League Rules regarding Board order by ECF rating

[E Michael White]

So long as the board order does not create mismatches where there is a gap of more than 40 BCF grading points, you can play in any order you like without altering the expected result. Playing a weak player on a high board reduces his expected score by exactly the same as the sum of the increased expected score of all his team mates.

Strange that this topic generates so much heat.

David your analysis has two low points.

Firstly the strategy of maximisation of the expected score does not necessarily produce the same result as maximising the chance of winning or minimising the chance of losing a match where the result is determined on total game points. A knowledgeable captain could, in many cases, skew the result distribution and increase the chance of winning by fiddling the board order. Fortunately many captains do not have the skill and reduce their teams chances by such strategy.

Secondly the expectation of game results should be derived from true probabilities not hypothetical ones derived by reverse engineering the grading sums. There is no truth in the rumour that two players 30 grading points apart should have an expected score of 8-2 and even less in the rumour that if A wins x% against B and B wins y% against C then the probability of A v C can be calculated. Chess players have known for decades that most grades are inaccurate and that nearly all grade differences between two opponents are unreliable.

[Anthony Taglione]

I'm reminded of a player I knew whose grade would flip between ~150 and ~185 year after year. He had a very aggressive, cavalier style of play and would carve up his opponents in the years when he was a 150. The following year, the holes in his speculative attacks would be exploited and he'd spend most of the year losing his way back down to 150.

Grades can never be more than a general guide to board selection.

[Anthony Taglione]

...

Returning players.... they should forget all about these grading issues, at least for the first season.
Instead, it is imperative that they report immediately to the local club of there choice, and present themselves for selection...the lucky club able to receive such players would be highly delighted to see them.
They should then commit themselves to enjoying there chess and in rediscovering long lost skills, maybe some long lost friends...and hopefully hours of good chessing. Maybe such players should be provisionally rated after the first 5 games, after an initial guestimate, based on any relevant information available. My suggestion is that players who have been out of the game totally for 10 years might initially be rated no more than 15 - 25 grading points lower (but factor in also, the recent grading rebase).
Players who had played informally, or used the web for practice, etc..might even merit a slight initial rerating!

Just my opinions.....

Thanks for this post, it resonates well with my own thoughts.

Regarding lost skills, from looking at selected positions from GM games, (http://www.wtharvey.com/index.html), I seem to have retained an ability to perform hard calculation and I seem still to have an excellent eye for a sacrificial attack. On the other hand, I seem to have lost much by way of positional judgement and find myself utterly floundering at times in the few games I've played against Fritz on its default training level, not to mention missing the odd trivial fork. I've ordered a chess set, which should arrive tomorrow, and I'll see how I feel with a proper board in front of me and some bits to pick up and move. My only real contact with chess over the past 25 or so years was the televised Short - Kasparov match. I don't even have my books to hand, since they've long been in storage.

I'd currently rate myself several hundred ELO points down on where I was 30 years ago. I'll have a better idea when I finally wander down to the local chess club.

[David Williams]

So long as the board order does not create mismatches where there is a gap of more than 40 BCF grading points, you can play in any order you like without altering the expected result. Playing a weak player on a high board reduces his expected score by exactly the same as the sum of the increased expected score of all his team mates.

Strange that this topic generates so much heat.

David your analysis has two low points.

Firstly the strategy of maximisation of the expected score does not necessarily produce the same result as maximising the chance of winning or minimising the chance of losing a match where the result is determined on total game points. A knowledgeable captain could, in many cases, skew the result distribution and increase the chance of winning by fiddling the board order. Fortunately many captains do not have the skill and reduce their teams chances by such strategy.

Secondly the expectation of game results should be derived from true probabilities not hypothetical ones derived by reverse engineering the grading sums. There is no truth in the rumour that two players 30 grading points apart should have an expected score of 8-2 and even less in the rumour that if A wins x% against B and B wins y% against C then the probability of A v C can be calculated. Chess players have known for decades that most grades are inaccurate and that nearly all grade differences between two opponents are unreliable.

Michael, I appreciate that you say my analysis has low points, rather than that I am wrong. My contention is that, in the absence of gross mismatches, if you gain on some boards by manipulating the board order, you will lose a very similar amount on other boards, and this is supported by rough arithmetic. Even if a captain was able to manipulate a board order so that the grade differences on every board maximised his chances of exploiting the (non-linear) expectations of each of his players, it would have only a minimal effect on the result. And if the grading system is truly as hopeless as you maintain, he has even less chance.

