Does your League still have adjournments?

[David Sedgwick]

Representatives from the Surrey League ...... make your case for retention!

In the Surrey Main League, all three possibilities (Adjournment, Adjudication and Quickplay Finish) are permitted. At the start of the game the away player offers the home player the choice of at least two of the three options and the home player selects one of the choices offered. In this way nobody can be forced to conclude the game by a particular method which he or she really dislikes; everyone gets at least his or her second choice.

This is not true I dislike both adjudications and adjournments - I will never again pick or offer adjudication, and dislike adjournments as it means you may be forced to travel long distances after work just to play a few moves where your opponent has probably studied the position on a computer. In one game this year I was put under pressure to resign a "lost" position to avoid my opponent having to travel a large distance. In the end I went back to their club a second time (a round journey of about two hours after work - as the club although in the Surrey league was not in Surrey) as it did seem slightly unfair to make the opponent travel to finish in a position where I would have resigned had the outcome of the match not depended on it. In the end I drew but was left with a dislike of adjournments.

I'm sorry, but I can't see anything which is "not true" in the remarks of my which you quote.

If you have an antipathy to one of the three methods, you can avoid it. I accept that that doesn't help you, as you have an antipathy to two of the three methods.

I don't think that you should have had any compunction about asking your opponent to travel to your club to play the adjournment session. If he wasn't prepared to make the journey, he shouldn't have offered Adjournment in the first place. He would then have offered Adjudication and Quickplay Finish, you would have selected the latter, and everyone would have been tolerably happy.

[Alex Holowczak]

I am going to amend a proposal such that the Surrey League system is trialled in some of the Birmingham League's less-important competitions this season.

The Birmingham League says that an adjourned session is played at a home club's venue. So if you can't travel, don't offer adjournment. Sorted.

[David Shepherd]

[quote="David Sedgwick
In this way nobody can be forced to conclude the game by a particular method which he or she really dislikes.
[/quote]

This was the bit I was specifically disagreeing with - I dislike adjudication (I want to finish my own games) and adjournment (I do not have the time).

[John Saunders]

Why do we still have adjudications? I cannot see any reason for not obliging players to play a game to a conclusion. Some have suggested that adjudicated games should not be graded, and I'm sympathetic to that view.

Adjournments are a different matter. I would never play in any league or tournament that featured adjournments, and I would never vote to keep them given a choice.

I support the view that Leagues and tournaments have the right to choose the format of their own competitions, within obvious parameters.

The ECF has no plans to refuse to grade adjourned games, and I would not support such a proposal as I consider it unworkable and unfair.

Adam

First you suggest that you are sympathetic to the view that adjudicated games should not be graded, and then in the next breath say that you support leagues having the right to choose their own format. So leagues can do what they like but the ECF won't grade the games - is that what you are saying? Not much use having a choice of format if the ECF turns around and says it won't grade the games.

It doesn't bother me particularly that other people put such views forward but presumably you represent the ECF here. Or do you? Have your views any official standing or are you just voicing personal views? You also say you wouldn't play adjournments - does that mean you have given up playing in the LL?

Plenty of arguments have been put forward here over the last couple of years on all sides of these arguments and I haven't read anything particularly original on the subject in recent weeks or months. It's all become rather tedious, with the same old stuff by the same old people with their various prejudices and misconceptions. But I do think the ECF should think long and hard before it takes any irrevocable action against the grading of adjudicated games. It would annoy quite a few people around the country. Listening to the views of a small sample of people on the forum doesn't amount to a consultation exercise. Probably best left alone.

Personally I don't like adjudication but I can understand why some leagues use them. But I do like adjournments. There can be valid practical arguments against them in some circumstances and I'm sympathetic to those but other arguments against them are entirely spurious - they are sometimes voiced by weak players and/or barrack-room lawyers who don't seem to realise that they are depriving themselves of an invaluable chess experience which QPF simply cannot deliver.

[David Shepherd]

I agree with John - I also like adjournments in some cases, certainly I think within a club they give you an opportunity to study position, play a slow game and improve endgame technique. One can argue that it is grading a game where a player can consult a book or computer in the middle of the game, and so it is not a measure of their playing strength, but in my experience within a few moves it is often the case that the position changes significantly and it is back to the head to head competition, or else one player resigns without playing on as they have found the position to be lost.

