STOKE promoter Dave Tattum has given the thumbs up to the National League AGM that took place on Wednesday where he declared once again that the Potters will be coming to the tapes in 2019.

The Potters boss said “I felt it was one of the best meetings that I’ve attended and I actually enjoyed participating in the meeting. Everyone was very positive and people in the room especially our top table are looking at ways of moving the sport that we all love so much forward and I felt good coming away from the meeting and in honesty that has not always been the case. Leicester have replaced Coventry in the league although there was a huge blow and a real heavy heart for me losing Buxton, there were tears in the majority of people eyes and bearing in mind there was only one woman in Jayne (Moss) is the room we were all choked with their withdrawal from league racing and I really do hope that Buxton are back in the near future. I’m happy with the 36-point limit and feel it is about right and with the reduction on new riders to an assessed 2-point average helps everyone along, everyone now knows what the points limit is and all sides will be building their team up to that limit and I feel it will suit Stoke very well and I do feel we had to take a step back in order to move forward four or five steps in the next few years to move the sport forward.”

Looking back on the 2018 campaign Tattum commented “We started out badly losing Luke Chessell before we’d even got to the beginning of the season though a serious injury he sustained in America and then we lost our captain Tony Atkin who I have spoken to and I accept what he has told me. Then results didn’t go our way and we really struggled early on and then lost William O’Keefe due to injury and Joe Alcock and it wasn’t until towards the end of the season things took a turn for the better. I feel the turning point was when the guest Tom Perry came to ride and he came to me and said “Dave what on earth is wrong with your pits, as the mood up and down the camp is terrible”.

“Tattum continued “With Tom (Perry) and Max Clegg they suddenly changed that and bounced off each other and lifted the whole team spirit within the side and everyone suddenly had smiles on their faces in fact even I was enjoying it in the end it was really good and it got to the stage where we didn’t want the season to end.

“We sorted the track out and the track was starting to produce race times that we hadn’t seen around here since the likes of Paul Pickering, Jan Steachmann and Alan Mogridge which were terrific times, riders who had criticised the track earlier on in the season and had started to praise the track.”