After the excitement of the last few days it was a pretty uneventful Annual General Assembly of the World Curling Federation today. With 43 members represented and 15 proxies there were more than enough for a quorum. President Kate Caithness started proceedings with a minute’s silence in the memory of the people of Japan and New Zealand and also the recent losses of Frank Duffy and Jim Duff, one of whose roles of course was as Master of Ceremonies for the Pondhoppers Club.
One of the banes of the organisers of major championships is the recent custom for teams to arrive late for things like final banquets or to appear in casual clothes when team uniform has been requested. In future if a complaint is received from an organising committee there will be a financial penalty for the infraction payable by the national association concerned.
I have talked already a couple of days ago (see here) of some of the proposals. Time outs (as coach interactions will now be called) will remain as they are currently operated, with clocks stopped for a specified travelling time and then the coach having one minute to interact with the team with the clocks running; tie breakers will remain in operation for most competitions, but for the WSCC, WMDCC and EJCC, alternative skill based solutions which do not require extra games will be trialled from next season; more detail will be put on the bones for the new World Championship Qualifying system for further approval at Moscow, and the first World Curling Congress will be held in the autumn of 2012 though there will still be a General Assembly at Basel in April.
And that was about it!
Friday, March 25, 2011
And the fun continues...
Yesterday was the Semi Annual General Meeting of the European Curling Federation and just 18 of the 37 members of the Federation were represented in person. The problem was that 50% are required to make the meeting quorate so no decisions could be taken! So bit of a waste of time for anyone who had travelled specially, though most are here for today’s WCF Annual General Assembly.
The meeting got off to a sensational start when President Andrew Ferguson-Smith announced that he had come to an agreement with the municipality of Champery for the setting up of a European Centre of Curling Excellence in Champery of which he would be the first CEO. It was going to be set as a Société à responsabilité limitée, broadly equivalent to a private company limited by shares (Ltd) in the United Kingdom with 49% owned by the ECF and 51%% by the curling club and municipality of Champery. The HQ office of the ECF would also be there and the municipality was giving free office space.
After the good burghers of Champery had given their presentation on the project, uproar ensued as many of the ECF members complained that they were being presented with a fait accompli and that they had not had a chance to see if this deal was the best for their association and members. Even the Executive Board of the ECF had only seen the proposal last night and so were not prepared to fully back their President.
After last year’s stand-off with the WCF this was a further blow to the credibility of the ECF President with his members. At the end of the day he was asked to go away and produce the paperwork for the project, which he hoped to begin in September, so that members could pore over it and check out the details.
That is not to say that the members disagreed with the idea – all who spoke backed the concept of the proposal but unfortunately the manner of its presentation and sudden appearance on the agenda did not find favour. One can only hope that the visitors from Champery will not drop the idea as being too much of a hot potato and that the proposal will get the go ahead in due course.
The rest of the meeting passed quietly. The one major announcement was that the 2012 EMCC and ECC – C group competitions would more than likely be in Erzurum, Turkey, the recent site of the World University Games. Just a few more details need to be finalised before the venue is confirmed. Interestingly to make the combination of the two championships easier the games in the ECC-C group will be limited to 8 ends, the same as the EMCC.
The International Court of Arbitration of Sport had also thrown out Poland’s legal action against the ECF after the ECF had suspended them from the European Championships for non-payment of their annual subscription. It was also announced that ten countries had still to pay their subscription for this year – including Denmark, Germany and Russia. I hope the last pays in time or they will not be playing at the Europeans in Moscow!
The meeting got off to a sensational start when President Andrew Ferguson-Smith announced that he had come to an agreement with the municipality of Champery for the setting up of a European Centre of Curling Excellence in Champery of which he would be the first CEO. It was going to be set as a Société à responsabilité limitée, broadly equivalent to a private company limited by shares (Ltd) in the United Kingdom with 49% owned by the ECF and 51%% by the curling club and municipality of Champery. The HQ office of the ECF would also be there and the municipality was giving free office space.
