ITEM: Another week, another rules fiasco. This time, Peterborough. At the back
end of last week, Peterborough
made the announcement that they’d signed Thomas H Jonasson to replace the
injured Olly Allen, and that he would make his debut in the televised clash
with table-topping Swindon Robins. Only for Jonasson to ride in Poland and get
injured. Now, as we aware from last week’s shenanigans, if you haven’t ridden
for your club you are not entitled to be replaced by anything other than a
National League rider (and the club landed with a £300 fine). However, Peterborough were allowed
to revert to their previous declaration, with still included Olly Allen, and
they tracked Ryan Fisher as a guest.
Guess what? Nowhere in the SCB regulations – speedway’s
rulebook – does it say that this is possible. But I’m assured by several
members of the BSPA that it is. If so, it must be an unwritten convention, and
if we’re getting into that territory we’re really in trouble.
No-one wants to see a rider clearly out of his depth,
especially on a televised match, but if we are going to have rules – and I’d
argue that they are pretty necessary – then we have to follow them to the
letter. What’s the point of having them otherwise? As it was, Fisher rode superbly
for the Panthers, scoring a crucial seven points before falling in a nasty
crash that took the wind out of the meeting. The Robins have every reason to
demand his points be taken away, but seem happy to accept this weird
rule-breaking, even though it may cost them top spot in the league. I know of
at least one promoter who wouldn’t stand for it, and strangely I’d back him on
it (and that would be a first!).
Speaking of demanding points be taken away, an understrength
Coventry side rode at Birmingham on Tuesday and took the hosts to a
last-heat decider. Birmingham, though, rode
under protest, because they’d studied the latest team declarations on the BSPA
website and noticed that Coventry
shouldn’t have been allowed a guest at number 6, and thus wanted any points the
guest – Rohan Tungate – scored to be taken away. As it was, he only scored one
point, so it was kind of moot, but it’s still embarrassing for both Birmingham and the BSPA.
Why? The BSPA – and not for the first time – messed up the
team declarations page on their website. They listed Adam Roynon as doubling-up
with Leigh Lanham, and Aaron Summers as doubling-up with Josef Franc. If that
were the case (and it’s actually Roynon/Franc & Summers/Lanham) then Coventry should have
tracked Leigh Lanham at number 6. However, a simple glance at their own
declarations would have revealed that they were wrong too, meaning their own
team was illegal. Birmingham chose to protest
rather than ask the Coventry
promotion if the declaration was right, and hopefully will forfeit their £300
protest fee for wasting time. As the money goes to the Speedway Riders
Benevolent Fund (or it always did – does it still?), I think it’s only fair if
the BSPA matches it, a bargain for their continued ineptitude.
ITEM: There’s been some talk lately of mid-ranking British
riders – which, of course, means anyone outside the top three – looking to
double-up next season, even though the rules currently forbid anyone with an
Elite League average over 6.00 from doing so. This doesn’t preclude many – Danny
King, Edward Kennett, Simon Stead, and Lewis Bridger – but it’s become a
subject of some debate. Bridger has publicly stated his preference for it, yet
scored well last night, increasing his average rather than dropping it, and
thus – as the rules stand – ruling him out of contention. Likewise, Danny King
has had a solid year, scoring well for Birmingham,
and fully deserving his place in the British World Cup squad.
Kennett and Stead, however, have had difficult years. Both
have dropped their averages substantially, with Kennett failing to reach double
figures in the Elite League since April. Naturally there have been rumours that
this has been deliberate, but I would hope that no rider would betray his
promoter, his club, and his fans in this way. Especially Kennett, whose
indiscretions last season were rewarded with a loyalty few would be shown.
The simple answer, as I’ve written in this blog before, is
to allow all ACU license-holders to double-up, as in Sweden. That way there is little
incentive to drop your average (other than the old chestnut of going out on
loan from your parent club to return on a lower average), and everybody is
happy. If a Premier League wants to track Chris Harris on a near-12.00 average
they should be free to do so.
Until that’s the case there’s always going to be talk. Yes,
Bridger has come out and stated his desire in plain terms but while Kennett
& Stead remain silent yet continue to turn in disappointing scores for
their clubs, the rumour-mongers circle…
ITEM: I’d like to see the word “open” used more in speedway.
Not as in a freedom of information (though I would like that, obviously, and it’s
a subject for another blog), but as in the first half of the phrase “open license”.
Tracks ran on open licenses quite freely in the past. They’d
put on a dozen or so meetings a year – either team challenges or individual
competitions – unburdened by the day-to-day running of a league speedway club.
It doesn’t happen much now –Sittingbourne and Northside are the only non-league
tracks operating in the UK
(although Lydd runs “black” - that is, without SCB consent) – but my interest in
the subject was piqued by a trip to the Norfolk
coast this week.
Driving to the Norfolk coast
is a fair old haul, unless you actually live in East Anglia, and there’s not much
to see and lots to think about. I drove past the site of the proposed Norwich revival, which looks perfect for speedway, and
onwards towards Yarmouth.
On the way out to where I was staying I passed Yarmouth Stadium, once the home
of the “Bloaters”, now a venue for greyhounds and stock cars. The old speedway
track has been tarmac’d over, but it struck me it would be a perfect venue to
stage half-a-dozen meetings a year, in the summer season, if the track could be
sorted out.
There’s plenty of other, similar venues dotted around the
country, with the infrastructure and target market to support speedway, but
perhaps not at a full, league level. If these venues were to be given open
licenses, they may even, in time, become fully-operating league tracks. If not,
it’s half-a-dozen extra tracks, running half-a-dozen extra meetings, on tracks
of different shapes and sizes, where young British riders could learn their
trade. It’s also a way for prospective promoters to learn the ropes, without
losing their shirt. Everybody wins.
ITEM: The World under-21 final returned to Coventry on Friday, for the first time in
(appropriately enough) twenty-one years. Only it didn’t, really. Because it was
only round three of seven rounds, and so although Michael Jepsen Jensen won the
meeting with a referee-assisted 15-point maximum, he actually won nothing more
than to add to his cumulative score going into the next round. In short, it was
a glorified open meeting, charged at premium prices.
This Grand Prix-it is spreading. It’s bad enough that the
senior GP series now has an eye-watering twelve rounds, and the under-21s seven
but now the European Championship, run by the strangely- redundant UEM, has
four rounds, and the World Longtrack Championship (which features speedway
riders) has six. All this adds up to blue balls for the paying public and a
headache for British promoters looking to build a team which will appear at all
of their fixtures.
It has to stop. Except it won’t, of course, and will only
get worse. Either the FIM needs to see some sense and schedule meetings to
happen on the same weekends (meaning a non-GP rider would have to choose
between the under-21s, the GP challenge, the European championship, and the
longtrack, and compete in only one) or the Elite League has to take a stand. It
may mean saying goodbye to some good competitors, but it’s cheating the public
the way things are being run currently.
As fans there’s little we can do. We can stop supporting these
piecemeal events that are sold to us as showcases or we can shrug our shoulders
and accept the whiphand of the FIM. It’s a tough choice.
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