’s not but maybe could be. This applies to all rides but it’s best to mention it now, just incase. Oh and we’d just like to add that we are monitoring the situation should Brady break any rules, not that he has but just in case. Better safe than sorry, eh?“

Yep, a semi against Ipswich and a final against whoever would have helped greatly but it wasn’t to be and we can’t be arsed getting lawyer involved any more. Apathy rules.

….with a carvery. This has Bates written all over it. Quite why Mark continually goes along with this kind of thing, with any promoter is beyond me.

Sheffield dumped us out of the cup. They have comfortably twice beaten us to the bonus point this year. Last year we only dropped 2 bonus and one of those was to Sheffield. With Leicester, honours are even with regards the bonus and we have put up a much better display against the Lions this year compared to the tigers. Everyone knows the issues Ipswich currently face. Commercially anyone saying Belle Vue would actively choose Sheffield is having a daft laugh. Given the information above Sheffield would pick The Aces commercially as the semi crowd will match that of the final against Leicester and that’s what they did.

Nobody stands to gain from riding against Ipswich? Are you mad? They stand to gain a qualification to the grand final. That brings in the best crowd of the year domestically. I’m a Belle Vue fan and even I know we’re not going past the semis. We will gain nothing but had we ridden against Ipswich and Leicester we would have stood a better chance of making the final. If you think 1 semi v Sheffield is financially better than a semi and a final then you’d be well placed to join the current think tank that’s handling the financial affairs of UK speedway. Bates however is benefiting greatly for this is where this came from.

Bates has spoken. I wondered what he would be up at this year's end of season. Any rider he wants to guest, he gets whether it’s within the rules or not. Same last year. With him picking Belle Vue he gets a highly lucrative fixture due to The Aces bringing the most fans. Let’s hope the publicity machine is allowed to flow freely this time.

Great, we’re good to go. Thanks for checking.

Must admit I’m not the best with numbers and there’s the 2.5% Brit reduction and my calc doesn’t do percentages. I’m sure there’s someone better suited than me to work out these averages using the final figures on the BSPL stats page.

Brady Kurtz Tate Zischke Tom Brennan Ben Cook Dan Bewley Connor Bailey? Flint/Cairns (RS)

I think it’s used to wedge the pit gate shut during races.