After the good burghers of Champery had given their presentation on the project, uproar ensued as many of the ECF members complained that they were being presented with a fait accompli and that they had not had a chance to see if this deal was the best for their association and members. Even the Executive Board of the ECF had only seen the proposal last night and so were not prepared to fully back their President.
After last year’s stand-off with the WCF this was a further blow to the credibility of the ECF President with his members. At the end of the day he was asked to go away and produce the paperwork for the project, which he hoped to begin in September, so that members could pore over it and check out the details.
That is not to say that the members disagreed with the idea – all who spoke backed the concept of the proposal but unfortunately the manner of its presentation and sudden appearance on the agenda did not find favour. One can only hope that the visitors from Champery will not drop the idea as being too much of a hot potato and that the proposal will get the go ahead in due course.
The rest of the meeting passed quietly. The one major announcement was that the 2012 EMCC and ECC – C group competitions would more than likely be in Erzurum, Turkey, the recent site of the World University Games. Just a few more details need to be finalised before the venue is confirmed. Interestingly to make the combination of the two championships easier the games in the ECC-C group will be limited to 8 ends, the same as the EMCC.
The International Court of Arbitration of Sport had also thrown out Poland’s legal action against the ECF after the ECF had suspended them from the European Championships for non-payment of their annual subscription. It was also announced that ten countries had still to pay their subscription for this year – including Denmark, Germany and Russia. I hope the last pays in time or they will not be playing at the Europeans in Moscow!
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
Off the Ice at Esbjerg
While the women battle it out on the ice in Esbjerg, happenings off the ice could change the face of international championships in the near future.
Under the two tenets of the WCF wanting to have control over who plays in their championships and having the best teams on the ice at the major finals, a group was set up following the meetings in Champery last December to iron out the details of a qualifying competition for the Men’s and Women’s World Championships from 2014 onwards.
As a result of that group’s discussions and further talk in the last couple of days it looks as though the following system will ultimately get the go ahead – but not until further details are added to the proposal and so not until Moscow in December.
For the World Championships from 2014 onwards the participants will be decided as follows: the host nation, the top 7 countries from previous World Championships and then the top two teams from at least two qualifying competitions to be run by the WCF.
The top seven countries may be from the previous season or from a weighted average of past performance (say over the previous three seasons) – this is one of the details to be finalised.
All other member nations would participate (if they wanted to) in a qualifying competition – let’s assume there will be two called Red and Blue. If the host venue for one of these competitions is in the entries then they would be placed in the respective group and then all other nations would be placed according to World ranking. Otherwise World ranking would be the sole determinant. Entries would need to be in by June 1st and the qualifying competitions would be held in November, except for an Olympic season when they would be held in January because the Olympic Qualifying Event is programmed for November (see below for details of that!). The top two teams from each event would qualify for the WMCC and WWCC.
So this means the end of regional qualification via the European or Pacific Championships and also ends the almost automatic qualification of Canada and the USA who would have to finish in the top 7 or 8 to qualify for the next year. In the most extreme circumstances it could mean a World Championships made up entirely of European countries or alternatively with only three or four European Countries participating. It also calls into doubt the role and status of the Pacific and European Championships.
With Olympic qualification dependent upon gathering points in the World Championships will national associations be forced by their national Olympic Associations to enter the World Qualifying competitions but then not offered any help to compete in the European Championships which will occur just a few weeks later? Will a country’s best players be able to get time off or to afford to attend both competitions?
From an England point of view for example why should we send a team to the World Qualifying as we do not get any Olympic points even if we get to Worlds and even if we did it is certain that our champion teams could not afford to play in both – so do we send a poorer quality team to the Europeans? But then entry to the WCF Qualifier will presumably be free while an entry to the European Championships costs over £500?
