European Team Chess Championship 2021

[A.Kluckova]

There are two anomalies and the second one does not look smaller . A chess player who has not played chess officially for decades has been nominated to the team. It will be a rarity of ETCC 2021. Opponents will be very surprised. ENG women board 3rd - 34 years chess player with no one Fide rated game from 2005 . By the way, the board 4th looks similar , S.Bayat has played 4 Fide rated games for last 10 years ?! When opponent teams find the background of ENG boards 3 and 4 , it will bigger shame than if we would have in the team lower rated active seniors or girls....

[Chris Rice]

There are two anomalies and the second one does not look smaller . A chess player who has not played chess officially for decades has been nominated to the team. It will be a rarity of ETCC 2021. Opponents will be very surprised. ENG women board 3rd - 34 years chess player with no one Fide rated game from 2005 . By the way, the board 4th looks similar , S.Bayat has played 4 Fide rated games for last 10 years ?! When opponent teams find the background of ENG boards 3 and 4 , it will bigger shame than if we would have in the team lower rated active seniors or girls....

Shohreh Bayat is very well known to the chess world and is an inspirational figure for women and for chess. To have her playing for England is a bit of an honour in my opinion and makes quite a statement.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shohreh_Bayat

[Paul Heaton]

Agree the board 4 is a legitimate selection, as the player is resident in the U.K., though I’ve no idea about the playing strength. The board 3 is a complete joke- it seems the eligibility threshold for the national team is less than the British Championships, or the County Championship. From the ridiculousness I do wonder if the ECF fully appraised the situation.

[Jonathan Rogers]

There are also teams in the Open (only) from the other "home" nations, which are the three bottom seeds.

34. Scotland (RtgAvg:2263 / TB1: 0 / TB2: 0) Captain: Burnett, Andrew
Bo. Name Rtg FED FideID Games
1 FM Tate Alan 2342 SCO 2401878 0,0
2 IM Muir Andrew J 2254 SCO 2400138 0,0
3 FM Morrison Graham 2251 SCO 2400090 0,0
4 CM Bremner Adam 2204 SCO 2400847 0,0
5 FM Burnett Andrew 2163 SCO 2400855 0,0

35. Ireland (RtgAvg:2216 / TB1: 0 / TB2: 0)
Bo. Name Rtg FED FideID Games
1 FM Kanyamarala Tarun 2309 IRL 45004714 0,0
2 FM Jessel Stephen 2297 IRL 628859 0,0
3 Nemeth Zalan 2177 IRL 2512041 0,0
4 WIM Kanyamarala Trisha 2082 IRL 45004722 0,0

36. Wales (RtgAvg:2120 / TB1: 0 / TB2: 0) Captain: Garcia, Jason
Bo. Name Rtg FED FideID Games
1 FM Toczek Grzegorz 2296 WLS 1106457 0,0
2 CM Kett Tim 2156 WLS 1801210 0,0
3 Garcia Jason 2028 WLS 1801775 0,0
4 Pleasants Allan J 2001 WLS 411337 0,0

The Irish team is composed of three teenagers (one of whom has gained about 100 rating points this year in Hungarian tournaments) and Stephen who lives in France. He has three IM norms but never yet managed to get his rating to 2400. Hopefully he can get some good results and start building up his rating again.

Andrew Muir pointed out on LinkedIn that he has been selected for Scotland for six decades now: 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, 2000s, 2010s , 2020s which is very impressive though I'm guessing not the longest ever for a player to be selected for their country?

Who has been involved in selecting Scottish teams in recent years (say, this century)?

[Angus French]

Dare I ask, was anything said at the recent AGM about financing of the ECF's participation in the Championship? For example, is there sponsorship and, if there is, how much? I ask because budgetted expenditure for the event is £40,014 (from the management accounts spreadsheet presented to the April Finance Council meeting) and I think that's quite a lot in the context of the Federation's somewhat stretched finances.

[Mick Norris]

Probably a question for Satish Gaekwad, ECF Manager of Sponsorship for International Chess

[David Sedgwick]

Shohreh Bayat is very well known to the chess world and is an inspirational figure for women and for chess. To have her playing for England is a bit of an honour in my opinion and makes quite a statement.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shohreh_Bayat

Absolutely. Shohreh's latest achievement, not mentioned yet on Wikipedia, was her 343 - 0 result in the recent ECF elections. She was the only candidate to have no votes at all against her.

Agree the board 4 is a legitimate selection, as the player is resident in the U.K., though I’ve no idea about the playing strength.

I can't format it, but I have pasted in below the current list of the England top 12 active women players.

Shohreh Bayat is in 8th place. In 9th place is Louise Head, who has been selected to play on Board 2.

Admittedly, Shohreh's active status is something of a quirk.


Name Title Tr.T. Fed Std. Rpd. Blz. B-Year
Hunt, Harriet V
IM WGM ENG 2410 2391 1978
Houska, Jovanka
IM WGM ENG 2381 2317 2345 1980
Ciuksyte, Dagne
IM WGM ENG 2294 2288 1977
Toma, Katarzyna
WGM WGM FT ENG 2261 2202 2210 1985
Kalaiyalahan, Akshaya
FM ENG 2149 1869 1913 2001
Kueh, Audrey
ENG 2099 1987
Jackson, Sheila
WGM WGM ENG 2095 2065 1957
Bayat, Shohreh
WFM WFM ENG 2091 2009 1987
Head, Louise
WFM WFM ENG 2069 1853 1843 1997
Lauterbach, Ingrid
WIM WIM ENG 2046 2011 2087 1960
Grigoryan, Meri
WFM WFM FT ENG 2044 1988 2007 1977
Longson, Sarah N
WFM WFM ENG 2039 2084 2043 1988

[Ian Thompson]

A tip for the future - put it in a code table and separate fields with tabs.

