World Cities Team Chess

[Sean Hewitt]

The ECF have been asked, and I have agreed, to enter a team in the above event taking place 21-29 December 2012 in Al Ain, United Arab Emirates.

The 'London' team is

Nigel Short
David Howell
Stephen Gordon
Simon Williams

The team has been assembled at no cost to the ECF.

[Leonard Barden]

The ECF have been asked, and I have agreed, to enter a team in the above event taking place 21-29 December 2012 in Al Ain, United Arab Emirates.

The 'London' team is

Nigel Short
David Howell
Stephen Gordon
Simon Williams

The team has been assembled at no cost to the ECF.

Howell and Williams are listed entrants for the Hastings Masters starting 28 December.....

[Roger de Coverly]

Howell and Williams are listed entrants for the Hastings Masters starting 28 December.....

The team championship is being run on the same lines as the football world cup, so there would remain the "early plane".

It would be up to the Hastings organisers as to whether to permit participation with byes in first two rounds, and the players whether they were prepared to play on that basis.

from http://www.fide.com/images/stories/NEWS ... p_2012.pdf

Dec 21 arrival, team captains’ meeting and opening ceremony
Dec 22 RR1
Dec 23 RR2
Dec 24 RR3
Dec 25 Round of 16
Dec 26 Quarterfinals
Dec 27 Semifinals
Dec 28 Finals and closing ceremony
Dec 29 Departure

[Jonathan Rogers]

'London' indeed - only one of them, so far as I know, either lives in London or plays regularly for a London League team!

[Clive Blackburn]

I daresay most of the other world cities will be equally liberal with their interpretation of the rules

[David Sedgwick]

I daresay most of the other world cities will be equally liberal with their interpretation of the rules

I don't think it's even a question of being liberal. The Regulations, at the link given by Roger above, state:

"Qualified National Federations are eligible to play with their national team members representing a city."

When I heard that we'd been invited to this event, after narrowly missing automatic qualification, my initial thought was that financial considerations would preclude us accepting, at any rate with a representative team.

Congratulations to Sean on proving me wrong.

[Jonathan Rogers]

David's post prompts the question as to what exactly the point of this competition is - and I am sure that most of us have not heard of it before. If the rules say that any national team members can play for a city, regardless of any affiliation with a city, then how is it different from an international team event for countries? It looks like another type of world team event, with the difference that it is a KO and that England is invited!

(Of course it is still an opportunity for strong players to make money and should be welcomed. But since the ECF chooses the players, it reminds us again of the desirability of actually appointing a international director, who can then appoint a selection panel).

[Andrew Martin]

The team should be called ' England'. To say that it is 'London' is a clear misrepresentation.

[Clive Blackburn]

The team should be called ' England'. To say that it is 'London' is a clear misrepresentation.

Yes but it is a competition for cities, so I don't think that 'England' would meet the requirements.

[Andrew Martin]

What has this team got to do with 'London' ?

[Christopher Kreuzer]

What has this team got to do with 'London' ?

Nothing, but it is quite common for this to happen. They could have named the team after another city, just any city that happens to be in England.

There were two earlier version of this:

http://www.olimpbase.org/index.html?htt ... story.html

1997 in Jakarta, Indonesia, and in 1999 (article doesn't say where).

[Christopher Kreuzer]

When I heard that we'd been invited to this event, after narrowly missing automatic qualification [...]

From here:

http://www.chess.com/news/fide-announce ... ships-9644

Those appear to be the qualifiers. How narrowly did we miss automatic qualification? I can't make sense of those qualifiers. Did England just miss out on "25 top zonal teams from the Istanbul Olympiad"?

[Paul Dargan]

They've held similar Cities events in Al Ain for the last few years. There's a couple of nice hotels there and the club house in a large villa. Like Abu Dhabi Chess Club they have ambitious plans for a new venue - but I'm a few months out of date on how that's progressing.

Nice bunch, well organised events there normally and a nice city to spend some time in, very different from Dubai! much quieter pace of life, more moderate climate and cultural sites/forts, date groves and Jebel Hafeet to visit.

If the team want sightseeing recommendations, etc. happy to provide.


Paul Dargan

[David Sedgwick]

When I heard that we'd been invited to this event, after narrowly missing automatic qualification [...]

From here:

http://www.chess.com/news/fide-announce ... ships-9644

Those appear to be the qualifiers. How narrowly did we miss automatic qualification? I can't make sense of those qualifiers. Did England just miss out on "25 top zonal teams from the Istanbul Olympiad"?

England are in Zone 1.1 - see Number 8 in the link you posted.

Of the countries in that Zone, England were the third highest placed in Istanbul, after Netherlands and Italy.

[Jonathan Rogers]

This has now started, in case anyone is bothered. (Chessbase isn't, at least not yet). England's game from the first round can be seen here

http://worldcitieschess.com/live-games/

Unfortunately, it was something of a debacle, though I daresay we will still qualify for the next stages, since the other two teams in our group (which includes the hosts) are very weak indeed, and two teams from each group qualify. I admit to being a bit hazy about how it all works, since there are six groups and I don't know what they will do with 12 teams in a knockout format.

Yang-Fan seems to have taken Stephen's place, which does at least augment the "London" credentials of the team.