[Alex Holowczak]

Out of interest, What's wrong with a captain being able to put his team in any order he or she chooses? A bit like the Ryder Cup singles on the last day; the captains can put their players into whichever order they choose, rather than order of strength (which can be determined by a player's World Ranking). I mean, conceptually, what's wrong, rather than the fact it's against most of the rules in league chess.

[Jonathan Rogers]

It seems to me that in that situation, instead of the teams playing chess, the team captains are playing battleships.

[Adam Raoof]

Out of interest, What's wrong with a captain being able to put his team in any order he or she chooses? A bit like the Ryder Cup singles on the last day; the captains can put their players into whichever order they choose, rather than order of strength (which can be determined by a player's World Ranking). I mean, conceptually, what's wrong, rather than the fact it's against most of the rules in league chess.

Actually there is nothing wrong with the idea, per se. However as a team Captain I am constantly made aware by my team that they are there not just to try to win the match, but also to play a decent game of chess against someone who is roughly the same standard as them. The ECF grading system, whatever you think of it, does at least give us a chance to do that by putting teams in grading order.

If I tried a random order in order to bamboozle the opposing team Captain it would not only be against the rules of the League, but I might have a riot on my hands

[Ian Kingston]

The Notts League does away with this issue by having no rules about board order. However (and simplifying slightly), players who play on one of the top three boards (five-board matches) for a team on more than one occasion in the season are then rendered ineligible to play for a lower team.

Captains are expected to write out their team lists in advance and then to exchange lists. Obviously a little shuffling is possible, but without knowledge of what the other captain may have done it's all guesswork. Many clubs have 'overlapping' team squads, so team captains have to be wary of accidentally rendering a player ineligible for his or her regular team. This further reduces the scope for tinkering with the board order.

There are some possible abuses of this system. A player can play all season for multiple teams, but in practice this is confined to a few individuals who turn out for two teams on a regular basis. It's also possible for a strong player who has played all season on Board 4 for a club's first team in Division 1 to appear suddenly on Board 1 for a team in Division 5 in a crucial promotion match.

The system isn't perfect but it does avoid any disputes about board order.

[LozCooper]

The Notts League does away with this issue by having no rules about board order. However (and simplifying slightly), players who play on one of the top three boards (five-board matches) for a team on more than one occasion in the season are then rendered ineligible to play for a lower team.

Captains are expected to write out their team lists in advance and then to exchange lists. Obviously a little shuffling is possible, but without knowledge of what the other captain may have done it's all guesswork. Many clubs have 'overlapping' team squads, so team captains have to be wary of accidentally rendering a player ineligible for his or her regular team. This further reduces the scope for tinkering with the board order.

There are some possible abuses of this system. A player can play all season for multiple teams, but in practice this is confined to a few individuals who turn out for two teams on a regular basis. It's also possible for a strong player who has played all season on Board 4 for a club's first team in Division 1 to appear suddenly on Board 1 for a team in Division 5 in a crucial promotion match.

The system isn't perfect but it does avoid any disputes about board order.

This reminds me of when I played in the Notts league. I played board 2 behind keith Arkell and some of the opposing teams would sacrifice one of their lower graded players on board 1 against Keith confident in the knowledge their best player was more likely to score something against me. It actually suited both of us, I got to play stronger players whilst Keith had an easier nights work

[David Pardoe]

...

Returning players.... they should forget all about these grading issues, at least for the first season.
Instead, it is imperative that they report immediately to the local club of there choice, and present themselves for selection...the lucky club able to receive such players would be highly delighted to see them.
They should then commit themselves to enjoying there chess and in rediscovering long lost skills, maybe some long lost friends...and hopefully hours of good chessing. Maybe such players should be provisionally rated after the first 5 games, after an initial guestimate, based on any relevant information available. My suggestion is that players who have been out of the game totally for 10 years might initially be rated no more than 15 - 25 grading points lower (but factor in also, the recent grading rebase).
Players who had played informally, or used the web for practice, etc..might even merit a slight initial rerating!

Just my opinions.....

Thanks for this post, it resonates well with my own thoughts.

Regarding lost skills, from looking at selected positions from GM games, (http://www.wtharvey.com/index.html), I seem to have retained an ability to perform hard calculation and I seem still to have an excellent eye for a sacrificial attack. On the other hand, I seem to have lost much by way of positional judgement and find myself utterly floundering at times in the few games I've played against Fritz on its default training level, not to mention missing the odd trivial fork. I've ordered a chess set, which should arrive tomorrow, and I'll see how I feel with a proper board in front of me and some bits to pick up and move. My only real contact with chess over the past 25 or so years was the televised Short - Kasparov match. I don't even have my books to hand, since they've long been in storage.

