Elite juniors-a proposal
Posted: Sun Jun 30, 2013 11:03 am
In the thread on the European School Championship, Richard Bates and Roger de Coverly wrote:
Richard: is there any serious 'elite player' strategy and targets relating to this?
Roger: Leonard mentions the 1960s and 1970s, but a major difference then was the numbers of players of secondary school and university age. So the grass roots grew of their own accord without the BCF directly assisting.
Judging by the junior director’s report which Roger provides. the answer to Richard’s question is ‘No’. Roger is right that we had a larger pool of secondary school players in the 1970s, but we actually produced way too many GMs and IMs in the 1970s and 1980s for the size of the chess economy then This became especially true after the 1990 collapse of the USSR which led to greatly increased competition from ex-Soviets.
Now the chess economy has shrunk further, and it is hard for any GM/IM outside the 2600+ quintet of Adams, McShane, Short, Jones and Howell to make a reasonable living from play alone. But in a decade Adams and Short will be over-50s, McShane may remain in the City and Howell could decide to become just a part-time GM after university, so there is a need for a small number of new elite players.
Yang-Fan Zhou is 18-19, is close to 2500 strength, and will probably achieve his first GM norm at Big Slick a few hours from now, so he has a real chance for 2600. Our other best sub-19 elite prospects are Franklin, Sanders and Wadsworth, for all of whom 2450-2550 currently looks the probable ceiling barring a sizeable teenage quantum jump by Sanders and/or Wadsworth.
In 1972 Jim Slater offered an award of £5000 for the first English GM and £2000 for the next four to achieve the title. The number was defined (by me) because there were seven realistic candidates (Miles, Keene, Hartston, Stean, Nunn, Mestel and Speelman), who would know they all had a good practical chance but that there was also serious competition. The Slater awards were successful and broke psychological barriers for English talents, though they were also technically aided because in the 1970s many more titled and rated players emerged worldwide.
What I would like to see now are awards for English juniors who become IMs or GMs at an age when, judged by what is happening in other countries, it becomes realistic to hope to succeed in serious adult GM events.
I reckon that GM at 16 /IM at 14 £5000, GM at 17/IM at 15 £3000, GM at 18/IM at 16 £1000 would be about right. These are standards which top international prospects in strong nations do currently achieve. I should add I have read of several cases of such players where they didn’t have a regular coach but strengthened their game by internet play at ICC or Playchess. So I think in principle that an outstanding English talent could attain such targets.
The awards would be an immediate incentive to Sanders and Wadsworth, and would also target any parents of younger talents/ambitious players who wanted a more challenging target than being one of a large ‘England’ group at a junior competition in Europe.
Where would the money come from? Ideally from the Robinson Trust, but the trust already provides an annual award of around £2000 to a selected junior (formerly Howell, now I think Zhou) so probably wouldn’t give support for a theoretically open-ended concept.
I think the people to approach are players and ex-players who were part of the 1970s and 1980s generation and who have since been successful in business-Norwood, Mortazavi, Hennigan, Parker, Chapman to name a few.
They would not even need to put money up front, just to guarantee the awards if anybody achieved them. There could be a time limit of, say, five years, with option to renew.
Realistically, it is quite possible that the guarantors would not need to put up any money at all, for these are challenging targets which would demand a strong work ethic as well as considerable talent from any junior aspiring to them. At most, I would expect less than a handful of serious candidates for the awards.
There is no need for the ECF to be involved, and quite possibly it wouldn’t want to be. The administration required is not demanding but some widely respected person would have to handle it. I think Lawrence Cooper would be the obvious choice for the post.
So that’s the proposal. You can debate its exact terms, but I think this has to be the way forward to meet Richard’s valid point above.
I
Richard: is there any serious 'elite player' strategy and targets relating to this?
Roger: Leonard mentions the 1960s and 1970s, but a major difference then was the numbers of players of secondary school and university age. So the grass roots grew of their own accord without the BCF directly assisting.
Judging by the junior director’s report which Roger provides. the answer to Richard’s question is ‘No’. Roger is right that we had a larger pool of secondary school players in the 1970s, but we actually produced way too many GMs and IMs in the 1970s and 1980s for the size of the chess economy then This became especially true after the 1990 collapse of the USSR which led to greatly increased competition from ex-Soviets.
Now the chess economy has shrunk further, and it is hard for any GM/IM outside the 2600+ quintet of Adams, McShane, Short, Jones and Howell to make a reasonable living from play alone. But in a decade Adams and Short will be over-50s, McShane may remain in the City and Howell could decide to become just a part-time GM after university, so there is a need for a small number of new elite players.
Yang-Fan Zhou is 18-19, is close to 2500 strength, and will probably achieve his first GM norm at Big Slick a few hours from now, so he has a real chance for 2600. Our other best sub-19 elite prospects are Franklin, Sanders and Wadsworth, for all of whom 2450-2550 currently looks the probable ceiling barring a sizeable teenage quantum jump by Sanders and/or Wadsworth.
In 1972 Jim Slater offered an award of £5000 for the first English GM and £2000 for the next four to achieve the title. The number was defined (by me) because there were seven realistic candidates (Miles, Keene, Hartston, Stean, Nunn, Mestel and Speelman), who would know they all had a good practical chance but that there was also serious competition. The Slater awards were successful and broke psychological barriers for English talents, though they were also technically aided because in the 1970s many more titled and rated players emerged worldwide.
What I would like to see now are awards for English juniors who become IMs or GMs at an age when, judged by what is happening in other countries, it becomes realistic to hope to succeed in serious adult GM events.
I reckon that GM at 16 /IM at 14 £5000, GM at 17/IM at 15 £3000, GM at 18/IM at 16 £1000 would be about right. These are standards which top international prospects in strong nations do currently achieve. I should add I have read of several cases of such players where they didn’t have a regular coach but strengthened their game by internet play at ICC or Playchess. So I think in principle that an outstanding English talent could attain such targets.
The awards would be an immediate incentive to Sanders and Wadsworth, and would also target any parents of younger talents/ambitious players who wanted a more challenging target than being one of a large ‘England’ group at a junior competition in Europe.
Where would the money come from? Ideally from the Robinson Trust, but the trust already provides an annual award of around £2000 to a selected junior (formerly Howell, now I think Zhou) so probably wouldn’t give support for a theoretically open-ended concept.
I think the people to approach are players and ex-players who were part of the 1970s and 1980s generation and who have since been successful in business-Norwood, Mortazavi, Hennigan, Parker, Chapman to name a few.
They would not even need to put money up front, just to guarantee the awards if anybody achieved them. There could be a time limit of, say, five years, with option to renew.
Realistically, it is quite possible that the guarantors would not need to put up any money at all, for these are challenging targets which would demand a strong work ethic as well as considerable talent from any junior aspiring to them. At most, I would expect less than a handful of serious candidates for the awards.
There is no need for the ECF to be involved, and quite possibly it wouldn’t want to be. The administration required is not demanding but some widely respected person would have to handle it. I think Lawrence Cooper would be the obvious choice for the post.
So that’s the proposal. You can debate its exact terms, but I think this has to be the way forward to meet Richard’s valid point above.
I
I wonder what help is being given to them by the ECF and the Trust?