League Rules regarding Board order by ECF rating

[Alex Holowczak]

Just last night, I was in a League game where the opposition board 1 was graded 119, and the board 2 was ungraded. The board 2 did, however, have a grade of 128 in 2006! They seemingly concluded that since he had been out of the game for about 3 years, his play would have fallen below the standard of 119. This overlooks that the grading system had changed since 2006, and using the '0.81 x Old Grade + 43' formula on the ECF website, his grade would actually be 146 (rounded down).

Assuming the law of "don't put down to malice what you can put down to stupidity", I think this was just a case of ignorance on the part of the club, rather than actually trying to fiddle the board order.

[Anthony Taglione]

Actually the idea that club officers are competent to establish playing strength is in my experience a fallacy. I know several officers who can barely provide accurate match results, or correctly spell their players names, let alone establish whether the player might have had a past rating. In one case this year the full name of a player was established by the opposing side, and I did a bit of searching around on the web to find a USCF grade, way in excess of what his club had estimated his strength to be.

This also ties in with my position and with Simon Brown's. I remember having a grade of between 190 and 200 a couple of years before I quit playing and someone fishing back might well find a grade for me somewhere between 200 and 220. If anyone were to pair me against a current 200+ player, it'd be a waste of my evening and his, or hers.

There really should be an expiry date on gradings or some kind of decay factor built into them to account for years of zero entries. In the example you give, I'd have more faith in the captain's estimate than in a past grade.

[Ian Thompson]

Actually the idea that club officers are competent to establish playing strength is in my experience a fallacy. I know several officers who can barely provide accurate match results, or correctly spell their players names, let alone establish whether the player might have had a past rating.

... and I, as a league grader responsible for estimating the grades of ungraded players playing in the league, have seen several examples of team captains not knowing that their new players have current grades.

[Roger de Coverly]

There really should be an expiry date on gradings or some kind of decay factor built into them to account for years of zero entries

International (FIDE) Elo ratings are for life - so once rated always rated. Any ECF(BCF) grade of more than three years old would be ignored for new grading calculations but such a player would still need rulings to establish eligibility or otherwise for board orders and rating restricted events.

For a national rating system, I don't think that automatically deducting points for "inactivity" is particularly sensible since a "missing" player might have been playing abroad or just playing blitz or postal.

[Anthony Taglione]

International (FIDE) Elo ratings are for life - so once rated always rated. Any ECF(BCF) grade of more than three years old would be ignored for new grading calculations but such a player would still need rulings to establish eligibility or otherwise for board orders and rating restricted events.

For a national rating system, I don't think that automatically deducting points for "inactivity" is particularly sensible since a "missing" player might have been playing abroad or just playing blitz or postal.

Yes, Elo ratings are for life and, as noted by Simon Brown, this is not ideal in the case of someone who has taken a significant layoff from playing.

As for someone playing competitively abroad, presumably he'd have a rating there to display his current strength from some suitable conversion rate.

As for someone spending decades either not playing or playing postal or blitz, surely you can accept that, after some time, his old grading bears little relevance to his actual competition playing strength. His grading will, however, be brought up as though it were indicative of his current ability and then rules will dictate from that how his captain must make use of him within the team, leaving him placed wholly inappropriately to his current skill.

[Roger de Coverly]

Just last night, I was in a League game where the opposition board 1 was graded 119, and the board 2 was ungraded. The board 2 did, however, have a grade of 128 in 2006! They seemingly concluded that since he had been out of the game for about 3 years, his play would have fallen below the standard of 119. This overlooks that the grading system had changed since 2006, and using the '0.81 x Old Grade + 43' formula on the ECF website, his grade would actually be 146 (rounded down).

Assuming the law of "don't put down to malice what you can put down to stupidity", I think this was just a case of ignorance on the part of the club, rather than actually trying to fiddle the board order.

In the past, it used to be a part of the prize for some club and county championships that the winner had the right to play on board one. There's still some residual prestige to playing on top board so a club or match captain might be unwilling to evict an established player in favour of an ungraded newcomer no matter what the newcomer might have been graded in the past.

[Roger de Coverly]

surely you can accept that, after some time, his old grading bears little relevance to his actual competition playing strength. His grading will, however, be brought up as though it were indicative of his current ability and then rules will dictate from that how his captain must make use of him within the team, leaving him placed wholly inappropriately to his current skill.

I think it would be unlikely that a player of a 200 grade 20 years ago would be accepted in an under 150 tournament or as under 150 in a board order until they had scored 1/5 in an open or two against 175 fields. It would though be up to the tournament organiser or league controller to rule on an initial estimate for eligibility purposes.

[Anthony Taglione]

Well, it was closer to 30 years for me but thanks for your insight on that. It would be irritating to have to enter a tournament or two just to get chopped up by 175s merely to demonstrate that I'm no longer a 200.

I can see the logic in there being no "fresh start" option, however. Maybe much of it will come back quite quickly.

