Edinburgh co-promotor John Campbell stepped in to rescue the three match series between Scotland and the England Under-21 side. After the successful Test Match series last year, it was expected that it would become an annual fixture. Certainly Graham Reeve, England Under-21 manager said as much last year. The matches will be held at Edinburgh, Workington, and Glasgow this September.
It appears that the Scotland team manager, Bert Harkins, had not asked for a follow up. Campbell added:
"The matches were not in the original BSPA shared events scheme so I wrote back and said because Edinburgh have six Scots in their team we wanted to run a one-off match which would be of interest to us, though not necessarily to anybody else. It turned into a three-match series. Bert didn't bother asking for it, I did."
Harkins' main objective is to get Scotland readmitted to the World Team Cup. This has already been rejected by the FIM. Campbell was rather cool on the idea despite the fact that the Scottish national team would be largely based on the current Monarchs team plus two ex-Monarchs, Scott Lamb and Barry Cambell and David Meldrum.
"Bert may move in the circles that might launch Scotland back into the World Team Cup. I don't move in such cirles. And when it comes to Scotland v England on Premier League tracks, I have more to say on that than Bert ever will."
"I did say to Bert at our annual dance that he shouldn't naturally assume he's going to get a huge swell of support to push Scotland back on the world stage. At the end of the day, that could prove an expensive exercise. Last year's series wasn't a financial success for the tracks involved. While it is nice to see Scotland pushing for recogition, it's costing Scottish clubs money that they can't really afford."
Caampbell added about the prospects of Scotland facing teams such as Austria and the Ukraine:
"We may have four riders who are could defeat Austria here, it's doubtful if we could beat them in Austria."
The Test Match series will be held at the Lothian Arena, Armadale on September 17, at Derwent Park, Workington on September 18, and at Ashfield, Glasgow on September 19.
[This news item was added on March 14th 1999]