European Team Chs in Warsaw

[LawrenceCooper]

Round 8 results:

Br. 5 ENGLAND Elo - 7 HUNGARY Elo 2 : 2
5.1 GM ADAMS, Michael 2752 - GM ERDOS, Viktor 2658 1 - 0
5.2 GM SHORT, Nigel D 2680 - GM BALOGH, Csaba 2630 ½ - ½
5.3 GM JONES, Gawain C B 2648 - GM ALMASI, Zoltan 2710 0 - 1
5.4 GM HOWELL, David W L 2644 - GM POLGAR, Judit 2689 ½ - ½

Br. 23 England Elo - 17 Azerbaijan Elo 1½:2½
11.1 WFM Chevannes, Sabrina L 2200 - WGM Mammadova, Gulnar 2354 0 - 1
11.2 WGM Corke, Anya S 2276 - WGM Mamedjarova, Zeinab 2236 1 - 0
11.3 WFM Grigoryan, Meri 2039 - WIM Abdulla, Khayala 2255 0 - 1
11.4 WFM Bhatia, Kanwal K 2039 - WGM Mamedjarova, Turkan 2250 ½ - ½

[LawrenceCooper]

Round 9 pairings:

Br. 5 ENGLAND Elo - 12 POLAND Elo 0 : 0
6.1 GM ADAMS, Michael 2752 - GM SOCKO, Bartosz 2661
6.2 GM MCSHANE, Luke J 2696 - GM SWIERCZ, Dariusz 2627
6.3 GM SHORT, Nigel D 2680 - GM GAJEWSKI, Grzegorz 2634
6.4 GM HOWELL, David W L 2644 - GM BARTEL, Mateusz 2626

Br. 32 Iceland Elo - 23 England Elo 0 : 0
15.1 WGM Ptacnikova, Lenka 2238 - WFM Chevannes, Sabrina L 2200
15.2 Thorsteinsdottir, Hallgerdur 1951 - WGM Corke, Anya S 2276
15.3 Finnbogadottir, Tinna Kristin 1882 - WFM Grigoryan, Meri 2039
15.4 Kristinardottir, Elsa Maria 1819 - WFM Bhatia, Kanwal K 2039

[John Moore]

I rather wonder what the rest of the team think about the performance of our board 4 today - a hugely talented player who, not for the first time, turned a fairly level position into a loss by getting into ridiculous time pressure.

[Andrew Stone]

http://en.chessbase.com/post/etcc-08-me ... d-tomorrow
Very unfair article in chessbase. Has a photo of Kanwal Bhatia, the women's board 4. It says "Kanwal Bhatia's below 2000 performance has certainly not helped". Now to the casual reader this would appear like she had had a shocker. Not sure what the rating she was on after round 8 when the article was published, but it must have been within 100 points of her rating and I'm expect 50 or so players were underperforming more. Anyway well done for winning today Kanwal (to make it 3 wins in the last 4)! Perhaps chessbase might like to mention it in their final report.

[Ian Kingston]

Judging from the team statistics on the tournament web site, Kanwal Bahtia actually performed better than the rest of the team, losing just 5 rating points. Frankly, given the fuss about whether or not to send a team in the first place, and the fact that the team had no coach, I'd prefer to congratulate the players for (a) being prepared to represent their country under such difficult circumstances and (b) recovering so well after such a horrible start.

[Andrew Stone]

I rather wonder what the rest of the team think about the performance of our board 4 today - a hugely talented player who, not for the first time, turned a fairly level position into a loss by getting into ridiculous time pressure.

How is it possible to get into ridiculous time pressure when you get an extra 30 seconds a move? Now I know this is subjective, but surely for someone like David Howell, this is fairly normal. He got his rating to this level playing like this anyway. I suspect he was in the same sort of time pressure yesterday when he drew with Judit Polgar?

[LawrenceCooper]

Judging from the team statistics on the tournament web site, Kanwal Bahtia actually performed better than the rest of the team, losing just 5 rating points. Frankly, given the fuss about whether or not to send a team in the first place, and the fact that the team had no coach, I'd prefer to congratulate the players for (a) being prepared to represent their country under such difficult circumstances and (b) recovering so well after such a horrible start.

I agree completely, it shows amazing character for the team to bounce back from their 0-16 start. Kanwal was also captaining the team so was burdened with extra admin. I never thought I'd see the day when an England team had no non-playing captain, no coach and no spare player for any round. I was especially pleased for Sabrina to contribute to the winning result today, it showed great commitment on her part to fly out for the first three rounds, fly home to work and then fly back out for the last three rounds and to keep fighting after such a tough time on top board. The whole team deserve enormous credit and so does Jovanka for fighting their cause and helping to ensure that the team was even sent.

[Mick Norris]

Judging from the team statistics on the tournament web site, Kanwal Bahtia actually performed better than the rest of the team, losing just 5 rating points. Frankly, given the fuss about whether or not to send a team in the first place, and the fact that the team had no coach, I'd prefer to congratulate the players for (a) being prepared to represent their country under such difficult circumstances and (b) recovering so well after such a horrible start.

