Chess Moves 2012 May-June, Chess, Chess Moves, ebook, pdf

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//-->4NCL 2011-2012 final weekend - 5-7 May 2012, Hinckley IslandMickey Adams & Jonathan Rowson ponder ... [pictures by Ray Morris-Hill]The final weekend of the 2011-12 4NCL season was hosted by the BarceloHotel, Hinckley Island who provided good playing conditions and accom-modation.Wood Green Hilsmark Kingfisher 1 powered to the Division OneChampionship Pool title finishing with maximum points and five pointsclear of second place. Round 9 saw them demolish Jutes of Kent 7.5-0.5,Cheddleton only managed one game point in round 10 whilst Barbicanmanaged a creditable five draws in round eleven but wins for MichaelAdams, Nick Pert (who scored 8/9 overall) and Pia Cramling ensured theirone hundred per cent record was maintained. Luke McShane, DavidHowell and Jonathan Rowson were among the many other grandmastersthat contributed to the team’s success.1Guildford 1 finished in second place with nine pointsfrom fourteen, White Rose were placed ahead ofCheddleton on game points both having eight matchpoints. There followed Barbican 1 with seven, Jutes ofKent 5, Barbican 2 (IM norm for Sam Franklin) scoredthree and e2e4.org.uk two.Notable results were White Rose defeating Guildford inround nine with wins for Richard Palliser (GM norm),Colin McNab, Iain Gourlay and Jean-Luc Weller againstAntoaneta Stefanova, David Smerdon, Stuart Conquestand James Plaskett. Guildford recovered with a 5-3 victo-ry over Barbican in round ten, there were six draws withAntoaneta Stefanova and Stuart Conquest securing victo-ry.Individually, Ingrid Lauterbach had a fine weekend, draw-ing with David Eggleston (2327), Marcos CamachoCollados (2422) and GM Alexander Baburin (2535).The three European Club places went to White Rose,Jutes of Kent and e2e4.org.uk as the higher placedChampionship Pool teams declined a place.Cambridge University 1 topped the Demotion Pool withmaximum points but Oxford 1 with seven points, TheADs six, Bristol 1 two and Anglian Avengers 1 one wereall relegated. Blackthorne Russia survived on game pointsahead of Oxford, largely due to their 7-1 victory in theirmatch in round nine. Harriet Hunt scored two out of twoto help them to safety. Michael White, of Oxford, madean IM norm.Olivia Smith had draws with IMs Malcolm Pein (2382)and Gavin Wall (2330) and a win against Nicole MirandaGonzalez (2027)AMCA Dragons won the Division Two Promotion Poolwith twelve points and were therefore promoted alongwith Warwickshire Select on ten and South WalesDragons and Sambuca Sharks on nine. Pandora’s Box nar-rowly missed out with eight points.Significant results included South Wales Dragons 4-4draw with Pandora’s Box with John Cooper and SvenZeidler defeating much higher rated IMs on the top twoboards and Sambuca Sharks 4.5-3.5 win against KingsHead with wins for GM Robin Van Kampen on boardone and Chris Russell on board eight in round nine.Sambuca then beat Pandora’s Box 4.5-3.5 with wins forTom Rendle, Peter Roberson and Sam Williams in roundten whilst in round eleven SW Dragons, Sambuca andWarwickshire all won meaning that Pandora’s Box 5.5-2.5win against AMCA was insufficient to secure them pro-motion.Barbican Youth won the Division Two Demotion Poolwith Cambridge University 2, Bradford DCA Knights A,Brown Jack and FCA Solutions all being relegated.Important results included Rhyfelwyr Essyllwg defeatingBradford 4.5-3.5 in round nine, Spirit of Atticus 6.5-1.5win over Bradford in round ten and 3Cs victories overFCA Solutions and Bradford (4.5-3.5). Cambridge couldonly draw with Brown Jack in round eleven whereas anextra half point would have meant they stayed up by onegame point ahead of 3Cs!e2e4.org.uk 2 were champions of Division 3 with 18match points and were promoted along with KJCA Kingsand North East Eagles on seventeen and Wessex on six-teen. Three victories for e2e4, 5-1 against AMCA Rhinosfollowed by 3.5-2.5 against North East England and 4-2against Wessex saw them take the title. KJCA Kings andNorth East England drew in round nine before round tendefeats meant they had to win in the last round, whichthey both did. Wessex won in round, nine and ten whichproved sufficient for them to take fourth place. Hackney,AMCA Rhinos and Guildford 3 on fifteen points wereamong the many frustrated teams that missed out on thetop four.Various links to the results and league tables can be foundas follows:League tables: http://www.4ncl.co.uk/tbs_1112.htmResults: http://www.4ncl.co.uk/resdiv1.htmhttp://www.4ncl.co.uk/resdiv2.htmhttp://www.4ncl.co.uk/resdiv3s.htmCrosstable: http://www.4ncl.co.uk/fide_crosstables.htmGames: http://www.4ncl.co.uk/downloads.htm2012-13 dates:http://www.4ncl.co.uk/2012_13_dates.htmIn closing I would like to thank the many people who helptowards the continuing success of the league includingMike Truran, Claire Summerscale and all of the arbitersand game inputting team.