County Championship Finals

Discussion about all aspects of the ECF County Championships.
Tom Middleton
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Joined: Mon Oct 29, 2012 5:24 pm

Re: County Championship Finals

Post by Tom Middleton » Fri Aug 11, 2017 5:35 pm

Could Nick Grey - an employee of Kensington & Chelsea Council! - please share any evidence he has to support his claim of the GLC wasting billions?

Nick Grey
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Re: County Championship Finals

Post by Nick Grey » Fri Aug 11, 2017 8:41 pm

I said if they came back they would waste billions.

We cannot afford 3 tiers of government - central, GLC and local in London. What extra value would it add.

Most of the fire risk tower blocks in London were built by the GLC or on former GLC housing estates.

Tom Middleton
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Re: County Championship Finals

Post by Tom Middleton » Sat Aug 12, 2017 11:02 am

Ok, understood. Just to add that - since 2000 - we have returned to having three tiers of government in London: Whitehall (central/national), Mayoralty (city-wide) & Borough (local).

Returning to chess, it's been well documented on this forum how the 'new' metropolitan areas such as Greater Manchester & Merseside have caused complications when selecting teams for the 'old' counties such as Lancashire. In the London context, Middlesex & Surrey are fairly fluid in their catchment areas. Richmond Council even straddles the traditional boundary between the two: the Thames.

Mick Norris
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Location: Bolton, Greater Manchester

Re: County Championship Finals

Post by Mick Norris » Sat Aug 12, 2017 12:47 pm

There have been no complications for Lancashire Tom; they select who they like
Any postings on here represent my personal views

David Pardoe
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Re: County Championship Finals

Post by David Pardoe » Sun Aug 27, 2017 9:25 pm

Maybe the NCCU constitution needs to be amended to recognise why the GM County came into being..
Namely to facilitate the playing of county chess at all levels by more players and teams.
At the time there was ample scope to accommodate an additional set of teams in county competitions in the North..
At that time chess was booming, and that was evidenced by the Manchester congress where entry numbers had reached circa 500 players.
so, there was scope to make the counties competitions more inclusive, with more teams and players able to participate..
And, as for Manchester now not entering teams because they cant get captains who are prepared to travel to venues more than 1 hours travel time away... this is not very smart... nor true surely. If Manchester reached the National Stages, they would have no choice but to travel for over an hour to play there matches. Would captains suddenly abandon ship at that stage..? surely not... part of the fun of these events is the travel...its part of the days package.. and only happens two or three times for a limited number of teams.
Is it any wonder that Lancs feel able to pouch GMan players almost at will.

As Neil Graham has said, the MCCU run much better organised county events, so Manchester are better staying with them.. in my view. The 1 hour travel time to good neutral venues is a price worth paying. We don't need to join the NCCU.. WE can play NCCU teams at the National stages, which would give us some good local matches in the Finals Stages to look forward to..!!

If Lancs want to show some real initiative to encourage chess, they should substitute the rule that Neil Graham referred to previously in their constitution, which bars entry to GMan, with the following rule....
In the interests of greater chess participation of Northern teams in County competitions, we will allow GMan to join the NCCU if they so wish. I believe that such a ruling would get high levels of support in Northern chess.

Meanwhile, their are things that the NCCU could do to improve their County events.
1st.. Split them into two distinct zones.. EAST and WEST. and maybe let Yorks run teams in both zones...
2nd... The ECF should talk to Unions individually to see if any structural or rule changes can be agreed to improve county competitions..
I`d like to see a reversion back to the previous grading boundaries. ie, U175, U150, U125, etc
BRING BACK THE BCF

Alan Walton
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Location: Oldham

Re: County Championship Finals

Post by Alan Walton » Mon Aug 28, 2017 1:45 pm

David,

After struggling reading you post, here a couple of points

1) Who ever mentioned Manchester not entering a team because they can't get captains; it is more due to the lack of top players willing to put up with the travelling; also travelling to the Midlands counties isn't just for your 1 hour based right in the South of Manchester, a good volume live in the north where it can take an hour just to get to the M6

2) It is expected that travelling will occur in the National Stages, players aren't idiots and will expect do this if you qualify

3) Is the MCCU better organized? The qualifying matches I play in the NCCU are perfectly organized; perhaps there are more participating counties, but that is not organization of matches but internal decisions of counties themselves

4) Finally the quality of the MCCU teams entering has significantly weaken over the years as can be seen teams from the MCCU deciding the Minor Counties root instead, good players don't fancy travelling distances to qualify for the national stages when the standard of opponents has dropped over the years (a few years ago Staffordshire beat Yorkshire in the Quarters of the main event); this year Manchester requested the Open nomination to the national stages from the MCCU since nobody ever takes it up recently, they declined saying we would have to play qualifying matches (qualifying for what?) so we politely declined our participation in the Open event

