English Chess Forum

With the new grades coming into effect in the summer I understand that the question of what to do with County Championship grading limits is to be determined at the April council meeting.

I hear that there are two proposals (although ammendments could be proposed on the day).

Firstly, to leave the bands as they are now and run U175 / U150 / U125 and U100 sections using the new grades.

Alternatively to change the bands to U180 / U160 / U140 and U120.

I'm interested in players opinions on this topic and, as I am the Basic members rep, I'm particularly interested in the views of Basic members.

How many players (roughly) will be in each band under the two proposals?

Ian Kingston wrote:How many players (roughly) will be in each band under the two proposals?

Looking at the grading list there are 9738 players who have a grade, and have a county affiliation - ie play for a club or county. This excludes mainly high graded foreign players who only play Hastings / Gibraltar / 4NCL.

I show below the number of players available for each proposed band as a absolute figure and more meaningfully as a percentage of the available pool of players

Limit Players % of Total

180 9077 93.2%
160 7871 80.8%
140 5813 59.7%
120 3405 35.0%

Limit Players % of Total

175 8831 90.7%
150 6902 70.9%
125 4128 42.4%
100 1545 15.9%

Are these all current grades?

The bands should be moved so teams can stay mostly the same, which will in turn help with things like organization, lifts, etc.

TomChivers wrote:The bands should be moved so teams can stay mostly the same, which will in turn help with things like organization, lifts, etc.

And indeed captains (whose views in particular should be sought)
Some say we should not change the status quo. In view of the known signifiicant changes in the grades the status quo would be to change the grades, not to leave them unchanged. Hence the "status quo" is to change to U180 / U160 / U140 and U120.

Not to do so would be like "From August 1st all cars will drive on the right. If that pilot is a success then lorries will as well"

None of Surrey's U100 teams would be eligible for their U100 team next season! Whilst they do now have an U75 team it is not as easy to get a full team out, particularly once most of the juniors in it go to over 100.

Ian Kingston wrote:Are these all current grades?

They are current "new style" grades.

Neill Cooper wrote:
And indeed captains (whose views in particular should be sought)

As the MCCU County Championship Controller I canvassed all MCCU Captains with email to seek their views. That email reproduced below

Dear All,

As you are I'm sure aware, ECF grades will be changing this summer, with most players seeing their grades go up. Consequently the ECF will be discussing in April what, if anything to do with the exisiting County Championship grading limits of U175, U150, U125 and U100.

The options currently under discussion (though new ideas are no doubt welcome)

1. Leave things as they are ie Open, U175, U150, U125 and U100. The logic being that the grading changes fixes grading deflation and so the historical grading bands become correct again. Certainly, the U175 competition would liely become viable in the MCCU in a way that it isnt at the moment.

2. Change the bands so that teams are approximately the same as now. By my calculations that would give approx Open, U185, U165, U148 and U125. The advantage here is that teams would stay approximately the same as now. The downside is that the competitions would remain the same, with the same sections prospering and the same sections struggling.

3. Change the bands to reflect the actual grading distribution. In other words, have an Open plus graded sections that would be open to 80%, 60%, 40% and 20% of players respectively. That would give grading bands of U162, U141, U124, U106 (no dount these would be rounded). Advantage is that each section should have the same size pool of players to choose from.

4. The fourth option (I believe this is going to be suggested by SCCU) is that there is an extra competition added and that grading bands are Open, U180 (or 185), U160 (or 165), U140 (or 145) U120 (or 125) and U100 (or 105).

It would be useful to hear feedback from existing captains so that your views can be put to the meeting. You should also, of course, let your county ECF rep know your views too. I would suggest that you cc everyone on your reply so that everyone know what thinking is going on out there!

Regards,

Sean

The replies were heavily in favour of leaving the grading bands unchnaged at U175 / U150 / U125 and U100. I reproduce the replies below in their entirity, though will keep the authors anonymous - unless they wish to identify themselves!

My immediate reaction is to leave things as they are on the grounds that everyone is familiar with the u175, u150 etc. Let players settle in to the new gradings. If we find that we need to change the u175 etc later then so be it, but don't rush it. Please note that I have not discussed this within [My County] yet.

