enotian

Maybe for one match passes but if I've paid an annual/monthly subscription I'd be a bit miffed if then I was blocked from watching my local teams home matches. The fact that matches are going to be spread across all the venues should minimise lost home revenue. Totally understand if individual clubs are streaming all their home matches that they'd want to exclude local purchases but disappointing if the BSN did likewise.

If you're talking about the British Speedway Network for Championship matches then clearly that won't be the case if you've subscribed. However there'll only be about two Diamonds home matches streamed, greatly reducing the chances of a losing fans on the terraces. Unless I've missed something and the Diamonds have announced that they're streaming all their home matches?

Agreed. For far too long foreign over developing homegrown riders was a no brainer. Bring them over on a low assessed average. If they're any good you've got yourself a ready made asset to sell or loan. If they're rubbish bin them off let them develop at home for a while and then bring them back on an even lower average. Not a fan of Brexit but this might be one of the positive's to come out of it. Get Jacob Rees Mogg all over it. Although he'll insist on 2 values, black leathers and cinder tracks I imagine.

Reasonably priced for the season if you're inclined to watch all the content. Monthly feels a bit step compared to say Netflix or Disney Plus but they have economies of scale and no doubt it's priced to incentivise annual pass purchases which is better vfm. Not sure what happens if you pay for a month and all the live matches are postponed?? The one off price is interesting. If you're a family of four you'll make quite a saving staying home to watch your team. They'll be hoping the extra income from away supporters and neutrals who wouldn't have travelled will offset. Also with each club only featuring 2 or 3 times you're not going to lose those families permanently. Match selection will be key. You put on a dominant home team vs strugglers (say Poole at home to the Diamonds) you might get a host of home fans taking the stream option with little or no away or neutral interest. Hopefully the knock on effect will be that the promoters at last realise that evenly matched teams and competitive matches on properly prepared circuits can now attract a much wider audience and the "as long as we win at home" theory can be shelved.....

and remember, excluding play offs, it looks like it's only two/three of each clubs home fixtures which will be made available. And if you've subscribed for the full season they've already had more money out of you than they would have anyway so the risk of missing ticket sales for two/three matches is worth the risk of generating new income from those who physically couldn't attend. of course making the attending live product much better than the televised version will also help. after the last two years I think we all value shared experiences much more. One of the problems with speedway on TV is that the speed, sound and smell can't be conveyed fully to do it justice. That's not dissimilar to most stadia based sports. Attending in person is always a better experience. But how much better is attending a live speedway meeting?

I'm not sure if there is a PPV option available. At least the press release referred to a subscription basis but it wouldn't be the first time a press release didn't provide all the information. If it's solely a subscription basis it doesn't matter where you're located. It's no different to any other broadcaster you pay to watch, i.e. Discovery Sports. You pay for their service if you want to watch the content they provide. The broadcaster doesn't mind where you are from because they don't sell tickets to the live event anyway. Where a club is making all of their matches available to stream either on a subscription or PPV they want to protect their attendance figures to maximise income, on the basis that the streaming price is likely less than the ticket price to attend in person. Therefore the streams are often restricted to users whose IP address is outside of the region in which the club derives its home crowd. I don't know how the technology works but as I understand it everyone's IP address is attached to a region and the host site will block any attempted connection from any restricted region. Using a VPN cloaks your IP address so that it appears to be from a region which isn't restricted. In terms of technology to prevent illegal re-broadcasts I think it's down to the broadcaster to monitor and enforce the law to block those streams. With regard to Polish and Swedish streams being made available to British audiences I don't think it results in any (or minimal) lost income to those broadcasters who have the right to broadcast those fixtures in the UK. In some cases the illegal streams probably aren't being broadcast in the UK anyway. Ultimately it's down to the broadcaster to protect their rights. I would imagine (and hope) that the BSPL will do exactly that should streams of Championship matches be made available for free illegally.

You can VPN to get around that but that isn't what is being offered anyway. Based on the press release it's a subscription (annual/monthly?) for 30+ matches in total streamed from all of the tracks. With 11 teams that's only 2 or 3 matches from any one track. So 2 or 3 home matches which clubs might notice reduced gate receipts. Worth the risk if the income generated from the subscriptions exceeds those potential losses. There are a number of ways that the subscription income could be split and presumably each promoter has agreed to the method. Presumably each team will feature in a similar number of away fixtures to make the subscription equally attractive to all 11 clubs supporters and I guess it will be more like Newcastle at Plymouth than streaming a local derby to protect gate receipts. So it does look like they're trying to minimise the impact on gate receipts. I hope it's a great success, the pricing will of course be critical in determining if it is. Bearing in mind there might be a few subscriptions required next season if you want to follow all televised speedway.