And then there is the Olympic Qualifying Event (OQE) – this was confirmed at the meetings in Champery – it will be held in the November prior to the Olympics and will be for all nations who have played in the three previous World Championships but not gathered enough qualifying points to automatically play in the Olympics. So for season 2013-14 (and other Olympic seasons) the programme begins to look like this: OQE in November, Europeans/Pacifics in December, World Qualifiers in January, Olympics in February and Worlds in March/April – quite a programme and is it sustainable in what is still an amateur sport?
In non Olympic years the World Qualifying Competition will take place in November. One side effect of all this could be that the World Mixed Doubles and World Seniors will not be changed to November as was previously proposed – soundings will be taken of the teams in St Paul at this year’s competitions.
Two rule changes will also be voted on at Friday’s General Assembly. Firstly the issue of time-outs has arisen again. In Cortina it was decided that they would be replaced by coach interactions when the coach could have a minute on the ice with his/her players but the clock would not stop. This led to some dangerous situations with coaches running or climbing barriers to get to their team as quickly as possible. In Champery it was decided to implement a travelling time for the coaches which would be specific to each venue and would be when the clock would be stopped. When the coach reached their team the clock would start and they would have a minute on the ice with their team.
It is necessary for this revised rule to be defined in the Rule Book and so this will be done on Friday if voted for but in addition the option of doing away with time-outs all together will also be put on the table.
The WCF is still keen to do away with tiebreakers as the need to allow time in the programme is not an efficient use of time if it is not needed and situations have arisen recently where insufficient time was allowed in the programme for tiebreakers, leading to the situation at the EJCC in Prague where the Czech Republic played four games in one day.
There is no option on the table to do away with tie breakers but there is a motion to keep tie breakers for the moment in the WMCC, WWCC, WJCC, WWhCC and WMDCC but to try out a number of alternative systems in the EJCC, PJCC, WSCC and WWhQCC – these alternatives include variations on the Draw Shot Challenge, including more than one stone per game, a post round robin shoot out, as trialled at the EMCC last September, or a reversion to a previous system of a post round robin four-stone all team member draw shot challenge.
The final major proposal put forward by the WCF Board was to disconnect the WCF General Assembly from the World Championships to allow attention to be focussed on the curling and allow WCF Board Members more time to network and entertain sponsors. The idea is that there will be a World Curling Congress in the Autumn which will not just incorporate the meetings but could be expanded to include clinics etc. While the WCF wanted to initiate this in 2011, they were persuaded that arrangements were already too far advanced for the semi-annual assembly at Moscow in December and so the likely outcome is for the General Assembly due for Basel in April to be abandoned and the first World Curling Congress to take place in Autumn 2012.
Further information on these proposals will follow the General Assembly in Friday.
Watch this space.
Under the two tenets of the WCF wanting to have control over who plays in their championships and having the best teams on the ice at the major finals, a group was set up following the meetings in Champery last December to iron out the details of a qualifying competition for the Men’s and Women’s World Championships from 2014 onwards.
As a result of that group’s discussions and further talk in the last couple of days it looks as though the following system will ultimately get the go ahead – but not until further details are added to the proposal and so not until Moscow in December.
For the World Championships from 2014 onwards the participants will be decided as follows: the host nation, the top 7 countries from previous World Championships and then the top two teams from at least two qualifying competitions to be run by the WCF.
The top seven countries may be from the previous season or from a weighted average of past performance (say over the previous three seasons) – this is one of the details to be finalised.
All other member nations would participate (if they wanted to) in a qualifying competition – let’s assume there will be two called Red and Blue. If the host venue for one of these competitions is in the entries then they would be placed in the respective group and then all other nations would be placed according to World ranking. Otherwise World ranking would be the sole determinant. Entries would need to be in by June 1st and the qualifying competitions would be held in November, except for an Olympic season when they would be held in January because the Olympic Qualifying Event is programmed for November (see below for details of that!). The top two teams from each event would qualify for the WMCC and WWCC.