David Pardoe
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Re: County Championship Finals

Post by David Pardoe » Wed Aug 30, 2017 10:20 pm

Alan,
I`m not sure what problems you had with my post, but I`ll try to deal with any specific points you raise..
Firstly.. lets realise that the County Qualifying competitions are catering for a wide range of teams of every strength group, its not just about the Open competition. I`d urge many counties to look at raising teams in the lower sections.. say U160, U140 or U100

Getting our top brass out to play in these events will always be tricky, not least because they`d probably prefer to be paid, or take a rest day. Players graded over say 220 are very hard to get hold of, and even those graded 200+ are often reluctant, possibly due to lack of prize funds.. I`d urge such players to consider making the occasional appearance.
They really do boost team moral when they turn out... and greatly help the captain. Is the Open section FIDE rated..?

As regards travel times.. I`ll just say that Bradford comes out as 59 mins from Stockport.. whereas Newcastle U Lyne comes at 68 mins from Bolton. And anyone travelling to Bradford on a winters day has the snow, rain, mist and high winds to contend with, as well as a trip through congested Bradford and the joys of the M62 hell road.. So, no fun there really during the winter months. Manchester is only a small county compared to many others... I played for Gloucestershire some years ago and they turned out in spite of travel difficulties, for matches with Devon and Cornwall, etc.. Even Staffordshire is over 40 miles from north to south... which presents captains with team selection difficulties.

I`ll just say that travel is an issue for many counties, as you know. The problem is finding players with cars who are willing/able to take players to the matches.. this saves time and money, if good central pickup points can be found/agreed. Players co-operation here is vital, not least in sharing the travel costs.

The first essential for any captain is a good, accurate and substantive contact list, preferably up-to-date email lists for clubs, officials, and other chess contacts, including local Congress Organisers. We must use our contact lists and email networks more effectively, I think.

Nothing makes things tick better than a good list of volunteers to play these matches. It makes a captains life much easier if players would respond promptly to requests to play. Even if a player can only put in an occasional appearance, that's fine, and can make the difference. Club secretaries and team captains can help by asking their players if they can play for the county teams and advising on availability.
I`d personally urge captains and others to find good match venues, but its not always easy to get places at cheap rates. Maybe in some cases we should look to pay slightly more for extra comforts.
One other point... match venues and dates. Its important to get these right, so I`d urge team captains to make prompt arrangements and convey these in a timely manner to the team players.

Your point about the MCCU rejecting GMans offer to take a place in the OPEN section of the National stages `automatically` sounds fair enough... maybe you should go to the next AGM and appeal for a rule change, or even put in another request.
But qualifying the normal route would be easy too.. just need to play the few fixtures in the qualifier section..
BRING BACK THE BCF

Mick Norris
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Location: Bolton, Greater Manchester

Re: County Championship Finals

Post by Mick Norris » Thu Aug 31, 2017 9:56 am

I understand today is the closing date to enter the MCCU qualifiers; unless someone has come forward in the last couple of days, then G Man can't enter as we don't have anyone who wants to captain any team in the MCCU, which is a big pity especially for what's left of the U160 squad

We did have an U160 captain who said transport was the problem, so we agreed to hire a minibus to use to transport the team to matches in the MCCU; however, there must have been other issues of which we weren't aware

We do have captains for both the Open and U160 team if we were in the NCCU, but we aren't, so that's all theoretical

If there is a spare MCCU place available for the ECF stages at Open level, we would like to take it, but if the MCCU choose not to nominate us, there isn't anything we can do
Any postings on here represent my personal views

David Pardoe
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Location: NORTH WEST

Re: County Championship Finals

Post by David Pardoe » Fri Sep 01, 2017 9:44 pm

We are in..just beat the entry deadline!
Myself and David Kiermen will be running the team.
First match is on Sat, Nov 4th, start at 1pm tbc.. Newcastle Bridge club.
Let us know if you can play... its against Notts...
BRING BACK THE BCF

John Reyes
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Location: Manchester

Re: County Championship Finals

Post by John Reyes » Mon Sep 11, 2017 4:41 pm

Mick Norris wrote:I understand today is the closing date to enter the MCCU qualifiers; unless someone has come forward in the last couple of days, then G Man can't enter as we don't have anyone who wants to captain any team in the MCCU, which is a big pity especially for what's left of the U160 squad

We did have an U160 captain who said transport was the problem, so we agreed to hire a minibus to use to transport the team to matches in the MCCU; however, there must have been other issues of which we weren't aware

