Speedway: Campbell quits as Monarchs promoter

Campbell’s bombshell came after the Capital club suffered their eighth rain-off of the season when their play-off clash against Workington Comets was postponed two hours before start time. It’s unclear if it will be restaged.

Campbell, speaking exclusively to the Evening News, said: “I have had too much of it this year, the weather and the finances, both are very depressing. To get to the play-off and the KO Cup semi-finals and get crowds as low as we got for those meetings, makes me  believe there is no future for the Monarchs at Armadale.

“If we cannot get people to turn out for such important  fixtures, what hope is there for the future. At this moment I’ve had enough and I can’t take it any more. I’m very grateful for all those supporters who attend Armadale every Friday, but there are simply not enough of them any more.

“For three years now we have lost substantial amounts of money. At the end of the day what we run is a hobby as a business, and it’s now creating real financial problems for us, and I won’t go into the 2013 season as Monarchs promoter.

“I’m outlining what I personally intend to do but obviously there are a number of others directors of the club, and it could very well be they get themselves organised to carry on, but I have got to say at some stage everybody has got to be realistic, and realism tells me there is nothing to suggest that we can turn round the situation we have got ourselves into at Armadale.”

Campbell continued: “I have just come to the end of  promoting Monarchs for 29 years and I’d love to do a 30th season. It’s difficult to explain my feelings at this present time, but I don’t want the worry every Friday of, first of all the weather, and then the worry at the end of the night as to how do we pay the bills because we are thousands of pounds short of our  necessary income.

“The only meeting this year where we have probably made money on was the Scottish Open at the start of the season, but generally it’s been a drain, drain, drain. The directors have put in a very significant sum of money again during the summer to keep us afloat, yet we are back in the same situation at the end of the season, for me the enjoyment has gone out of it, and to my mind it cannot go on the way it has been.

“We need two or three hundred more people than we are getting now to survive. Everything is a struggle, we really need a very significant sponsor to come and help us at the  moment, far greater than we get from any other sponsor.”

Monarchs have a board meeting planned for next week when things could become clearer about whether they come to the tapes in 2013 or not.