One thing to bear in mind is the effect regarding county captains....they may move up a band, leaving a current team without a captain. So counties need to think whether they will still be able to run the same teams. One other issue is that an entire team may move up a band..so it might not be able to find a group willing to replace them..
By the same token, current players may move up a band, and find there is no-one volunteering to run that new band..if you see what I mean. So the impact of what's happening could be quite disruptive...perhaps causing teams to disappear..?
If we were going to change, I could favour Open, U170, U130, U100 as four break points...giving wider range and therefore making it easier for captains to raise teams.....this is a big problem, particularly with the reluctance of many players to play in `away` matches.. It might also reduce `overlap`, i.e., lower graded players being co-opted into higher teams.

Sorry to be late entering this discussion – for what it is worth, I would
favour leaving the grade bands as is at least in the short term – any
attempt now to put an alternative in place would probably need to be
re-assed in a year ot two’s time when we are older & wiser.

I also think it would give a healthy spin to the existing team structures.

I am absolutely clear that the present easily understood limits should be retained for the time being. The competitions have been running successfully under this regime for many seasons now and whilst the grading may have altered, now is not the time to start tinkering with a system that is known by all. The ECF has a history of making "knee-jerk" reactions with its events; none of which as far as I can recall has increased entries.

It is not at all clear to me how the new grades will affect the county team structure and I would suggest that should the sensible first option be adopted that the MCUU wait until the new grades are published before compiling entries and fixtures for the forthcoming year - this can easily be done by, say, 1st September if the grades are out by 31st July.

I agree that any major changes should be thought through carefully....to take a season for this would make sense.

As captain of [My County] i think its wise to leave things unaltered for a season to gauge the effect THANKS

Has anybody else noticed that the 'new ratings' have begun to decrease? Perhapy, by the time they come out, the increases will not be sufficient to make much of a difference to the county teams.

Also, it is worth mentioning that since few counties run an under 175 team, it will most likely end up becoming the new team for under 150s with the under 125 becoming the under 150 and under 100 becoming under 125...

Then, in a few years time, the big guns will have nicked most of the rating points and we will be roughly back to where we started.

Thanks for that clarification Sean.

The two options give very different distributions of players:
It looks to me as though the 180/160/140/120 option leaves the U180 and U160 sections rather short of players, so that people might have to be brought in from the band below. I'm not sure how this compares with the current situation.

I do wonder about the viability of the U180 (or U175) section. Is the time right for a review of the whole idea of graded county championships? Why four sections rather than some other split?

Then, in a few years time, the big guns will have nicked most of the rating points and we will be roughly back to where we started.

That's the plan

A few years ago I played regularly for the Surrey Open and U175 teams. Now I hardly get a chance to play for the Open team as it has gotten stronger. Using the new style grades, I calculate my performance this year to be 175. So, if the U175 grading limit remains, there’s a distinct possibility that I’ll play rather less county chess next year. This is not as I would wish it! I believe it’s likely that several other Surrey players will be in the same position. Maybe players for other counties will be similarly affected.

My preference is for the grading limits of county competitions to be adjusted up to reflect the increases in grades.

Interesting post from Angus which highlights the problem. Graded 175 he wouldn't qualify for the U175 team, but isn't strong enough to get into the Surrey first team.

In the Midlands, not only would he get into every county first team in the Union, but he would be playing board 1 for half of them!

This has led me to the conclusion that in County chess terms, size matters. The bigger the county, the more boards you want to accomodate all your players and the more divisions you want for the same reasons.

