Soundbites: 31st May 2005

Wilson	Norton

"I had a long chat with Sean last night and we are taking things on a daily basis. He will make a late decision but I have also said to him that I would rather him take a Thursday off and get it totally right rather than come back and make it worse. That could set him back weeks which would be a disaster both for him and the club. I'm not going to book a guest for Thursday, if Sean doesn't make it we will share his programmed rides amongst the rest of the team and therefore Sean has plenty of time to make a decision on whether to ride or not."
Neil Machin on Sean Wilson's shoulder injury

"There are definitely going to be big changes. Danny Norton had a poor afternoon, he only got five points. Paul Burnett was very, very disappointing - that's no good at all in my book. I want some changes because I'm not very happy about it at all. We have to out of respect to the spectators who have got behind us."
Scunthorpe boss Kenny Smith after their home defeat from Boston

"It is all down to the identity because you need a name which means something. If you have a team called Dyfed or Ayrshire people don't know where they are from but everyone knows Sheffield, Glasgow, Reading and so on. Teams riding under the name of Somerset and the Isle of Wight are too non-descript."
Tim Stone prepares to welcome Somerset to Newport

"The pain was so intense I thought I had broken it. It is extremely sore to say the least and I will have to see how it feels tomorrow before I can say whether I will be able to ride at King's Lynn."
Newcastle's Richard Juul on the leg injury he picked up on Sunday

"I'm gutted. I found out on Thursday when I spoke to Graeme Gordon and I think it's completely the wrong decision. Last week wasn't very good but before that I scored five and seven. I was starting to settle into it a little bit more. I was happy with my bikes and now I've had my chance taken away from me. Somebody mentioned after the second meeting of the season that I needed to pull my finger out and you don't need that. I had 100 per cent trust in Exeter, but when something like this happens it takes that away and you feel let down."
Nick Simmons on being axed by Exeter

"Nick has been here a while and was trying hard, but he doesn't seem to be going forward too much. Hopefully if he gets fixed up with a Conference League team it will do him a world of good and will get his confidence going again. It's got to the stage that he's not scoring as well as he should be at home and he's definitely not doing what he's capable of away. He's got himself stuck in a rut and they are very hard to get out of. Sometimes you've got to be cruel to be kind. I'm hoping he won't take this as a step backwards, but perhaps make a few changes, maybe go to a smaller track and come back a better rider for it."
Graeme Gordon explains why he dropped Simmons

"David is currently second in the averages and that means we can use our other top four riders to cover for him for this week's meetings, but new averages come into effect on Friday and he drops to fourth which leaves us having to use the reserves and we will not be as strong. We will hold some sort of open meeting and that will give riders who have not ridden for Wolves a chance to show what they can do."
Chris van Straaten on the search for a replacement for the injured David Howe

"It looked at one stage as though we might take our advantage into double figures. But Hull hit back hard over the last three heats and, while the right team won, Hull made a good go of it and will be reasonably happy with that. There were a lot of good individual efforts out there, as well as some good team riding and we are definitely building momentum. The reserves did a belting job and it was nice to see Paul Clews using his head to look out for young Jack Hargreaves in heat eight. That's team spirit."
Stoke manager Nigel Crabtree pleased with the Potters win over Hull on Saturday

"I was very impressed with Tommy last week, his gating was lightning fast but his lack of track knowledge was evident. I am sure that in the coming weeks we will see him become a formidable force at reserve along with Jan, who quite honestly is spectacular at the minute."
Buster Chapman on King's Lynn newcomer Tommy Stange

"I was disappointed with some of the performances, and sometimes we are a bit too soft. We need to be tougher in the first turns."
Alun Rossiter on Swindon's defeat at Coventry last night

"It was a bit of a spanking. I was hoping to keep it to 14 or 15, and that extra seven is going to take a lot of pulling back. We just couldn't get out of the starting gate and if you didn't there was only one racing line. If you weren't on that racing line you were history, and we just weren't on it too many times. But we can't complain, the track was the same for both teams."
Hull boss David Peet on their defeat at Glasgow on Sunday

"It is difficult trying to find someone to fill in for two months and there is nobody yet who fits the bill. But I haven't given up and I'm spreading the net wide in a search to find a suitable short-term stand-in. We have had wretched luck so far after such a promising start to the season."
Graham Drury - Trying to replace the injured Kauko Nieminen

"Whatever the conditions, day or night, rain or shine, we should be able to win at home and there are no excuses for not doing it. We always leave in a very sad mood when we lose at home because we like to win our meetings here. The conditions were tough, but Ipswich handled them better than us and rode really well."
Peter Karlsson on Peterborough's 40-55 defeat from Ipswich

This article was first published on 31st May 2005