So this means the end of regional qualification via the European or Pacific Championships and also ends the almost automatic qualification of Canada and the USA who would have to finish in the top 7 or 8 to qualify for the next year. In the most extreme circumstances it could mean a World Championships made up entirely of European countries or alternatively with only three or four European Countries participating. It also calls into doubt the role and status of the Pacific and European Championships.
With Olympic qualification dependent upon gathering points in the World Championships will national associations be forced by their national Olympic Associations to enter the World Qualifying competitions but then not offered any help to compete in the European Championships which will occur just a few weeks later? Will a country’s best players be able to get time off or to afford to attend both competitions?
From an England point of view for example why should we send a team to the World Qualifying as we do not get any Olympic points even if we get to Worlds and even if we did it is certain that our champion teams could not afford to play in both – so do we send a poorer quality team to the Europeans? But then entry to the WCF Qualifier will presumably be free while an entry to the European Championships costs over £500?
And then there is the Olympic Qualifying Event (OQE) – this was confirmed at the meetings in Champery – it will be held in the November prior to the Olympics and will be for all nations who have played in the three previous World Championships but not gathered enough qualifying points to automatically play in the Olympics. So for season 2013-14 (and other Olympic seasons) the programme begins to look like this: OQE in November, Europeans/Pacifics in December, World Qualifiers in January, Olympics in February and Worlds in March/April – quite a programme and is it sustainable in what is still an amateur sport?
In non Olympic years the World Qualifying Competition will take place in November. One side effect of all this could be that the World Mixed Doubles and World Seniors will not be changed to November as was previously proposed – soundings will be taken of the teams in St Paul at this year’s competitions.
Two rule changes will also be voted on at Friday’s General Assembly. Firstly the issue of time-outs has arisen again. In Cortina it was decided that they would be replaced by coach interactions when the coach could have a minute on the ice with his/her players but the clock would not stop. This led to some dangerous situations with coaches running or climbing barriers to get to their team as quickly as possible. In Champery it was decided to implement a travelling time for the coaches which would be specific to each venue and would be when the clock would be stopped. When the coach reached their team the clock would start and they would have a minute on the ice with their team.
It is necessary for this revised rule to be defined in the Rule Book and so this will be done on Friday if voted for but in addition the option of doing away with time-outs all together will also be put on the table.
The WCF is still keen to do away with tiebreakers as the need to allow time in the programme is not an efficient use of time if it is not needed and situations have arisen recently where insufficient time was allowed in the programme for tiebreakers, leading to the situation at the EJCC in Prague where the Czech Republic played four games in one day.
There is no option on the table to do away with tie breakers but there is a motion to keep tie breakers for the moment in the WMCC, WWCC, WJCC, WWhCC and WMDCC but to try out a number of alternative systems in the EJCC, PJCC, WSCC and WWhQCC – these alternatives include variations on the Draw Shot Challenge, including more than one stone per game, a post round robin shoot out, as trialled at the EMCC last September, or a reversion to a previous system of a post round robin four-stone all team member draw shot challenge.
The final major proposal put forward by the WCF Board was to disconnect the WCF General Assembly from the World Championships to allow attention to be focussed on the curling and allow WCF Board Members more time to network and entertain sponsors. The idea is that there will be a World Curling Congress in the Autumn which will not just incorporate the meetings but could be expanded to include clinics etc. While the WCF wanted to initiate this in 2011, they were persuaded that arrangements were already too far advanced for the semi-annual assembly at Moscow in December and so the likely outcome is for the General Assembly due for Basel in April to be abandoned and the first World Curling Congress to take place in Autumn 2012.
Further information on these proposals will follow the General Assembly in Friday.
Watch this space.
