League Rules regarding Board order by ECF rating

[Tryfon Gavriel]

Hi all

I recently had a match in the Middlesex league where my opponent although a promising junior was officially rated 151 ECF. He was put above Tasker who is 186 ECF and also a couple of other 160ish players.

Do you think this is acceptable, if a junior has had good recent results, or should board orders in League matches generally be in established ECF grade order?!

Here were the match pairings for Muswell Hill vs Hackney , Middlesex League, Division 1:

Played in January 2010 (I think 21st January)


Muswell Hill players | Hackney Players

Board 1 : Thomas, Joe (196) ( 1/2 - 1/2 ) Reid, John (202)
Board 2 : Ethelontis, A (195) ( 0 - 1 ) Cassillas, A (188)
Board 3 : Hall, Daniel J (192) ( 1 - 0 ) Willmoth, R (201)
Board 4 : Gavriel, T (188) ( 1/2 - 1/2 ) (Promising Junior player -----) (151)
Board 5: House, Dick (168) ( 1/2 - 1/2 ) Tasker, M (186)
Board 6 : Carter, J (168) ( 1 - 0 ) Tennyson, J (165)
Board 7 : Jenkins, G (160) ( 1/2 - 1/2 ) Lee, E (158)
Board 8 : Fleetwood, J (156) ( 1 - 0 ) Tracey, S (136)

Match Result

( 5 - 3 )

It was however a very exciting game, and I was perhaps in danger of losing too - and the result being a draw. Here is the video annotation of the game:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x8A_yNQyA_0

I raised issue with the grading order with my match captain who in turn contacted the League secretary. The official reply seemed to be that because the result of my game was a draw, that seemed to justify their captain placing my 12 year old opponent Malhotra above the other higher rated players.

Shouldn't there be thresholds applied for not going in ECF grading order - e.g. a threshold of maximum 10 ECF points, or should it be "anything goes" as far as promising juniors are concerned - even if they are more than 30 ECF points below someone else ?!

Feedback welcome from all

Best wishes
Tryfon

[Adam Raoof]

Hi all

I recently had a match in the Middlesex league where my opponent although a promising junior was officially rated 151 ECF. He was put above Tasker who is 186 ECF and also a couple of other 160ish players.

Do you think this is acceptable, if a junior has had good recent results, or should board orders in League matches generally be in established ECF grade order?!)

Dear Tryfon - this is clearly unacceptable. The point of the ECF grading system is to establish just such an order - the rules in this particular league are worded poorly. They read;

The opposing captains, or their deputies, shall exchange the names of their players, whom they shall place in their recognised order of playing strength.

http://www.middlesexchess.org.uk/newrules.html

and this gives some Captains scope to interpret what should otherwise be obvious, namely that the ECF grades should be used to determine playing strength. I suggest that you propose a rule change at the next AGM.

[John Upham]

I would always put out any of my teams in order of playing strength rather than rating order. I feel I am morally obliged to do this.

Tarun Malhotra is a very promising junior and a member of the AMCA 4NCL squad and his recent results speak for themselves.

Of course there are those who might try and "play the game" by sacrificing a high board by playing a weak player higher than can be justified. This is unacceptable.

[Simon Spivack]

Is it appropriate to be publicly dissecting a match in this manner when one of the principals is a ten year old boy?

Hackney have an excellent reputation. I should imagine that Mike Tasker is having a poor season, whereas the child is improving by leaps and bounds.

... the rules in this particular league are worded poorly. ...

The opposing captains, or their deputies, shall exchange the names of their players, whom they shall place in their recognised order of playing strength.

In the London League the rule is similar:

It is expected that the players shall be arranged consecutively in order of strength, beginning with the strongest on top board ...

In division one of the London League this is clarified by mentioning ten ECF points as an appropriate difference. A previous Middlesex League secretary used fifteen ECF points as an unofficial ball park figure. In the London League it is possible to gain an exemption from the league secretary.

One can argue that Mike, who I should imagine was the captain on the night, should have contacted the league secretary first. However, I very much doubt that there is anything out of order here.

[Adam Raoof]

I would always put out any of my teams in order of playing strength rather than rating order. I feel I am morally obliged to do this.

I see. Can you give us an example from one of your teams?

Edit: I agree with Simon's first point. Perhaps all those who have posted below can remove the name of the player concerned from their posts; it is clearly not the player's fault. However I don't agree with Simon's last point; this is liberal interpretation of the rules. The vague wording of the league rules is not much of an excuse!

[Roger de Coverly]

In division one of the London League this is clarified by mentioning ten ECF points as an appropriate difference.

In the 4NCL, the rule is 80 international Elo points, which is equivalent. However the 4NCL makes no stipulation that players should be in order of strength, so captains have lots of tactical possibilities. It helps that the colours are predetermined.

[John Upham]

I would always put out any of my teams in order of playing strength rather than rating order. I feel I am morally obliged to do this.

I see. Can you give us an example from one of your teams?

