October 2008 TC Meeting

Having just been elected chairman of the Tournament Committee and chaired my first meeting, I thought it would be a very good time to write my first blog. It’s an opportunity to introduce myself to people who don’t know me and to talk about some of the issues that we are considering.

First something about me. I have been playing in EBU competitions since I was at University. I have had tremendous enjoyment from these events over the years and I am a very big fan of the EBU’s Tournament Programme and the people who make it all happen — the Competitions department at Aylesbury and the tournament directors at the event.

However just because something is very good doesn’t mean it should remain static — anything that never changes is almost always eventually doomed. So one of the main jobs of the Tournament Committee is to constantly review our programme of events to ensure it evolves to meet the changing needs of the members. For instance in the 1970’s the EBU’s programme consisted of Crockford’s, Hubert Philips, National Pairs and a couple of Congresses — I don’t think people would appreciate that now as a Tournament programme. Although we feel we have a pretty good understanding of what members want there is always a danger in basing decisions on the views of a small group of people. We have therefore decided to embark on three projects to help us ensure we meet the needs of all our members:

1. We will conduct an extensive online survey of members to find out what they want from the EBU’s Competition programme in terms of things like format, venue, location, timings, cost, etc. We are expecting this to take place in the first quarter of 2009, so when it’s launched please, please complete a questionnaire and make sure we have your views.
2. Another big challenge facing the Tournament Committee is the introduction of Universal Membership in April 2010. This is expected to bring to the EBU about 20000 new members. Working with the Club Committee we hope to introduce a number of new events aimed particularly at the typical club player.
3. To try and improve the flow of communication we are going to produce a blog and an electronic newsletter, certainly after each Tournament Committee meeting and hopefully more often. This will keep members up to speed with what’s under discussion and what’s planned for the future and give you the opportunity to make your views known.

I can assure you that the Tournament Committee is a mixture of people with different but complementary skills and experience. They are all wedded to these three objectives and all keen to hear from new and old members alike on how best to move forward.

As with most things in life there is an ebb and flow to most events and not all of them are successful. The EBU has an absolute duty in making decisions to consider the best interests of the membership as a whole and in general we consider subsidising failing events does not meet this duty. Our strategy for dealing with these events is to firstly put them on our “at risk list”, so that they can receive particular discussion and consideration. We then come up with changes that we think might rejuvenate them (eg venue, location, format). If all this attention doesn’t bring a significant improvement then normally they would be discontinued. We never lightly decide to discontinue an event because we recognise it always disappoints a number of players who particularly like the event. The two current events on our at risk list are the Northern Easter Congress and the Great Northern Swiss Pairs.

One change that we expect to be fairly controversial is the move of the Autumn Congress from Bournemouth to Birmingham in 2009. We have decided to do this for a number of reasons:

1. It’s a much more central venue bringing easier access to players in the North and the South-West.
2. We have quite a number of Congresses on the South Coast but none at all in the West Midlands.
3. We have had a number of requests to hold an event at a prestigious hotel — this meets that request.

If this change doesn’t personally suit you then we do apologise but hope you can accept as valid the reasons given above.

Two other decisions we expect to be less controversial are:

1. Provided Crockford’s Plate can be arranged to have 8 teams left at the same time as the main event, then these 8 teams will play a final alongside the main event.
2. During 2009 we will stop issuing EBU vouchers as prizes and move to direct credit of prize money to an individual’s personal EBU account.

At our next meeting in March we will be particularly discussing EBU KO events (Crockford’s, Gerard Faulkner Salver, Hubert Phillips, NICKO) and the National Women’s Teams. We would be very keen to have your views on either or both of these issues. If you do want to comment on these or indeed any other aspect of the EBU’s competition programme then please send an e-mail to tcfeedback@ebu.co.uk. I can’t guarantee that every e-mail will get an individual response but I can guarantee that every opinion will be read and taken into account when the issue is discussed by the Tournament Committee.

Eastbourne Seniors Congress 2009

As a result of the strength of feeling shown at Eastbourne over the proposal to combine the Southern and Northern Summer Seniors Congresses and to relocate to Birmingham, the Tournament Committee has reversed its decision and confirms that the Summer Seniors Congress will continue to be held at Eastbourne. The 2009 Congress will take place from 10 to 12 July. Please note that this is 1 week later than the date proposed for Birmingham. In view of the poor support for the Northern Congress this year, the viability of that event will be reviewed by the Committee at its next meeting but no such event will be held in 2009.