- Lawrence Cooper2Above - Anantha Anilkumar, Mark Hebden | Right - Stuart ConquestBelow (L-R) - Matt Carr & David Clayton, Nick Pert, Jack RuddBottom (L-R) - Elizabeth Paehtz, Bogdan Lalic/Brian Smith/JonSpeelman & Sheila Jackson, Antoaneta StefanovaVery bottom - Phil EhrPictures on this page courtesy of Dr John Upham - http://johnupham.smugmug.com/chess3FINANCE COUNCIL MEETINGThe ECF Finance Council met in London on Saturday, 14 April.Chief Executive Andrew Farthing offers his personal diary of thecourse of the meeting. Any views expressed are his own.1.30 p.m. Start on time. It’s a formidable, 24-item agen-da, with a maximum available time of 5 hours (less a shorttea break), i.e. about 12 minutes per item on average.Piece of cake…1.34 p.m. Items 1-3 completed and Minutes approved.1.35 p.m. Matters arising from the Minutes not otherwiseon the agenda. Alex McFarlane, representing theScarborough congress, read out a statement asserting thatthe President’s Report approved at the previous Councilmeeting should be considered inaccurate in the light ofsubsequent information. Discussed for 25 minutes with-out clear conclusion.2.02 p.m. Chief Executive’s Report. Updated Council onthe Board’s decision regarding the online membershipsolution. This prompts 8 detailed questions from oneperson alone. Council not being asked to approve Boarddecision, but discussion continues regardless.2.25 p.m. Still on my report. It mentions the CAS lawsuitagainst FIDE. Despite my pointing out that this is thefollowing agenda item, discussed for 10 minutes, mainlyregarding the non-reporting of the case to Council at the2011 meetings.2.35 p.m. Back to the events following the 2011 BritishChampionships and, in particular, matters relating to ateleconference of the Board directors, referred to erro-neously by me at the time as a Board meeting but techni-cally not one. This leads to mild hilarity when Mike Gunnrefers to his having been overseas and therefore “notpresent at the non-meeting”.2.52 p.m. A few delegates are starting to grow concernedat the slow progress and press the Chairman to move tonext business. The Chief Exec’s Report is approved, with– if memory serves – one vote against.2.56 p.m. Update on lawsuit. Delegate comments areoverwhelmingly disapproving of the Board’s judgement indeciding to initiate the action and of its failure to briefCouncil on it. It is decided that the most appropriate wayto express approval or disapproval is to vote on accept-ECF Newsance or rejection of the FIDE Delegate’s report. On ahand vote, the score was 17-15 in favour of approval, butthe closeness indicated the need for a card vote. This sawthe report rejected, 73 to 103.3.13 p.m. The first piece of finance business: item 7(Report on ECF accounts for the year ended 30 April2011). We’ve averaged 22 minutes per agenda item thusfar, but this is a quickie. Approved with none against afterfour minutes.3.17 p.m. Introduce the report of the Chairman of theFinance Committee, who is unavoidably absent.Discussion of the first half, concerning the annualaccounts, takes just over five minutes. Questions strayonto the second half, which concerns the accounts of the2011 British Championships. John Philpott explains toCouncil the work that he completed on these and talkedthrough the figures. Council is satisfied with the correct-ed accounts as presented but concerns are expressed overlapses in the processing and approval of transactions,which are breaches of the ECF’s Financial Bye Laws.Connecting this to earlier discussions, a motion is pro-posed which, after debate, is modified to the following:‘Council considers that the conduct of the Presidentbrings his performance in the role into question and callsfor a full review of his activities.’After a close hand vote, the resulting card vote saw themotion defeated 84 – 93.4.05 p.m. Just past halfway in terms of time; a third of theway down the agenda, with the most substantive topicsstill to come. With some relief, delegates welcome theChairman’s announcement of a ten-minute tea break.4.20 p.m. The meeting resumes with item 9, a motionproposed by Sean Hewitt to move responsibility for inter-national rating from Home Chess to International Chess.Despite the momentary absence of the proposer, themotion is overwhelmingly approved on a hand vote.4.22 p.m. Council is invited to approve the Business Planfor 2012/13. This is approved with none against after theusual extensive discussion.CONTENTS4NCL - FC, 2-3ECF News - 4-8International - 9Results Round-Up - 9World Schools - 16-214ChEx Bookshelf - 22Book Reviews - 25Grand Prix - 27Batsford - 28Calendar - 294.24 p.m. Next item – the report of the Finance Director,including the forecast for the 2011/12 financial year justconcluding. There is a motion to insert item 21 - the con-sultation paper on a junior membership scheme – at thispoint, i.e. to discuss it before getting into the meat of the2012/13 budget. There is insufficient support for thisrequest. Slightly alarmed by the reason for opposing thesuggestion given by one delegate, “If I had known thatone of the consultation papers was going to be discussedas a concrete proposal, I would have read them,” but Iunderstand what he means. The Director of Finance’sreport is duly noted.4.44 p.m. Finally into the meat of the Finance meeting.Item 12 is the proposal for Membership Fees from 1September 2012. These are as presented to Council at thelast AGM. A proposal from the floor to increase the rec-ommended subscription rates for Bronze, Silver and Goldby £2 is defeated on a hand vote 11-21. A further propos-al to remove the £1 discount for online payment is alsodefeated.A proposal to increase the proposed 3-year rates so thatthey are simply three times the annual rate (i.e. no dis-count, but protection against price rises) was approved22-8.As amended by the above, the proposed membership feeswere approved 28-3.5.15 p.m. An hour and a quarter left, and the halfwaypoint has been reached on the agenda, numerically if notnecessarily in terms of substance. Not good.Item 13 – the proposal to keep the minimum MembershipFee for Member Organisations at £58 – is quicklyapproved. Under the new arrangements, this will apply tovery few organisations anyway.5.17 p.m. Here’s where it became complicated. This wasthe proposal for the Game Fee rates to apply from 1September 2012. Many different amendments were pro-posed from the floor. The final outcome was as follows:Paragraph 4.6 of the Game Fee Bye Laws were amendedin October 2011 to state:“The payment of Game Fee is hereby waived …. witheffect from 1st September 2012 in respect of gamesplayed by Direct Members in competitions organised bythe Federation (including the British Championships, theNational Club Championships and the National Stages ofthe Counties Championship) and competitions registeredpursuant to 4.3 hereof (i.e. competitions run by ChessLeagues Congresses and Clubs which are registered by31st October).”So Game Fees will only be payable in respect of games (orhalf games) played by non Members:The Board proposes the following level of GameFee for results as from 1 September 2012: the alignmentof all rates for standard graded games at £2 and for rapid-play graded games at £1 is consistent with the relative vot-ing entitlements under Article 30 that will apply from 1September 2012.(a) Standard graded games – £2;(b) Rapidplay graded games – £1;(c) Standard graded games submitted by clubs (forinternal club competitions) – £2;(d) Rapidplay graded games submitted by clubs(for internal club competitions) – £1:Provided that:(1) for Congresses the respective rates shall bereduced to a total fee per event of £6 per adult player and£4 per junior player irrespective of the number of gamesplayed and where a Bronze Member takes part in aCongress such fee shall be effective to upgrade his or hermembership for the year in question to a SilverMembership.Rates for junior events(e) Standard graded games played between juniorplayers under the age of 18 in solely junior events – 50p;(f) Rapidplay graded games played between juniorplayers under the age of 18 in solely junior events – 25p:(g) Standard graded games submitted by clubs (forinternal club competitions played between junior playersunder the age of 18 in solely junior events) – 50p:(h) Rapidplay graded games submitted by clubs(for internal club competitions played between juniorplayers under the age of 18 in solely junior events) – 25p:where each graded game will comprise two results andGame Fee shall be payable for each result (all of whichterms are defined in the Game Fee Bye Laws).What’s the significance of this amended version? Theanswer is not straightforward and not necessarily pre-dictable. This is my take on it:(1) Removal of complexity. In process terms, the removalof the different rates depending on the achievement of an85% threshold of membership makes things clearer andeasier.(2) Addition of new complexity. There are now different‘pay to play’ fees (in non-junior only events) depending onwhether the player is an adult or a junior. Also, the pro-posed simplified game fee structure has been “de-simpli-fied” again.(3) Increased risk of discouraging new/ungraded players.With the passing of the 85% threshold also went the5 [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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