Check out some of my 4NCL, Surrey Border League and Berkshire League teams.

This view follows logically from my total lack of faith in the ECF rating system as we now have it! Replace it with FIDE and my faith might be partially restored!

Many of us realise that ECF rating is not a great predictor of playing strength especially when it is only updated once per year.

[Adam Raoof]

I would always put out any of my teams in order of playing strength rather than rating order. I feel I am morally obliged to do this.

I see. Can you give us an example from one of your teams?

Check out some of my 4NCL, Surrey Border League and Berkshire League teams.

This view follows logically from my total lack of faith in the ECF rating system as we now have it! Replace it with FIDE and my faith might be partially restored!

Sadly the Berkshire rules are equally vague;

Match Captains shall arrange their teams in descending order of known playing strength.

[J T Melsom]

Bucks rules are similarly tolerant, although the league controller has seen fit to query a board order on at least one occasion, when he felt the ECF grading difference was too great. And although we allow overlapping teams, he has also dropped a strong hint to at least one club as to which side a new player should be playing for.

But how to determine playing strength? We have disparity between a player's ELO and ECF, we have players with different sample sizes (can we really rank an E above an A grade with confidence?), we have returning players with grades from a rating system which has no historic continuity with the present, and juniors who are rapidly improving or substatially overgraded.

[Adam Raoof]

Bucks rules are similarly tolerant, although the league controller has seen fit to query a board order on at least one occasion, when he felt the ECF grading difference was too great. And although we allow overlapping teams, he has also dropped a strong hint to at least one club as to which side a new player should be playing for.

But how to determine playing strength? We have disparity between a player's ELO and ECF, we have players with different sample sizes (can we really rank an E above an A grade with confidence?), we have returning players with grades from a rating system which has no historic continuity with the present, and juniors who are rapidly improving or substatially overgraded.

1. we have ECF grades, which we pay for; what is the point of ignoring them?
1 and a half. ECF takes precedence over any other grade
2. the ECF has a very precise official conversion formula to use with ratings from FIDE and others
3. you can take it that any published grade is accurate - so most events use any A-E grade

Perhaps I am just in one of those moods

[John Upham]

1. we have ECF grades, which we pay for; what is the point of ignoring them?


When the algorithm is clearly flawed, especially for juniors and they are only updated annually to make matters worse.

1 and a half. ECF takes precedence over any other grade
2. the ECF has a very precise official conversion formula to use with ratings from FIDE and others

That is fine if the players has a FIDE rating but no ECF rating : this would be ideal.

3. you can take it that any published grade is accurate - so most events use any A-E grade

I don't agree and I suspect many others also do not agree.

Perhaps I am just in one of those moods

[J T Melsom]

Irregular or unusual board orders may be prompted by gamesmanship, but they can also be prompted by a desire to give players a decent game where the opposition is obviously much weaker or tails off between boards two and three. Why should strict grading order be applied in these circumstances to players graded 156, 149, 142, especially if one plays ten games a year and the others 30?

[Adam Raoof]

Irregular or unusual board orders may be prompted by gamesmanship, but they can also be prompted by a desire to give players a decent game where the opposition is obviously much weaker or tails off between boards two and three. Why should strict grading order be applied in these circumstances to players graded 156, 149, 142, especially if one plays ten games a year and the others 30?

OK, you have a point. Your desire to be fair is something I support. However - tell me where the dividing line is between the desire to give a player a decent game, and gamesmanship. Who decides the boundaries? Is 10 points too much? How do you decide which grade is the more 'accurate'?

I would say that if the Captains agree before the game that they will play their teams in a certain order, that is fine. However in the example given below (not the worst I have seen in this League) I think the Captains did not agree. If there is any disagreement, the ECF grade is what counts. It is one thing to say that the ECF grading is not accurate, but until someone provides us with a better method (Elo ratings) then we have to stick with them.

[Roger de Coverly]

An alternative approach to board orders is that you declare the order of your squad at the start of the season and no variations are permitted. I believe this is the approach in the German League. The German squads always seem to be in something approaching Elo order so there may be a rating rule or order of strength rule as well. In the Olympiads on the other hand, whilst the order is locked at the start of the event, there is absolutely no rule to stop you putting your strongest player on a lower board. Some teams do this in the hopes of securing a board prize for that player. The other variation is where the team consists of four titled players and a team sponsor, that the team sponsor places himself on top board so as to be able to play against "famous" GMs.

From a team captain's viewpoint, when selecting or nominating teams, one does note whether players are A or E rated so an A player rated 15 points below an E player might be invited for the last place particularly if the captain was unimpressed by the E player's style of play.

Perhaps a question that a league ought to ask itself is the extent to which it wishes to allow tactical board orders as permitted in the 4NCL.

[Mike Truran]

Roger, not sure what you have in mind with tactical board orders in the 4NCL - derogations from the 80 point rule have to be agreed by both captains and the arbiter beforehand?