Recent Committee Decisions

In this blog I will report on decisions taken by the Committee at its recent meeting.

Firstly, the revised arrangements for the Ranked Masters were confirmed whereby green point awards will be given for matches won as well as for the top half of the final ranking list. These points will be decimalised so that victory in 2 board matches will earn an award, probably 0.1. Full details will be published as soon as they have been finalised. This is an experiment and, if successful, could be extended to other pairs events, provided they are scored by imps rather than match points. All the ranked master sections will continue to be butler scored. Additionally, as previously announced, the Committee has agreed to relax the regulations in the top categories to allow a player qualified for a particular rank to play with a partner of the rank immediately below. (i.e. a Premier Grand Master can play with a Grand Master in the Premier Grand Masters Pairs; a Grand Master with a Premier Life in the Grand Masters Pairs; and a Premier Life Master with a Life Master in the Premier Life Masters Pairs.)

Next, the Northern Easter Congress will be held at the Palace Hotel in Buxton. I expect many of you will remember it fondly from the BBL congresses held there. I understand that it has been refurbished and is now part of the Barcelo group, to which the Hinckley and Daventry hotels also belong. I’m afraid that single occupancy is expensive but I understand that there is plenty of cheaper accommodation nearby.

Finally, the Great Northern Swiss Pairs will be butler scored, and it and the Championship Pairs at the London Easter Festival, will be stratified. This means that while the event will be open to all (i.e. it will not be flighted) there will be green points and prizes for 3 categories of players, the top category containing at least one life master or above, the second category for pairs containing no Life Master or above, and the third category containing no Regional Master or above.

Lambourne Jersey Festival

In April, for the first time for some years, I attended the Lambourne Jersey Congress. I remembered it as a friendly, relaxed 10 days at a good hotel with excellent food and I was not disappointed. However, this year there was something different. As we arrived at the Portelet Hotel we were advised that the hotel would be closing at the end of the season for redevelopment and it would no longer be suitable for bridge. This caused great consternation among the many regular visitors to the event for whom the Portelet and the Lambourne Jersey congress had become virtually synonymous. In the three decades since the congress became a joint venture between the EBU and the Channel Islands Contract Bridge Association, it has been based in only three hotels — but the Portelet had become such a fixture that the earlier venues had faded in the memory.

It subsequently transpired that Ken Wise, one of the organisers of the congress, was informed of that decision only 48 hours before the congress was due to start which, as one can imagine, was a considerable shock to him and his colleagues in the CICBA.

Undaunted, Ken and his colleagues set out to find a venue somewhere in Jersey’s 45 square miles which had everything the congress needed — good food and service, a playing hall which could take up to 80 tables, space for the TDs, relaxation areas, and accommodation with plenty of single rooms. And all at reasonable cost.

This kind of thing is hard enough when you have months in which to do it. With a maximum timescale of ten days it becomes a matter of toil, sweat and tears.

But it was done. The team arranged a flurry of meetings with different hotel groups, and in just eight days a very favourable deal had been brokered. Next year’s congress will be at Jersey’s Hotel de France — a prestigious four-star establishment with better facilities than the Portelet, ample parking, and a location within walking distance of the island’s main town of St Helier .
So as one door has closed, another has opened. Those who like spring sunshine (not guaranteed but the odds are better than a finesse) coupled with friendly bridge should make a note of these dates: Friday 24 April to Sunday 3 May 2009. The congress is on the move, but the warm welcome will stay the same.

I and my teammates have already booked our accommodation for next year and I recommend you do the same.

Welcome

Welcome to the Tournament Committee Blog.

On this page you will be able to read about committee decisions that are most likely to be relevant to the average tournament player, and in due course all our committee members will be adding insights into various aspects of the EBU Tournaments.
First up will be Brian Crack, who will be writing shortly with news on the Lambourne Jersey Festival.

Constructive feedback from our members will always be welcome. Members can post comments on this site by clicking on ‘comments’ below. If you have any greater issues that you would like the Tournament Committee to consider at their meetings, please e-mail me.

Ian Mitchell
EBU Tournament Secretary