[John Philpott]

There has been some criticism of League rules on this thread for being vague or unduly tolerant, but it should be pointed out that the phrase "in order of current playing strength" features in the rules both of the County Championship and of the National Club Championship. Indeed the former also include the explicit statement in C3

ECF grades shall not be taken as indicating the order of current playing strength.

As a match captain I strongly approve of this state of affairs for as long as standardplay grades are only published once a year. If the County Championship rules required strict grading order to be used, board order in the finals to be held in July 2010 would be determined by results in 2008/9 which were more that a year old come finals day.

My own normal practice as a captain has been to adhere to published grades for the first couple of matches, and then apply an increasing amount of judgement as the season progresses. If I am exercising judgement, I am exercising judgment, and I would not welcome a mathematical limit telling me how much leeway I had. The most extreme adjustments that I can remember making for the Essex U175s were to play a 161, rebounding after a bad season, above a 173 who was struggling (the next season their grades were 173 and 154 respectively) respectively, and to play a very promisining junior graded 151 above a 165. The junior's rate of improvement made him ineligible for the team the following season and he is now an IM.

That team, now the Essex U180s, is not enjoying a particularly successful season, and one of the factors may well be that I have kept the board order based on published grades for four matches rather than two. I will probably apply a greater degree of judgement in fixing the board order for our match against Middlesex tomorrow.

[Trevor Davies]

The most extreme adjustments that I can remember making for the Essex U175s were to play a 161, rebounding after a bad season, above a 173 who was struggling (the next season their grades were 173 and 154 respectively) respectively, and to play a very promisining junior graded 151 above a 165. The junior's rate of improvement made him ineligible for the team the following season and he is now an IM. .

Thus, for the established adults, their ECF grades varied over one season by 12 and 19. Fluctuations in established player's grades (usually) has nothing to do with changes in playing strength (in other words, there isn't any change in playing strength). It's just a consequence of the statistics.

The question then becomes "what change of grade is "statistically significant" ?" Not less than 10 points, for sure. Here's a thought - stop publishing ECF grades to the nearest integer. Problem solved.

Meanwhile, I'm all in favour of captains applying their discretion (provided that they are happy to justify their judgements)

[Tim Spanton]

When I played in the Doncaster League, one of the teams always began the season in strict grading order but from then on everything was determined by match results, eg if board two won while board one only drew, then in the next match board two would be promoted to board one. There was some grumbling from other teams but this tended to be muted as the captain in question applied his formula strictly and without exception.

[Simon Brown]

John, I think this concept of "current playing strength" is difficult. If I could start a game today in an equal middle game, against anyone less than 2200, I would expect to win. If I start a game from move 1 against someone well-prepared, I would expect to lose as I haven't looked at openings for about 20 years, and apparently it isn't difficult to study openings these days and things have moved on a little......

So I would estimate my strength as about 1800 up to move 20, and 2300+ thereafter. What board do I play?

Simon

[Anthony Taglione]

Lol, I was having similar thoughts earlier today.

[andrew martin]

Boys, you have to take emergency action. If you can bring yourself to do it, you have to have an opening rep something like this:


White 1 f4 or 1 b3 or some QP stuff such as Torre,London,Colle ( although even these are well-known now and really quite dull)

Black 1 e4 d5 2 exd5 Qxd5 and aim for a pawn structure with...c6,...e6

1 d4/Nf3/c4 Slav-based set up against anything. Sister pawn structure rep, cuts down on time.


If the ageing talents can stay awake using this stuff they might yet beat the theory and computer boom.

[Richard Bates]

John, I think this concept of "current playing strength" is difficult. If I could start a game today in an equal middle game, against anyone less than 2200, I would expect to win. If I start a game from move 1 against someone well-prepared, I would expect to lose as I haven't looked at openings for about 20 years, and apparently it isn't difficult to study openings these days and things have moved on a little......

So I would estimate my strength as about 1800 up to move 20, and 2300+ thereafter. What board do I play?

Simon

I think you significantly overestimate the extent of any loss in strength due to out-of-date opening knowledge. Very few people at the sort of standard you are referring to can really be considered "well-prepared". Obviously if they knew in advance that they were playing you, knew what you would play, and you used to play openings that have now been refuted then it might be different but that scenario, especially in league chess, would be somewhat unlikely. And something that could be avoided with a very small amount of pre-game research on your part.

I would suggest that any disadvantage would be more likely to come from the loss of time that unfamiliarity with opening knowledge brings, rather than a significant dimunition in strength.

It is also often the case that players returning to the game after a long time can potentially have an advantage in the opening. Not all openings disappear from common practice directly because of theoretical developments. Many simply fall out of fashion leaving the knowledge with those who either refuse to follow fashion or who are "frozen in time" when they stop playing!

I would say that the bulk of my opening repertoire is backed up by theoretical knowledge that is 12-15 years old but i seem to survive OK.