I'd currently rate myself several hundred ELO points down on where I was 30 years ago. I'll have a better idea when I finally wander down to the local chess club.

Anthony, I`ll just say that I took a break from chess for several years a while back..
I asked myself the same questions as you....
I got a fairly cheap touch board computer chess...nothing quite as strong as Fritz.
I played it on several levels, just for fun & curiousity... I found it almost a revelation.....great fun doing post match analysis, etc...
At the higher levels, the computer was very challenging...and exposed some of my weaknesses. Its resoursefullness amazed me at times....
This re-enforced my resolve to get even with the blasted machine....
To cut a long story short, I eventually decided that I still could play to a fair standard, and duely returned to my club, where I`ve enjoyed many encounters otb.
Websites like Gameknot.com allow you to play in various levels of tournaments...which is quite interesting.
So, I repeat, dont worry too much about gradings...enjoy the fun and (largely) good company....and getting away from those boring `soaps` on the telly....

[Simon Brown]

Anthony - but you are Tag, aren't you?

I agree entirely. Couldn't play Andrew's stuff, I'd just give up again. Opening skills out-of-date, confidence low, but hard analysis and sacrifices, no trouble.

Richard - it's not the actual opening theory, it's the fear of what you don't know. In my game - against a good player aged about 14, over 2200 - he played e4. Phew. I've been playing the French for 30+ years (or not playing for 13) so I was happy. So 1. e6 2 d4 d5 3 e5. Pause. Assuming he knew the nuances of the Advance better than me, after 15 minutes I played 3..b6 - a move I have never played before, not even on Playchess. I got a poor position after about 15 moves having played very slowly, he kept playing what I thought wasn't the most accurate move (and I was right) and sure enough I went astray and resigned, with equal material (posters to another thread please note) as soon as I was convinced he had worked out how to win.

I'll let you know about my next game. 2022 at this rate. Year, not rating....

Simon

[Anthony Taglione]

Hi Simon, David.

Yes, I'm Tag and honoured that you still have recollection of me. I offer my sincere apologies, since I'm failing to dredge your name from my memory to put a face to it.

I've considered playing online but I'd rather regain some confidence across the board, thrashing out half a dozen skittles games in an evening. My chess set arrived yesterday and I spent most of the day playing against Fritz. Except for the first game where I was positionally lost against a Caro Kann after about 8 moves, I'm beating it consistently at an 1800 rating, 1600 was almost a waste of time other than reminding me how to marshall an attack. After the Caro Kann debacle, I decided to play simply to keep things simple, although the final game went 31 moves before the first material exchange. Looking at the game analysis afterwards, I played some weak moves and missed some lines which should have been obvious but played no apparent howlers.

I could feel a glimmer of the old sense of obsession which kept me playing in wayback time. I think, for me, it'll be a matter of trying to bring back the memory and feel for where pieces belong in a position and trying to regain a good appreciation of piece coordination. I was very pleased that I found myself thinking in terms of generating "play" for myself and wanting to fish out his King.

Apologies, again, to everyone for our off-piste diversion.

[Simon Brown]

Tag, try Cambridge, about 1976 with Andrew Martin? Match against Centymca, lots of under age drinking (for me), team left after closing....and school in the morning!

[Anthony Taglione]

I do have a vague memory of Andrew coming up to Cambridge for a match, '76 or '77. If John Wilman had anything to do with it, and he probably did, then we likely all went to Trinity Hall bar to drink Theakston's ales. Those times were so full of novelty (and beer) for me that I can't say that I recall any details.

It's a small world.

[Neill Cooper]

I do have a vague memory of Andrew coming up to Cambridge for a match, '76 or '77. If John Wilman had anything to do with it, and he probably did, then we likely all went to Trinity Hall bar to drink Theakston's ales. Those times were so full of novelty (and beer) for me that I can't say that I recall any details.

I have a recollection of playing Andrew at Churchill in 1997, though I was in the same year as John Wilman at Trinity Hall. Churchill, though, is close to Wychfield, which is where John and I lived in our third year.

It's a small world.

Indeed it is. But in any youth generation there are a limited number of chess players. Simon Le Blanc was also recently mentioned.