IPSWICH Evening Star Witches stand-in captain Steve Johnston today blasted proposals for Elite League clubs to hold home meetings every other week next season.

Mike Bacon

IPSWICH Evening Star Witches stand-in captain Steve Johnston today blasted proposals for Elite League clubs to hold home meetings every other week next season.

The idea has been mooted by Poole promoter Matt Ford, as clubs try to cope with the demands of top riders and the general economic down-turn.

But it got a big thumbs down from the experienced Johnston, as the Witches crashed to a ten-point defeat at home to the Pirates.

“I'm sorry, but what a load of cobblers that idea is,” he said.

“For a start, how are the majority of riders who don't ride in Poland or Sweden ever going to make a living with less meetings?

“You take someone like Chris Schramm. He hasn't ridden for nearly three weeks and I've only had one meeting. We are not alone in that.

“The trouble this season is that we were so busy worrying about Craven Shield and KO Cup meetings early on, when we should have been going straight into the League clashes more evenly spread out.

“We had six meetings in eight days and then none for three weeks. That's not Ipswich's fault, that's the fixture list. Now, we don't have a meeting scheduled for another two-and-a-half weeks.

“Don't get me wrong, it's no excuse for our defeat here tonight as Poole were simply better, but it was clear for everyone to see some of us were rusty at the start of the meeting.

“However, there is no panic. Those away wins we picked up have helped us and we are still right in there.

“We had a real thing going during that week when we won all those meetings.

Now, we have hardly seen each other for three weeks.”