IainB

Merry Christmas to you too Spidvaj 🎄🎅🏿🫶

WBD managed to half the crowd from the moment they took over and then did pretty much nothing in the way of promotion to tempt those people back. Like @flagrag said they need to rent the stadium for a period of time to put the track in and that won't come cheap and then all of a sudden the numbers stop adding up. This time the decision truly has been made for "commercial reasons" but you can't help but think that if IMG were still the rights holders we'd all be off to Cardiff again next summer.

Oh what a tangled web they weave. They are the rights holders and ultimately the consequences of this decision, whoever made it, will reflect badly on them with the Speedway fraternity. Why on earth they've bid for and won the rights to stage the competition and then, from what you've just said, seemingly subbed it out is a bizarre business decision! Who is this mystery company that stages SGP's and do they stage any others?

There was something very up when they "announced" the dates so long after they usually do, which had been at the actual event previously, which is why I surmised it wasn't actually going to happen until tickets went on sale. But even I'm surprised at the way they've handled this, no explanation, just a twitter post, put the out of office on and do a runner for Christmas.

WBD have done very little to promote the event since taking over.

England 😂🤣😂

It seems to be 10 years in British Speedway these days.

So, the "new era" keeps going from strength to strength, the series is down to 1 big stadium in a major city, there's little to no promotion, all of the world's best riders are not riding in the series, the points system is a shambles, you can win a GP by coming 10th, the "sprint race" is not a sprint race... hang on though, there's TV screens and a camera in each pit bay, that'll get the masses queuing for tickets!

I shall be accepting apologies from all of those that scoffed when I called this months ago. I'll even let you have a large serving of Christmas humble pie 🥧 🎅🏿😂🎄

Is 2025 the final year of the Eurosport TV deal? I believe it is. I wonder what the chances are of a return to Sky Sports now Phil Morris has given the TV presentation a much needed face lift?

Poole already holding the competition up! Probably angling for the 2nd leg as usual... Maybe a Jubilee Trophy double header?

You are not wrong and you are not alone

Hope so, it'll be nice to possibly see a decent line up at Sheffield

Nothing shown in the Sheffield fixture list

The Sheffield/Poole tie is shown as TBC on the Sheffield website... I wonder if the reality of arranging this tie is sinking in?

You've left Robert Lambert out. I'd probably have Charles Wright ahead of King and/or Ellis. And I think Harris has retired from Team GB. 6 man teams, 18 heats, none of this 15 heat nonsense.

Thanks, my bad

I wonder who even suggested it and if they even thought about the difficulties in Poole assembling a credible team to compete 🤷‍♂️

Not sure why you'd allow those 3 and no others... Poole already meeting Sheffield in their first match so that rules Rowe out... or does it? It should. Whatever happens it's certainly going to take up some space on here! Let's face it, Poole shouldn't really be competing in the competition.

Surely the least you'd expect would be to "sign" a team of 7 riders that could potentially see them through to a final rather than a league select in every match.

How is it working? I haven't heard anything official.

Lawson, Cook & Thompson (D) cup tied surely?

Hope so 🤞 It didn't really seem a setup thing, he was just slow dropping the clutch.

Watched the speedway from Aus this morning, Sam Hagon was terrible from the starts, I can only hope he was still jet lagged as he seemed to be gating in a different time zone! His starts will need to be on point if he wants to score any points around Leicester next year.

Good to see that Aussie Speedway is even more farcical than British Speedway... after a big delay before the start of the meeting to get the outside of the tapes working, they've stopped working again midway through the meeting and have just decided to go with one side of the tapes only working lol, just when you think you've seen it all... 😂🤣😂