European Club Championship

[Warren Kingston]

Just browsing Chessbase and saw this.

http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=6745

Look at Board 32

[benedgell]

http://ecc2010.chessdom.com/

Great effort by Betsson in the first round. Adam Hunt and Andrew Ledger both drew (vs Kamsky and Sutovsky respectively), and Dave Ledger won against GM Boris Avrukh. A 4-2 loss against a team outrating them by probably a good 300 points a board on average is a fine effort.

Also well done to Richard Pallister, who drew with GM Kononenko.

[Richard Bates]

Just browsing Chessbase and saw this.

http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=6745

Look at Board 32

Board 8, not 32. We are the 32nd seeds. Also Richard Jones drew with somebody rated 2640, I think, but has had any norm chances wrecked by getting the bye in round 2. Surprised they couldn't have located a Bulgarian filler team, but there we are.

Round 2 draw is one for haters of Computer Pairing systems to get their teeth into. I must confess to being mystified as to how, within what looks largely like a conventional swiss seeded draw, the 2nd seeds have been paired against the 6th seeds (and on zero, the two lowest seeds other than the team getting the bye have been paired together)!

[Roger de Coverly]

Round 2 draw is one for haters of Computer Pairing systems to get their teeth into

They don't appear to be using the relatively straightforward and logical system from the recent Olympiad ( this ranked teams within score groups by their game point score as the first sort and by average rating as the second). Is anyone able to reverse engineer the system in use from the actual pairings?

[Michael Yeo]

Is anyone able to reverse engineer the system in use from the actual pairings?

It appears to be some form of top v bottom within each score group. The three teams on 6 game points have each been given a team on 4 game points. The three teams on 2 game points (including Betsson) have each been given a team with 0 game points.

[Warren Kingston]

Just browsing Chessbase and saw this.

http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=6745

Look at Board 32

Board 8, not 32. We are the 32nd seeds. Also Richard Jones drew with somebody rated 2640, I think, but has had any norm chances wrecked by getting the bye in round 2. Surprised they couldn't have located a Bulgarian filler team, but there we are.

Round 2 draw is one for haters of Computer Pairing systems to get their teeth into. I must confess to being mystified as to how, within what looks largely like a conventional swiss seeded draw, the 2nd seeds have been paired against the 6th seeds (and on zero, the two lowest seeds other than the team getting the bye have been paired together)!

Sorry about that, assumed Br meant Broad.

[Richard Bates]

Is anyone able to reverse engineer the system in use from the actual pairings?

It appears to be some form of top v bottom within each score group. The three teams on 6 game points have each been given a team on 4 game points. The three teams on 2 game points (including Betsson) have each been given a team with 0 game points.

Ah right. So it looks as if they've seeded on score groups according to game pts (as per Olympiad) and then tried to hide it by determining the board order according to rating seedings! But floats are still determined according to seedings (hence Nidum getting the bye as the weakest team).

[Alex Holowczak]

Perhaps they're coming up with complicated pairing systems deliberately to stop wannabe arbiters complaining about the pairings... If you can't work out how it's calculated, then you can't complain!

[Michael Jones]

Perhaps they're coming up with complicated pairing systems deliberately to stop wannabe arbiters complaining about the pairings... If you can't work out how it's calculated, then you can't complain!

On the contrary, I've heard most complaints from people who can work it out!

[Leonard Barden]

Three very interesting pairings this afternoon:

Adams v Nepomniachtchi
McShane v Caruana

Laznicka v Aronian Aronian will become world No1 on the live ratings if he wins, as Anand and Carlsen drew this morning in Pearl Spring

[Mick Norris]

Adam Hunt v Cheparinov should be interesting too, that's 3 GMs in 5 rounds for Adam - does he have chances of a GM norm?

[Alex Holowczak]

Adam Hunt v Cheparinov should be interesting too, that's 3 GMs in 5 rounds for Adam - does he have chances of a GM norm?

No, because the tournament is only 7 rounds.

[benedgell]

Gawain Jones got a norm in the ECC a few years ago.

Just looking at the results, Rd.3. The team Betsson were playing had players rated between 2470 and 2320 on the top 4 boards, then a 2539 GM on board 5. I understand playing people a bit above or below the exact rated order depending on form, but that seems ridiculous.

[Simon Ansell]

Adam Hunt v Cheparinov should be interesting too, that's 3 GMs in 5 rounds for Adam - does he have chances of a GM norm?

No, because the tournament is only 7 rounds.

You can make a 7-round norm in certain tournaments, the ECC being one of them. Bob Eames made an IM norm in Greece a couple of years ago playing for Betsson.

Edit: If Adam gets a result today he has a good chance, otherwise it will be difficult but probably still possible, depending on the pairings. Dave Ledger has a good chance of an IM norm I think.

[Alex Holowczak]

Adam Hunt v Cheparinov should be interesting too, that's 3 GMs in 5 rounds for Adam - does he have chances of a GM norm?

No, because the tournament is only 7 rounds.

You can make a 7-round norm in certain tournaments, the ECC being one of them. Bob Eames made an IM norm in Greece a couple of years ago playing for Betsson.

Edit: If Adam gets a result today he has a good chance, otherwise it will be difficult but probably still possible, depending on the pairings. Dave Ledger has a good chance of an IM norm I think.

Oh, fair enough then!