Wednesday, February 09, 2011
The English Curling Championships
Just ten days after all the foreigners had been seen off the premises following the Four Nations, the ECA’s second biggest event of the season - the English Championships - began at Greenacres. The five men’s teams, playing a double round robin, began on Thursday lunchtime, but they would be nearly half way through their schedule before the two women’s teams joined in for their best-of-five rubber on Friday evening.
Alan MacDougall, Jamie Malton, James Dixon, Neil Maycock and Ben Fowler were the male skips while Fiona Hawker and Sandra Moorcroft skipped the women.
Alan MacDougall, the defending champion and favourite, got off to the best of starts with a 4 at the first end against Neil Maycock and he was never seriously troubled as he raced to a 15-6 victory after eight ends. Meanwhile the two teams expected to offer the best challenge to Alan, Jamie Malton and James Dixon (skipping the Bruce Bowyer team after finishing second with that line-up at the previous weekend’s Haggis competition), were involved in a close struggle which eventually Dixon won by 6-4.
Session 2 introduced Ben Fowler and his fellow junior, Harry Mallows, to the Championships and in a switchback of a game they were unlucky to lose 9-10 to Neil Maycock after being 9-7 up after 9. Alan MacDougall had another emphatic victory over James Dixon who shook hands after 6 ends with the score at 7-1 to Alan. So already the leading challengers had both lost a game and things were looking good for the defending champions.
Session 3 and the MacDougall team were on a bye as Dixon and Malton both won, Dixon by 7-5 over Maycock, helped by a run of four singles, and Malton more easily by 10-3 against Fowler who was unable to repeat the form of the previous evening.
The next session is quickly dealt with - Malton beat Maycock 13-1 and MacDougall beat Fowler 15-4 but this then leads us to the third and last session of the day on Friday - and the closest and longest game of the weekend! The session began at 20.45 and finished nearly at midnight as Ben Fowler and James Dixon slugged it out. The other game in the session had seen Alan MacDougall deal Jamie Malton a serious blow to his Championship challenge by beating him 7-5 and so James Dixon needed to win this one to keep that one win ahead of Malton and be in prime position to attack Alan MacDougall over the weekend.
And he started off well and led 6-1 after five ends but then 'one of those ends' happened and before he knew it he had lost a 5 as Ben Fowler produced two great shots. Dixon nosed ahead with a single at the 7th but then lost a 3 at the eighth. However he then won the 3 back at the ninth before Ben Fowler levelled the game and forced the extra end which a last stone hit and stick secured for Dixon as the weary spectators prayed he would not roll out and force a twelth end!
So by the end of Friday and after the first complete round robin it was MacDougall on 4 wins, Dixon on 3, Malton on 2, Maycock on 1 and Fowler on 0.
The second half of the competition was due to begin at 0830 on the Saturday but an extra hour was found from some ice cancellations and the weary warriors trooped back on at 0930. The key game in this session was that between MacDougall and Dixon as a win for the former would open up a two win cushion between him and the chasing pack. And so while Malton sent Maycock off after seven ends for an early bath after an 11-3 win, all attention turned to sheet A and a thrilling game that was all square after 6 ends (3-3) and 8 ends (5-5) and which hinged on a 9th end where a complete miss by MacDougall gave Dixon a stolen 1 and a one shot advantage going down the tenth, but without the hammer.
Probably not the best position to be in and so it proved as MacDougall was eventually left with a straight draw to the rings for 2 and the game and a buffer between him and the opposition. Now he would have to lose both of his remaining games to take the competition to a tie break.
The first of those two games was in theory going to be the easier – against winless Ben Fowler, but it proved to be a tough battle only won by running the opposition out of stones deep into the tenth end and by a 6-4 scoreline. In the other game Neil Maycock’s team (now skipped by John Brown) went down 4-9 to James Dixon.
And so to session 8 and would we see the crowning of the champion - a simple win would do and this was achieved by 8-4 against John Brown, though once again the first half of the game was close and finished at 4-3 before Alan stole a couple of 2s to make things safe. It was irrelevant therefore that Jamie Malton finished with a repeat 10-3 win over Ben Fowler.