We do have captains for both the Open and U160 team if we were in the NCCU, but we aren't, so that's all theoretical

If there is a spare MCCU place available for the ECF stages at Open level, we would like to take it, but if the MCCU choose not to nominate us, there isn't anything we can do

I was thinking of standing as a captain, but the players are not happy going to stoke etc and rather travel to places like Bradford and Heywood so that is that

I'm also at the Lancashire AGM and I will asked the question about this and also put it on my facebook live to listen to their response.
also I will mention the same question at the ECF AGM
Any postings on here represent my personal views only and also Dyslexia as well

David Pardoe
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Location: NORTH WEST

Re: County Championship Finals

Post by David Pardoe » Mon Sep 11, 2017 9:51 pm

John,
This thing you`ve got about only wanting to play Yorks and Lancs at Bradford or Heywood seems a little narrow to me.
Travelling to Newcastle-u-lyne or Holmes Chapel is just as straight forward, I think... and they offer good venues in both sites.
As a point.. I`ve asked Peter Sherlock about GMan entering directly into the OPEN section National Stages, and he is willing to consider it at end of December. His concern is that we actually show up with a full team in the Finals Stages, when we`ll need to travel to places like Leicester and Birmingham to play. Our Open captain should speak to Peter Sherlock nearer the time, and maybe organise a friendly (graded 16) board match v Staffordshire at Holmes Chapel in the meantime. This would show our intent to play and take a wild card entry.
Meanwhile, we are running a County U160 team and our first match is v Notts on Sat Nov 4th and we are keen to hear from players who would like to play.
BRING BACK THE BCF

John Reyes
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Location: Manchester

Re: County Championship Finals

Post by John Reyes » Tue Sep 12, 2017 11:53 am

David Pardoe wrote:John,
This thing you`ve got about only wanting to play Yorks and Lancs at Bradford or Heywood seems a little narrow to me.
Travelling to Newcastle-u-lyne or Holmes Chapel is just as straight forward, I think... and they offer good venues in both sites.
As a point.. I`ve asked Peter Sherlock about GMan entering directly into the OPEN section National Stages, and he is willing to consider it at end of December. His concern is that we actually show up with a full team in the Finals Stages, when we`ll need to travel to places like Leicester and Birmingham to play. Our Open captain should speak to Peter Sherlock nearer the time, and maybe organise a friendly (graded 16) board match v Staffordshire at Holmes Chapel in the meantime. This would show our intent to play and take a wild card entry.
Meanwhile, we are running a County U160 team and our first match is v Notts on Sat Nov 4th and we are keen to hear from players who would like to play.
We would be able to get a full team for the National Stages, if the MCCU would be happy to put us forward!

with Friendly matches, it just trying to find a date and venue etc!
we just had one with Liverpool and that went down very well and we have been invited back next year, but we need to sorted a venue and date in 2018
Any postings on here represent my personal views only and also Dyslexia as well

Mick Norris
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Joined: Tue Apr 17, 2007 10:12 am
Location: Bolton, Greater Manchester

Re: County Championship Finals

Post by Mick Norris » Tue Sep 12, 2017 2:08 pm

Staffordshire don't have an Open captain which scuppered chance of a friendly a couple of years ago
Any postings on here represent my personal views

David Pardoe
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Joined: Mon Apr 16, 2007 11:29 pm
Location: NORTH WEST

Re: County Championship Finals

Post by David Pardoe » Tue Sep 12, 2017 8:14 pm

It might be worth contacting Ray Dolan to see if he could sort something.
It would certainly be good if Alan Walton had some kind of challenge match prior to seeking the nomination for the vacant OPEN team place in the National stages in December. I can see no good reason to leave the OPEN place unfilled if a valid wild card option is available. GMan fills that slot nicely if Alan can get a team together to play in the Finals stages.
BRING BACK THE BCF

John Reyes
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Joined: Sun Aug 30, 2009 10:51 pm
Location: Manchester

Re: County Championship Finals

Post by John Reyes » Wed Sep 13, 2017 10:06 am

David Pardoe wrote:It might be worth contacting Ray Dolan to see if he could sort something.
It would certainly be good if Alan Walton had some kind of challenge match prior to seeking the nomination for the vacant OPEN team place in the National stages in December. I can see no good reason to leave the OPEN place unfilled if a valid wild card option is available. GMan fills that slot nicely if Alan can get a team together to play in the Finals stages.
it all about looking at date etc as November we have

Bolton RP 5/11/17
4NCL 11-12/11/17
British Rapidplay 18-19/11/17
Preston 24-26/11/17
20-20 chess 2/12/17
Any postings on here represent my personal views only and also Dyslexia as well

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