22th European Team Chess Championship 2019

[JustinHorton]

So Germany in the last round for a medal?

[Jonathan Rogers]

The German board four, who lost the classic yesterday to Dubov (who would, it might be said in passing, surely have converted from Matlakov's position today) lost again today in the match against Ukraine from being a piece up for not very much - surely the most remarkable game of all on the top boards. Will be interesting to see whether he plays against us tomorrow.

[John Moore]

The German board four, who lost the classic yesterday to Dubov (who would, it might be said in passing, surely have converted from Matlakov's position today) lost again today in the match against Ukraine from being a piece up for not very much - surely the most remarkable game of all on the top boards. Will be interesting to see whether he plays against us tomorrow.

Presumably, Svane will be dropped and Germany will play their top 4 who are a fairly solid looking outfit. But with the draw odds, England must be favourites.

[Mick Norris]

13 - Russia, Ukraine
12 - England
11 - Croatia, Germany

Croatia yet to play Russia or Ukraine; England play Germany I guess

Armenia 11 too, having played Croatia, Russia, Ukraine, England

Tiebreaks currently

Ukraine 192
England 181
Russia 175
Armenia 174
Germany 139
Croatia 138.5

Not sure if that suggests Ukraine v Croatia, with Russia maybe getting Poland?

[Alex Holowczak]

The German board four, who lost the classic yesterday to Dubov (who would, it might be said in passing, surely have converted from Matlakov's position today) lost again today in the match against Ukraine from being a piece up for not very much - surely the most remarkable game of all on the top boards. Will be interesting to see whether he plays against us tomorrow.

Presumably, Svane will be dropped and Germany will play their top 4 who are a fairly solid looking outfit. But with the draw odds, England must be favourites.

If I've worked it out correctly - and I've rushed it rather - I think in Round 9 we'll see: Ukraine v Croatia, Russia v Poland, Germany v England.

[John Moore]

Pairings are a bit tricky since both Russia and Ukraine really want to play Croatia and whichever doesn't play them seems to have to drop down to the 10 pointers, the most dangerous of whom would appear to be Poland, the third seeds.

[John Moore]

Ah sorry, Alex is there ahead of me.

[Mick Norris]

Armenia v Greece?

[Alex Holowczak]

Armenia v Greece?

Yes

[Mick Norris]

Cheers Alex; maybe I'll get the hang of this eventually

What time UK time do the games start tomorrow? The organisers seem to have missed the obvious clash (G Man & Warks travelling to Newcastle under Lyme for the U160 match, I mean, not the rugby)

[Alex Holowczak]

Cheers Alex; maybe I'll get the hang of this eventually

They've actually changed the pairing rules this year, so I'm not sure I'm too hot on them either.

What time UK time do the games start tomorrow? The organisers seem to have missed the obvious clash (G Man & Warks travelling to Newcastle under Lyme for the U160 match, I mean, not the rugby)

Schedule says 11am, which is 7am UK time.

[David Sedgwick]

What time UK time do the games start tomorrow? The organisers seem to have missed the obvious clash (G Man & Warks travelling to Newcastle under Lyme for the U160 match, I mean, not the rugby)

European Team Championships: 0700 (0715 with the 15 minute time delay)

England v South Africa - Rugby: 0900

Greater Manchester U160 v Warwickshire U160: Please advise, Mick.

[John Moore]

Just realised - what on earth is tiebreak 2 and what would happen if, for instance, England were to draw 2-2 and Armenia win 4-0.

[Alex Holowczak]

Just realised - what on earth is tiebreak 2 and what would happen if, for instance, England were to draw 2-2 and Armenia win 4-0.

It's the Sonnenborn-Berger Olympiad Khanty-Mansiysk without lowest result tie-break. What don't you understand about that?

[Alex Holowczak]

Just realised - what on earth is tiebreak 2 and what would happen if, for instance, England were to draw 2-2 and Armenia win 4-0.

It's the Sonnenborn-Berger Olympiad Khanty-Mansiysk without lowest result tie-break. What don't you understand about that?

In a bid to be rather more helpful...

Basically, it's the sum of (matchpoints x gamepoints you scored against them) for all of your opponents, not including the team that's lowest in the ranking list.

So if you played a team on 12 MP, and you beat them 4-0, then you score 48 to your tie-break. If you played a team on 6 MP and you lost 1-3, then you get 6 to your tie-break. Repeat this for all your opponents, except the one that's last in the ranking, and that's your tie-break score. There are further complexities for unplayed games, such as forfeits and byes.

In a previous Olympiad, Malcolm asked me to give him a piece of paper with what he needed to keep track of to help work out the tie-break in Round 11. I presented him at breakfast that morning with a notebook containing everything. I suspect the notebook never made it into the playing area.

TAP is investigating the tie-breaks at the Olympiad in 2020. Our final proposal is likely to see this tie-break no longer in operation, and replaced with something that can actually be concisely explained and followed; rather than some arbitrary maths. We'll see what happens.