The following analysis is a bit rough and ready but highlights the situation. I have allocated every graded player to a county based purely on the team that they play most games for (I play most of my games for Littlethorpe so, as that club is in Leicestershire I have been designated a Leicestershire player). This gives the size of counties as follows

COUNTY UNION Players
CBED E 91
CCAM E 91
CHUN E 68
CNOF E 175
CSUF E 155
CDER M 108
CGRM M 285
CHEF M 20
CLEI M 192
CLIN M 90
CNOA M 93
CNOT M 217
CSHR M 144
CSTA M 350
CWAR M 474
CWOR M 121
CCLE N 133
CCNW N 337
CCUM N 122
CDUR N 109
CLAN N 318
CMER N 251
CNOU N 166
CYOR N 552
CBER S 212
CBUC S 90
CESS S 469
CHET S 344
CKEN S 402
CLON S 255
CMID S 546
COXF S 216
CSUR S 746
CSUS S 295
CBRI W 208
CCOR W 80
CDEV W 233
CDOR W 183
CGLO W 136
CHAM W 217
CSOM W 217
CWIL W 94

Interestingly, the average SCCU county has 357 players whilst the MCCU is nearly half that at 190. NCCU is 248, WCCU is 171 and EACU 116. The mean average for a county is 229 players, while the median is 200.

Perhaps we should be considering competitions that are based on the size of the county (in terms of player numbers), as well as or instead of grading limits?! Counties could be designated large and small with the large counties having more grading divisions. Smaller counties could compete over fewer boards or fewer grading divisions.

My personal feeling is that we should leave the bands as they are for next season, with a representative group looking at revamping for the following year.

Perhaps we should be considering competitions that are based on the size of the county (in terms of player numbers)

The more radical idea would be to officially allow wildcards - that is players who are not otherwise eligible. Even more radical would be to just structure the competitions as 12/16 board team events - You can play for any team (like the 4NCL) as long as you are either pre-registered or wild-carded.

Berks Bucks and Oxon have all withdrawn from the SCCU competitions although these counties still run our local u180 Chiltern matches along with Hampshire. If you haven't got the player base to be competitive and have no legitimate way of acquiring the players, then you may as well not enter. There's plenty of easily accessible weekend chess available anyway with the 4NCL and congresses for those that want it.

From Richard Hadrells excellent SCCU site it appears that the effect of leaving the bands unchanged would be something like this, in the SCCU at least.


U100
Between 90 and 100% of current players would be ineligible.
Comptetition defunct, unless completely new teams can be raised from somewhere.

U125
The vast majority of current players would be ineligible but players previously in the U100 would be available. However, the U100 is currently 12 boards vs 16 for U125, presumably because of difficulties in raising larger teams.
So the best case scenario is that teams currently struggeling to get enough players will fold, worst case scenario is that all teams will do so (maybe due to lack of opponents )and the competition cease to to exist.

U150
About half the current players would become ineligible but as there would be a vast pool of former U125 & U100 players to choose from I expect the U150 would flourish.

U175
Somewhere between a quarter and a third of players would be restricted to the Open team, but again there would be recruits from former U150 players no longer available for that team, so presumably the U175 would be OK

OPEN
Presumably largely unaffected.

To me it seems likely that the loosers will be players currently playing for U175 or U150 teams who will no longer be eligible to do so but also are not able to get into the team above and anyone playing for a U100 or U125 team which is no longer viable and therefore folds.


I also find some of the comments from the MCCU captains confusing,
For example:

I am absolutely clear that the present easily understood limits should be retained for the time being. The competitions have been running successfully under this regime for many seasons now and whilst the grading may have altered, now is not the time to start tinkering with a system that is known by all.

Sorry, what does he want to do? The statment is an oxymoron.
Leaving the nominal bands in place when average grades are increased by 20 is a major change, which certainly qualify as tinkering. If he wants to leave a system that is "known by all" in place then, surely, the bands have to be adjusted so roughly the same players qaulify?

Several of the other comments appear to be in the same vein, advocating caution or no change, whilst at the same time being in favour of disqualifying between a quarter and all of their current players (based on the SCCU numbers, depending on which team they captain, and assuming it's not an open team).

Have they actually consulted their players, in particular those who will be left without a team?

Sean Hewitt wrote: In the Midlands, not only would he get into every county first team in the Union, but he would be playing board 1 for half of them!

Which raises the question, how many counties outside the SCCU run teams in all grading bands? Three SCCU counties run teams in all six grading bands (from Open down to the extra U75 team) whilst the remaining three counties each run 4 teams. They also play lots of matches (Open teams 5, U175 8 matches etc).