marko

Really confused with all these different riders signing, looking forward to this all being cleared up tonight.

Can't imagine this taking off unless a professional company was given the ok. Individual fans could stream but on the basis of how hard it can be sometimes to find texters for the updates site for even the most well attended clubs, I don't think so.

I stopped using the Lakeside forum a couple of seasons ago, at that point it was just the same few contributing to it plus those that had a one sided view which was always negative and never pointed out any of the positive stuff, I don't mind people having a moan, you pays your money etc but I think some were very lapsed supporters and no longer went or were fans of other teams just trying to act as antagonists. Jon I don't think has ever been a fan of them because of this minority element, negativity breeds negativity, you only need to spend 5 minutes on here to see that.

You hit the nail on the head, entertaining meetings and I think even if Rye are not the strongest of teams compared to others their home track advantage should see them ok most of the time, away from not so important, yes you want to do well in the league but how many fans travel to away meetings nowadays? Very few.

As a neutral to Rye I would rather see a young gutsy rider than gate and go Klindt although I was thinking the latter might be able to do something for the Rockets but he clearly has an attitude problem that would have shown itself at some point during the season.

Glad to see some sanity has been restored, fwiw from the moment I read the article even before it all kicked off on here I never read anything into it. Edited for poor grammar

Is a bit confusing the whole draft thing but then so is the heat leader list and team building as a whole, long gone are the days where we as fans could speculate based on known averages, now we know pretty much nothing about what riders are available at what criteria and what average, I will just sit back and wait. Regarding a back up man for AJ though, I don't think we will end up with what many would call a genuine heat leader but not many teams will have that in 2016 anyway.

Kerr would be a good reserve for us if Lewis Blackbird (nearly wrote Carl Blackbird, shows my age) actually does ride, quite what the chances of that are heaven knows but Jon must have had some dialogue with him before making his decision to name him. Whilst the averages of the reserves are now to be included in the teams total (should have applied from day one) there will still be an importance to them although not anywhere near as much as when all reserves were deemed to be the same value.

Would I want the Bjarne of recent times who has struggled so badly he was not even as good as his alto ego Agent Pedersen? Hell no, would I want the Bjarne who back in the day was a thorn in our side most visits to Arena? Yes To be honest I get the feeling there is not a lot out there left so options are probably limited, it's looking like the weakest EL we have ever had but maybe that will produce more even teams, close contests and exciting matches?

Despite being only 45 mins away I have not been to Rye for many years, the teams have always had the same Len Silver look about them, when I saw the 2016 team in the recent speedway star my gut reaction was, this is not a regular Rye team even though several have ridden for Rye before, imo they have a very good mixture of youth and experience, racers and trappers, I think you will get a reasonable amount of cross Lakeside support too as you track a number of Hammers favourites past and present but above all else people crave entertainment and I think you will get that with that team, I will definetely be looking to pop along.

I was a big fan of Christian, very stylish rider, yes not always one that scored a ton of points but he had his moments for sure. Always remember one season he was with us we went to Oxford and I think he scored 15 or something and was the star of the show.

The Claret tag is not a reference to speedway but the football team I follow. Interesting to read that the original colours were going to be what we have now until Essex Radio became sponsors, never heard that before but does sound completely plausible. Looking forward to seeing how this team looks once all signings are complete, disappointed to lose Bech but he seemed to lose his way in last season or so and he seemed to miss more meetings than most through other commitments.

I would much rather see us going back to being a red,white and blue team like the old days of Arena Essex, the idea of adopting West Ham style colours was a decent one but has not yielded anymore support because of it, we just lost a bit more of our original identity.

I would not want Batch in my team either, decent rider, on his day can be very good but that is all few and far between, he seems to have a big attitude problem which is the main reason most would leave him alone, funny enough though if he was to ride for Poole I think he would pull his socks up a bit such is the pressure to perform there plus Ford and Middlo would have the bottle and asset list to replace him which he would be mindful of.

The way the bikes are now quite frankly who does not struggle with the Arena track to some degree?

It's possible you have just answered your own question, its possibly the car racing aspect that is the potential stumbling block if as i have heard and read elsewhere that Friday night being prime time slot is wanted by more than just the speedway which could force either a change of race night or result in a higher premium to use the same Friday race night and either would then bring the thorny topic of viability into question.

Today is the long awaited day where we find out the status of the clubs immediate future, the fact there is a fans meeting does fill me with hope that something has been worked out, no one would surely hold a meeting just to tell a couple hundred of fans that sorry this is the end, would they? At this point I don't care which league Hammers opt into just so long as they keep a foot in the door.

Oh for the days when a good percentage of the team was made up of local talent hey, Ipswich have a been a prime example of that in the past.

Purely guessing here but I suspect the issue is not one of can speedway use the stadium but simply when and at what price, if AJ is not in the Grand Prix next season it's makes wanting to retain a Friday race night even more attractive but then if Kent run on a Friday it muddies the water further, if it is a question of race night, we cannot expect any promotion to take one which they feel will cost them thousands in debt to run because once your bankrupted, stadium or no stadium it makes no difference. I recall Jon saying at the last home meeting if the wind does blow in the wrong direction or words to that effect they would run a special farewell meeting, whether that's 2015 or sometime in 2016 i don't know but I hope it does not come to that just yet but it's clear that whatever happens that venue in its present form is only temporary.

Birmingham was the classic example of buyer beware, go back a decade and you could say almost the same thing about Arena Essex, doing quite nicely in the second tier, big Ron gets the invite to take the club up with promises of help which never came, what followed was the worst few seasons the club has ever had in its history.

If Kent do go Elite then I think that will be that for Lakeside as the cross area catchment area cannot support two EL clubs especially racing on the same night, it's why Lakeside and Rye have never shared the same race night despite for much of their existsnce being in different divisions besides there is probably not enough riders around to support 9 EL teams? But I would not be surprised to see things turn full circle and see a repeat of 1996 where Hammers run solely as a NL team racing at least for one season.

Matt is very capable modern day promoter who has built up a business model that year on year is successful both on the track and i imagine off it, to be a great though would mean he standing among the likes of Johnnie Hoskins, i think with respect he has some way to go to match that and i am not implying anything to do with the way Poole are seen by other fans, the club are fortunate to be in a area where there is not an awful lot of things competing for peoples money though. But you cannot take away the fact there is probably quite a gap in total club value between Poole and next solvent club whoever that maybe.

Whilst true that will not go anyway near to making up for the fact the previous six months were about watching select teams in almost empty stadiums, well done to Pirates and Aces for an entertaining final but lets not kid ourselves, our sport is in a shocking state and no matter how good the play off finals were it won't bring back the thousands in lost revenue the majority of tracks have suffered during the season because fans stopped going.

Everyone knows the sky deal (which is the be all and end all) is dependent on at least 8 clubs in the EL, whether its by hook or by crook, there will be 8 clubs next year, regardless of whether Lakeside, Coventry or Swindon run or not, purely my opinion.

Not trying to be funny but we have all spent the last six months watching select team vs select team in a bid to see which clubs select team makes the top four, somehow i do not think it matters one bit if the play offs happen to contain the odd guest regardless of the reason after what has gone on before.