The 1972 Season

The 1972 British League was reduced to 18 teams during the winter.  West Ham, sadly, were forced to close, their Custom House stadium eventually being sold for redevelopment.  Wembley also pulled out after only a couple of years - the logistics of running league meetings around the other stadium commitments being too difficult to manage.  However, Ipswich moved up from the second division after several seasons of success at that level.

Halifax were looking to improve and build on the team which had disappointed during 1971.  Their hopes were not aided by Rider Control's decision to strip them of Paul O'Neal, who was moved on to Glasgow.  But with West Ham's demise, Halifax were offered the services of Preben Rosenkilde, who had impressed on his outings to the Shay the previous season.  Eric Boocock and Dave Younghusband were set to return, and with Alan Jay and Greg Kentwell also looking to start again, the Dukes looked set to have a strong top 5 - the question still being "could someone step up and be the missing third heat leader?"

At the bottom of the team the Dukes had competition for places.  Mike Hiftle and Chris Bailey were originally earmarked for the reserve spots, but Halifax also signed promising Australian John Titman, on the recommendation of ex-rider Bert Kingston.  Malcolm Mackay would also feature, continuing his loan spell at Workington, but being called upon when needed.

One change for the Dukes was the introduction for the first time of team leathers - after the project was scrapped the previous season, Halifax paraded proudly in front of their fans at the Shay in their red, white and blue outfits.

As the season started, the team failed to gel.  Five straight losses, with only Boocock hitting high scores, were ended with a win over Newport, albeit by the narrowest of margins.  Titman arrived in the country and was included in the team despite having little or no equipment, with Chris Bailey making way.  Bailey then crashed in the second half of the Newport meeting, suffering a crushed vertebrae, which kept him out for the remainder of the season - and ultimately ended his speedway career.

The Dukes turned to Rider Control, pleading a weakened team, and were offered the services of former favourite Tommy Roper - but to accommodate Roper, they were forced to release Rosenkilde, with the Dane having ridden in only 7 matches.  Roper, however, was not the rider who aided the Dukes to the double 6 years earlier, and after a maximum against Glasgow, saw his scores dip dramatically.

By mid-June, the Dukes had settled into the usual results pattern - win at home, convincingly beaten on their travels.  Boocock and Younghusband were bearing much of the load, with nobody else looking like becoming what Halifax were hoping for.  But on the 21st June, Halifax travelled to Poole in the Cup, and effectively their season was over.  Roper failed to arrive, blaming his recent form on mechanical issues - he would return once these were sorted out - but ultimately never did.  And Dave Younghusband's stellar Halifax career was ended after an altercation with Christer Lofqvist in heat 6 resulted in a badly broken leg.  Halifax, unsurprisingly, lost the tie.

The Dukes, now extremely weakened, moved to sign multi-World-finalist, Swede Gote Nordin, without a club after Wembley's closure, and he fitted in well - but the management committee ordered that Nordin was a replacement for Younghusband - not Roper - so the Dukes had to draft in Malcolm Mackay for Roper, and could no longer use a guest rider or rider replacement for Younghusband, which undoubtedly made them even weaker.  And Nordin failed to finish the season, injured in an individual meeting at Cradley in September, he ended up missing the final month, leaving the Dukes to search for guests again.

On the individual front, it was once again down to Eric Boocock to lead the quest for honours, and for a second consecutive season, the Dukes were represented at the World Final as Boocock made sure of his qualification after winning a run-off for the last place at Wembley.  But again, the occasion was the better of Boocock, as he failed to challenge, scoring only 2 points to finish 15th, after a first race exclusion.

The Dukes could not seriously hope to improve on the previous season, given their injury woes and lack of progress from the middle order.  They were defeated in the league at home by new-boys Ipswich, Wolverhampton and King's Lynn, and were held to draws by Belle Vue and Sheffield, ending the season with a wretched run of only one win in the final two months.  Remarkably, they grabbed their first away victory in two years with a win at Exeter, but ultimately ended up 12th in the league, two places higher than 1971, but with one team less in the league. 

Boocock was again the out and out number one, but with Younghusband now gone, the team lacked firepower.  Neither Kentwell nor Jay were going to improve, and ever-present Mike Hiftle was clearly a four point rider at best.  John Titman was the ray of hope - after a slow start, he started hitting some higher scores around the Shay, but was often out of his depth on away tracks he was seeing for the first time - better would come from him the following year... And Malcolm Mackay, although hitting high scores in Division 2 with Workington, found the step up tough, ending the season after an extended run in the team with an average similar to Hiftle.

Was this the end of an era?  The title winning side of 1966 was now well and truly gone, with only Eric Boocock - still one of the leading riders in the country - remaining a core part of the Dukes furniture.  Things would clearly need to change as Halifax went into 1973.

The heat details, scorers and reports for each meeting through the season can be found by clicking on the pages for each month.