Absolutely

[Mick Norris]

How is it possible to get into ridiculous time pressure when you get an extra 30 seconds a move?

First time playing the new time control in 4NCL today, and 2 of the 6 boards were lost on time before the first time control - I have sympathy with the players, playing for your country is fantastic pressure compared to our Manticores 2 v Cheddleton 3 match in Div 3 N

[Andrew Stone]

How is it possible to get into ridiculous time pressure when you get an extra 30 seconds a move?

First time playing the new time control in 4NCL today, and 2 of the 6 boards were lost on time before the first time control - I have sympathy with the players, playing for your country is fantastic pressure compared to our Manticores 2 v Cheddleton 3 match in Div 3 N

Mick I think you misunderstand. I wasn't saying David was in ridiculous time pressure. To me something like 10 moves in 1 minute is ridiuculous time pressure- playing on increment is tough (I know- I had to play about 40 moves against Rozentalis on it) but it is not as bad.

[Chris Rice]

So do the ECF do a lessons learned exercise? I read over both the threads concerning this tournament and it was quite clear that the focus of attention was on the Open team rather than the Women's team. With no coach being affordable for the women's team it seemed that they weren't going to enter a team at all but presumably a last minute flurry of donations meant that they could fly Ryan Air and get a Skype coach. The Open team were being hyped for a possible medal chance. So how did we fare?

On the bare bones of it the Open Team were seeded 5th, finished 10th. Women's team, seeded 23rd finished 23rd. Epic fail for the ECF strategy then? Well maybe not when you get a bit more granular:

The Open teams individuals results are here http://chess-results.com/tnr115919.aspx ... =30&wi=821 and we can immediately see that Adams, Short and Jones all gained points. Only McShane (has to be lack of match practice) and Howell (usual chronic time handling it seems) lost points but even then not too many. So 10th place and these results not a bad effort at all one thinks and the ECF has every right to feel satisfied.

Then you turn to the women's results and a different story unfolds altogether http://chess-results.com/tnr115919.aspx ... =30&wi=821 I don't know how you can describe it as other than a complete disaster as they all lost points. What went so wrong? The first few rounds were a nightmare for them and it's in a situation like this that a dedicated coach would have helped bring the team together. Without one it took till the middle rounds before the team established any kind of foot hold in the tournament. I understand money was short but it appeared that when the 'appeal' went out on these threads and it became known how dire the situation was that donations did materialise. Perhaps if this was done at an earlier stage next time a coach could be found? As it was Sabrina was on Facebook for the last couple of nights wanting to give up chess altogether and this was avoidable. Also avoidable was that rubbish regarding Kanwal on the ChessBase article Andrew Stone refers to. It woudn't cost the ECF any money to send a stinging email to ChessBase reminding them that Kanwal did get 4/9 and certainly did no worse than anyone else!

[Alan Walton]

We all have to agree that sending a coach and possibly a reserve player would have been a great benefit to the women's team

But we could also say all these players have performed significantly better than this numerous times in tournaments where the have been in the same situation (e.g. normal FIDE congresses)

So perhaps with all the off field problems has affected the concentration/mind-set of the players going into the tournament, and with hindsight maybe going with this late notice not the best idea

I think in the future the ECF should guarantee at least the minimum offer : entry costs, accommodation and flights (from England), (coach and reserve are bonuses). Also picking the team well in advance say two/three months, as most players are amateurs and giving them plenty of notice to take time off work

[Paul McKeown]

Also avoidable was that rubbish regarding Kanwal on the ChessBase article Andrew Stone refers to. It woudn't cost the ECF any money to send a stinging email to ChessBase reminding them that Kanwal did get 4/9 and certainly did no worse than anyone else!

Seconded.

[Michael Flatt]

As already pointed out above, the Women's Team were fighting against the odds as a result of poor decision making and uncertainty as to whether to send a team or not.

Surely, the ECF needs to ensure that the Women's team is better prepared and supported if they are to compete in International events such as this.

Difficulties in funding need to be raised much earlier and allow time for fund raising and sponsorship.

How can the situation be improved ahead of the next event?

[Stewart Reuben]

Michael Flatt >How can the situation be improved ahead of the next event?<

The next event of this nature is the Olympiad in Tromso in August. That is always cheaper as the hosts provide free accommodation and food. One year when International Director I had great problems financially for the European Team Championship and we sent a relatively weak open team.

The problem is that the ECF does not have adequate funds. Thus they are unable to guarantee that the money will be there and have to rely on sponsorship and philanthropy. Even when we won the silver medals in the Olympiad or Gold in the European Team this did not attract much media attention. If we attracted a business sponsor - and they are enormously difficult to find now - it would be difficult to justify their financial outlay in terms of what they would get in return.
Philanthropy is always fickle. But I do note the Australians have a virtually perpetual call for support.

If the ECF members want our teams to perform optimally, the solution is for them to pay for the privilege.