Friday’s scheduled BSN Series clash between Berwick Bandits and Edinburgh Monarchs at Armadale on Friday, was rained off so the focus turns to the Borders when the sides are due to meet in the same competition on Saturday (tapes-up 7pm).
And Berwick skipper Jye Etheridge can’t wait. The 31-year-old Australian-born but long-term Berwick-based battler has been the target of criticism throughout his British career, usually online but sometimes from his own management.
“The negative stuff? I thrive on it,” said Etheridge (pictured by Keith Hamblin) who has returned to skipper Berwick after spending last season at Workington.
He said: “All I’ll say is they’d better be there when we win the BSN Series, the Knockout Cup or the league to say sorry.”
While it may be a little tongue in cheek, Etheridge believes that the town he has lived in and represented on-track for most of the past decade could be on the verge of something special.
He admits to becoming stale in 2024 after seven seasons at Shielfield Park and losing the joy of racing, a lack of meetings meaning he had to work part-time to bankroll his racing.
A 2025 switch to Workington saw an uplift in scores and a mid-season return to top league racing – where he had been a Grand Final winner for Belle Vue – with Sheffield.
Etheridge is back with the Tigers in 2026 and returns to a Berwick side which has undergone a winter overhaul and been tipped by many to be challenging on all fronts.
“To be honest I hadn’t given any thought to coming back but (team owner) Jamie Courtney called me and when I saw the team he was putting together I though, I’ll have some of that,” Etheridge said.
Being named Bandits’ skipper is an extra incentive for a rider who is very much the talk of his adopted town.
“Population-wise Berwick is a little but it’s massive for speedway. If you go to the shops someone’s always asking you what’s going on with the speedway.
“If we made the play-offs the town would be pumping. If we actually won something the Black and Gold (the social club next to the ground which is a match-day gathering spot) wouldn’t close for three days.”
Berwick’s season begins with a home clash against Monarchs where he made his British debut in 2016, a season in which the then 21-year-old Etheridge struggled to such an extent that promoter John Campbell’s interview with a local evening newspaper prompted a headline branding Etheridge’s signing the “worst ever”.
Since then Etheridge has saved some of his best performances against the Monarchs including a paid maximum at Shielfield in 2019 and paid ten in their last win at Armadale – a 49-41 2023 triumph.
Australian reserve Reid Battye makes his British team debut on Saturday in what promises to be a tight qualifying section which also involves Glasgow Tigers.
Despite losing on their last four visits, Edinburgh have a decent record in the Borders, three of those defeats by just four points and the other by two.
