Northern League Jamboree

[Kevin Williamson]

You could play one game against each other team (effectively a five board match) and give a half point bye to each board six to balance the game points for when the leagues are merged.

However this would mean that six players are deprived of a game of chess and some people could play the same opponent on Saturday and Sunday.

If playing over six boards with six teams I don’t see a better way than what’s planned.

[Alex Holowczak]

I'm interested in hearing other opinions about whether this is fair or not.

Your team has the right of appeal to the Appeals' Committee, if it so desires.

[Mike Truran]

Bob

Here's the relevant rule:

12.3 An appeal against an arbiter’s decision must be made to the Chief Arbiter (or another on site Senior Arbiter if the Chief Arbiter himself made the decision). If permitted by the rules, a review of the outcome of the appeal may be made to an appeals committee (consisting of a third party arbiter and two independent captains/players chosen from a panel) on payment of a £50 deposit. The decision of the appeals committee will be final. The £50 deposit will be returned if the appeals committee finds in favour of the party requesting the review. Any review request accompanied by a £50 deposit must be made to the Management Board within seven days of the weekend in question.

We've not had an appeal to the Appeals Committee before, so that would be quite exciting. On the other hand, a discussion with Dave Welch/Dave Thomas/Neville Belinfante by phone or email would probably be an altogether easier way of going about it.

[Alex McFarlane]

Last year's jamboree round was simpler in that you could avoid the team from the round before and play all the others as it was round 8 in an 8 team section. I assume that it was considered that teams would not want to play the same opponent the following day (possibly with the same colour). For this reason that was avoided.

The colours do not alternate but do balance. With the exception of one game this gives games between teams the opposite colour to that played previously should they have the same team lists.

There is no totally satisfactory solution in my opinion.

[Alex Holowczak]

I spoke to Daves Thomas and Welch earlier, and got much the same reply as what Alex posted above. I'm sure that if you're starting from the position whereby the teams shouldn't play the team they played the day before, then this is the best solution. However, having thought about it for a few hours and looked at the pairings, I think the cure is worse than the disease.

[Mick Norris]

Bob

I have been too busy to study this (house hunting, illness, bring abused by chess players etc), but had noticed what you say

It does seem unfair to both our teams, as we avoid any games against each other on Sunday, and are thus deprived of a game against, on paper, the worst other team

However, I wouldn't want to play the same person 2 days running, last year playing the same person twice in a season was bad enough

No easy answers

[Mick Norris]

Bob

You were right, those pairings were rubbish