Code: Select all

Name			Title	Tr.T.	Fed	Std.	Rpd.	Blz.	B-Year
Hunt, Harriet V 	IM WGM		ENG	2410	2391		1978
Houska, Jovanka 	IM WGM		ENG	2381	2317	2345	1980
Ciuksyte, Dagne 	IM WGM		ENG	2294		2288	1977
Toma, Katarzyna 	WGM WGM FT	ENG	2261	2202	2210	1985
Kalaiyalahan, Akshaya   FM		ENG	2149	1869	1913	2001
Kueh, Audrey				ENG	2099			1987
Jackson, Sheila		WGM WGM		ENG	2095	2065		1957
Bayat, Shohreh		WFM WFM		ENG	2091		2009	1987
Head, Louise		WFM WFM		ENG	2069	1853	1843	1997
Lauterbach, Ingrid 	WIM WIM		ENG	2046	2011	2087	1960
Grigoryan, Meri		WFM WFM FT	ENG	2044	1988	2007	1977
Longson, Sarah  N	WFM WFM		ENG	2039	2084	2043	1988

[David Sedgwick]

A tip for the future - put it in a code table and separate fields with tabs.

Thank you.

[A.Kluckova]

Thank you at least for an acknowledgement that a player ( or players )chess status is something of a quirk. l think so.
Both players current represent the ECF , had no or very less international activities many years, so ECF chess status is only what you can compare for ECF player .




OTB standard OTB rapid Online standard Online rapid Online blitz

Pert , Nina ( year of birth 2008 ) - 1840 1845 1845 1833 1908
Emelianova, Maria ( year of b. 1987) - - 1810 1781 1859
Bayat, Shohreh (year of b. 1987) - - 1848 1742 1868
Head Louise (year of b. 1997) 2159 2068 2171 2072 2027

From current tables, so example Pert ( 2008) is over both ETCC players . Head is over all of them, so board second for Head is acceptable.
Any other activities are unable to compare, Pert no Head were not active candidates in ECF election 2021, both are not active in International awards schemes also.

What was also confusing, Emelianova rates her online results as good ones in the public podcast ( although her online chess results are weakness as the online results of junior year of birth 2008....)

Hope you understand now and accept my point of view. Thank you.

[Alistair Campbell]

Who has been involved in selecting Scottish teams in recent years (say, this century)?

Loads of people.

I think the International Director convenes a selection committee of strong players who don't want selected and they choose.

This century, I think the IDs have been:

Alan Minnican, Douglas Griffin, Jacob Aagaard, Jonathan Grant, Andrew Muir, Andrew Burnett and Jacob Aagaard again.

I imagine the strong players would include people like McNab, Shaw, Bryson, Arakhamia etc. Perhaps Matthew Turner has some insight.

[LawrenceCooper]

Bo. 9 Spain Rtg - 24 England Rtg 0 : 0
9.1 IM Vega Gutierrez, Sabrina 2394 - WGM Toma, Katarzyna 2261
9.2 IM Matnadze, Ana 2418 - WFM Head, Louise 2069
9.3 FM Eizaguerri Floris, Maria 2328 - WFM Emelianova, Maria 2113
9.4 WGM Calzetta Ruiz, Monica 2201 - WFM Bayat, Shohreh 2091

Bo. 24 Norway Rtg - 5 England Rtg 0 : 0
5.1 GM Christiansen, Johan-Sebastian 2582 - GM Mcshane, Luke J 2667
5.2 GM Urkedal, Frode Olav Olsen 2569 - GM Jones, Gawain C B 2654
5.3 IM Hauge, Lars Oskar 2490 - GM Howell, David W L 2648
5.4 GM Notkevich, Benjamin Arvola 2471 - IM Haria, Ravi 2497

[Matthew Turner]

Who has been involved in selecting Scottish teams in recent years (say, this century)?

Loads of people.

I think the International Director convenes a selection committee of strong players who don't want selected and they choose.

This century, I think the IDs have been:

Alan Minnican, Douglas Griffin, Jacob Aagaard, Jonathan Grant, Andrew Muir, Andrew Burnett and Jacob Aagaard again.

I imagine the strong players would include people like McNab, Shaw, Bryson, Arakhamia etc. Perhaps Matthew Turner has some insight.

The current International Director is Alan Tate and I think the selection for the European Team Championships have been difficult because so many players were unavailable.

Normally, there would be a selection committee as Alistair suggests, but I couldn't find details on the Chess Scotland website. I am not sure how effective a selection panel would be at the moment and I suspect that Alan has been primarily responsible for selecting the team.

In the circumstances, he has done an excellent job to assemble the team that he has. A number of the players are, in my opinion, significantly underrated, so I would expect Scotland to exceed expectations.

[Roger de Coverly]

5.3 IM Hauge, Lars Oskar 2490 - GM Howell, David W L 2648
5.4 GM Notkevich, Benjamin Arvola 2471 - IM Haria, Ravi 2497

Earlier publicity suggested that David Howell would be on top board. Evidently they've gone for a more usual line up. Ravi presumably needs a win for the GM title, although a draw wouldn't adversely change his rating.

[Mick Norris]

TWIC

Giri, Grischuk, Firouzja, MVL, Mamedyarov, Rajdabov, Duda, Adams, Dubov, Esipenko are among the leading players, Russia followed by Azerbaijan are the top seeds.

Results and Women

Website including Schedule and Special Competition Rules