Agreed but not every Championship fixture is being streamed. So you might get to see Berwick at Plymouth but not Berwick at Newcastle depending on what fixtures they choose to stream. If all teams feature equally (notwithstanding Play Offs/Finals etc) then each team will feature, on average, once every 5 meetings but you'll have subscribed/paid to watch them all. Still a positive innovation just not perhaps what people seem to be interpreting this as.

It says subscription.

The proof of the pudding will be in the eating but this sounds like a really positive move. It doesn't sound like every fixture will be streamed but rather "over 30 meetings from all 11 venues". So roughly three from each track with each team hopefully featuring about six times (3 home, 3 away) as a rough estimate. Also, it doesn't sound like a pay per view option but rather subscription based. Where you pay for the whole season or maybe monthly and have access to all content while you have a live subscription. If that's correct there shouldn't be a mass exodus from attending in person but the question is will enough people subscribe for content in which the team they support features in about 20%, i.e. once every 5 meetings streamed? No doubt it will need to evolve over time in terms of production standards, price and content but certainly sounds like a step in the right direction. Depending on price and guaranteed content (i.e. how many time the Diamonds will feature) I'd be tempted.

Vast improvement? Whilst most of the content is unchanged the visuals are a great improvement. If I was a layman looking for fixtures to attend the new site seems that much more vibrant. Hopefully they'll keep refreshing it with the latest action.

Nice. I'm still swaying towards the Collins' given that extra world finalist. Could there be a Lawson septet? Maybe a surnames 4TT would be competitive. Collins', Pedersen's, Jansson's, Williams'

Like it. Maybe not the top end strength of the Pedersen's but more strength in depth.

1 world Champion? How many were World Finalists? How many were top flight heatleaders? Pedersen's have 2 world champions and a GP winner as a heat leader trio,

I'm aware of Tommy and Bengt as World Final standard riders, who is the other? Who would be the 2nd strings and reserves? I recall the lad from Ipswich from recent history.

Which era were Eric and Mark?

Who would be the seven? Were there three brothers?

I was thinking off Brian Collins in the top five. Not related but decent top flight rider in the 70's? Wembley?

Could they field a 7 man team to rival the Collins' or Pedersen's?

Who wins? 15 heat 7 man team match between a team whose riders surname is Collins and a team whose riders surname is Pedersen. From any era in the sport. Are these the two most prominent surnames in speedway history or are there any others worthy of mention?

“Our final rider will, I can say now, be a rider with an average that will keep us close to the new points limit, and this also means we have a solid team with strength-in-depth the key that we believe will gain us success on track. They will be a team of entertainers, a team who all want to race for us and get us, and our fans triumphs to cheer from day one to the end of October. 2022 is going to be a year to remember at Brough Park!” You didn't dream it. Plus it was part of the same press release which announced Wilson Dean and Congreve so no arm twisting has occurred post the assertion of being close to the points limit. A couple of things could have happened post the press release. 1. Congreve as a 4.00 instead of a 2.00 or 2. the points limit is different to what was expected. At the time I thought the statement inferred that the 7th rider was signed. But with hindsight it sounds aspirational more than anything.

I recall the one season 1 to 7 home and 8 to 14 away (like Poland do) trial but i'm struggling to recall squad numbers? I'm sure it was a massive success.

In a world where merchandise can be a profitable income stream is it not only a matter of time that the riders insist on wearing their own 'unique' rider number? "And riding at number 1 it's number 505 Robert Lambert!!!". No different to when squad numbers were introduced in football and it doesn't seem to matter in SGP.

It's all relative to how the opposition lines up isn't it. Presuming that the away team gets to see how the home team has lined up. So if the home team line up with a 'traditional order' the comparison provided by Humphrey below is key. If the away team manager thinks his highest averaged rider is unlikely to defeat the home teams #1 (or their #5 as well) then you wouldn't select them in position #1 or #5, putting them up against the home #1 and #5 on 4 occasions, in the first 14 heats. Presuming that the away highest average rider can beat all the other home riders (2, 3, 4, 6 and 7) then placing him in position 4 would yield 10 from 4. Compared to 8 from 4 in the number 1 position. Of course that would mean lower averaged riders taking harder rides so their scores may drop by the equivalent or more so nothing is guaranteed. But if you knew that one of your lower averaged riders was going to struggle against any of the opposition you might as well put them up against the tougher opposition. Of course it does rob the paying public of seeing the top riders from each team locking horns as often as they do with the fixed line ups. Which is presumably why they're fixed. I'm not too fussed about seeing the opposing best riders up against each other three times during the meeting and would be more interested in the tactical nuances (I still wish every rider could take one TAC sub per meeting whenever a team is 6 down). However, there'll be others who want to see those top riders clashing more often.

It's relatively recently isn't it. Last 20 years or so. Done to appeal to the mass TV audiences.