What I do not like is being faced with the choice of adjournment and adjudication in an evening match where to adjourn may mean I have to travel to a club miles away just to finish (but I have no choice as I will never accept adjudication again).

I can also see very slight merit in the arguement for not grading a game where a player does not have the choice to finish in one session, but where the players both having free choice choose to adjourn I see little problem in grading the result which may well give a better measure of ability than in some random finish during a quickplay ending.

[David Sedgwick]

But I do think the ECF should think long and hard before it takes any irrevocable action against the grading of adjudicated games. It would annoy quite a few people around the country. Listening to the views of a small sample of people on the forum doesn't amount to a consultation exercise. Probably best left alone.

As I said up thread, a proposal not to grade adjudicated games was heavily defeated when it was put to Council in 2007.

I see no reason to think that the result would be any different now.

[Adam Raoof]

Adam = First you suggest that you are sympathetic to the view that adjudicated games should not be graded, and then in the next breath say that you support leagues having the right to choose their own format. So leagues can do what they like but the ECF won't grade the games - is that what you are saying?

No.

Not much use having a choice of format if the ECF turns around and says it won't grade the games.

It won't.

It doesn't bother me particularly that other people put such views forward but presumably you represent the ECF here. Or do you?

No.

Have your views any official standing [...]

No.

[...]or are you just voicing personal views?

Yes.

You also say you wouldn't play adjournments - does that mean you have given up playing in the LL?

Yes.

Plenty of arguments have been put forward here over the last couple of years on all sides of these arguments and I haven't read anything particularly original on the subject in recent weeks or months. It's all become rather tedious, with the same old stuff by the same old people with their various prejudices and misconceptions. But I do think the ECF should think long and hard before it takes any irrevocable action against the grading of adjudicated games. It would annoy quite a few people around the country. Listening to the views of a small sample of people on the forum doesn't amount to a consultation exercise. Probably best left alone.

Yes.

[John Saunders]

Not much use having a choice of format if the ECF turns around and says it won't grade the games.

It won't.

So you are saying that the ECF won't be putting forward any proposal to outlaw the grading of adjudications. That is very clear, thank you.

[William Metcalfe]

Both leagues that i play in have QP finishes so you can add Durham and Cleveland leagues to your QP finish list Alec.
I could just imagine my players reaction after travelling from Darlington to Whitby if they were told if the game is not finished on move 36 you have to make this 120 mile round trip again another evening there would be a riot.

[IM Jack Rudd]

Similarly the Devon League: Barnstaple to Newton Abbot is another journey that would cause such responses.

[Richard Bates]

A 120 mile round trip! - it just shows what a different world it is in London! I think you would have to get through 3 or 4 adjournment sessions here before you could reach comparable levels of inconvenience.

[Alex Holowczak]

Both leagues that i play in have QP finishes so you can add Durham and Cleveland leagues to your QP finish list Alec.

Thanks Wilf.

The Birmingham League has two lengthy trips:

Tamworth to Stourbridge is an 80-mile round trip. This game was scheduled last season, and Tamworth (the away team) defaulted the match.
Lichfield to Redditch is a 75-mile round trip if you don't mind using the M6 Toll. Other options are a 100-mile round trip on the M5, or a 70-mile round trip if you go on the A38 - straight through the heart of Birmingham, so it actually takes much longer to get there.

Both of these matches will occur again in Division Three this season.

Stourbridge is the only one of these four clubs which choose adjournments. I believe they will travel to Tamworth this season (given Tamworth had to come to them last season). It'll be interesting to see if Tamworth v Stourbridge goes ahead. I have my doubts.

[Sean Hewitt]

Longest league round trip in an evening could become a whole new thread!

[Ian Thompson]

Longest league round trip in an evening could become a whole new thread!

... or greatest time spent travelling to an adjournment divided by number of moves played (30 minutes for me - 2 hours of travelling for a game that lasted a further 4 moves). Attempts to beat this by dividing by 0 moves don't count!

[Paul Bielby]

Add the Northumberland League to those that have neither adjournments nor adjudications. Alnwick Chess Club is some 40 miles North from the Tyneside area where most of the other clubs are situated. However there is a League arrangement that ALL Alnwick matches, both home and away, are played at Morpeth (20 miles North of Newcastle; 20 miles South of Alnwick). This has proved eminently satisfactory for at least the last 35 years to my knowledge. Perhaps other clubs or leagues could adapt this system?