The last place in the Premier League was filled this week by Berwick. They recruited 32 year old Phil Pickering from Buxton to fill their vacant place at reserve. Berwick are now the only Premier League team not to have ridden this year and have their first outing at Armadale this Friday, weather permitting.
As the last place is filled many teams are already looking to make changes. Some changes may be forced by injury. Exeter's Phil Jeffery will probably be out for over six weeks. Swindon have already replaced injured reserve Gary Phelps with Steve Bishop of St. Austell initially on a temporary contract.
Other teams will be looking for the publication of the first Green Sheet Averages so that they can strengthen up.
The first few weeks of the season have produced some apparently contradictory results. For example, Newport beat Reading home an away in a challenge and lost home and away to Swindon. Yet Swindon lost on aggregate to Reading over two legs in another challenge. Similarly Edinburgh having beaten Workington home and away lost at home to Newcastle who earlier were beaten on aggregate by Workington. No doubt it will take a week or so for the disruption caused by the late change in tyre compound regulations to settle down.
Any further predictions will have to wait for another couple of weeks.
| Northern Teams | Edinburgh, Glasgow, Berwick, and Newcastle. |
| Central Teams | Sheffield, Swindon, Stoke, and Workington. |
| Southern Teams | Exeter, Newport, Reading, Isle of Wight, and Arena Essex. |
[This news item was added on April 8th 1999]