So an unbeaten campaign gave Alan MacDougall, Andrew Reed, Andrew Woolston and Tom Jaeggi their second championship in a row and they will head to Moscow in December hoping to improve on their 21st place in Champery.
Fiona Hawker and Anna Fowler first played together last year and they continued their partnership this year as one of only two entries for the women’s Championship. After eight years of representing England at the Europeans Kirsty Balfour had not entered and Fiona’s opposition came from the team that will represent England at the World Seniors in St Paul in April, skipped by Sandra Moorcroft who plays lead stones while Susan Young throws last stones.
The fomat was a best-of-5 rubber but only 3 games were necessary as Fiona won 13-1, 15-9 (12-6 after 5 ends!) and 14-4. Included in her team is Angharad Ward who will become the youngest player to represent England in a major International Championships at just 16 years and 4 months. The fourth player in the team is Debbie Hutcheon.
One other Championship was settled at the weekend. If you have been following this blog you will remember that the ECA Senior Men’s Championships was unfinished back in December after all three teams tied and only one tie break was possible. The final tie break took place alongside the main National Championships and was won by Michael Sutherland who defeated John Brown 9-0 after just 4 ends. It was one of those games that I was never going to win.
And so Michael Sutherland returns to the World Seniors for the first time since 2008 and is joined by Tommy Campbell, John Summers and Phil Barton. Only John Summers is new to the Worlds as Tommy (2002) and Phil (2006 and 2009) have previous experience there. The defeat brought to an end the amazing record of John MacDougall who had qualified for every World Seniors since they began in 2002, though the ash cloud meant he could not get to Russia last year to play in his ninth event.
Alan MacDougall, Jamie Malton, James Dixon, Neil Maycock and Ben Fowler were the male skips while Fiona Hawker and Sandra Moorcroft skipped the women.
Alan MacDougall, the defending champion and favourite, got off to the best of starts with a 4 at the first end against Neil Maycock and he was never seriously troubled as he raced to a 15-6 victory after eight ends. Meanwhile the two teams expected to offer the best challenge to Alan, Jamie Malton and James Dixon (skipping the Bruce Bowyer team after finishing second with that line-up at the previous weekend’s Haggis competition), were involved in a close struggle which eventually Dixon won by 6-4.
Session 2 introduced Ben Fowler and his fellow junior, Harry Mallows, to the Championships and in a switchback of a game they were unlucky to lose 9-10 to Neil Maycock after being 9-7 up after 9. Alan MacDougall had another emphatic victory over James Dixon who shook hands after 6 ends with the score at 7-1 to Alan. So already the leading challengers had both lost a game and things were looking good for the defending champions.
Session 3 and the MacDougall team were on a bye as Dixon and Malton both won, Dixon by 7-5 over Maycock, helped by a run of four singles, and Malton more easily by 10-3 against Fowler who was unable to repeat the form of the previous evening.
The next session is quickly dealt with - Malton beat Maycock 13-1 and MacDougall beat Fowler 15-4 but this then leads us to the third and last session of the day on Friday - and the closest and longest game of the weekend! The session began at 20.45 and finished nearly at midnight as Ben Fowler and James Dixon slugged it out. The other game in the session had seen Alan MacDougall deal Jamie Malton a serious blow to his Championship challenge by beating him 7-5 and so James Dixon needed to win this one to keep that one win ahead of Malton and be in prime position to attack Alan MacDougall over the weekend.
And he started off well and led 6-1 after five ends but then 'one of those ends' happened and before he knew it he had lost a 5 as Ben Fowler produced two great shots. Dixon nosed ahead with a single at the 7th but then lost a 3 at the eighth. However he then won the 3 back at the ninth before Ben Fowler levelled the game and forced the extra end which a last stone hit and stick secured for Dixon as the weary spectators prayed he would not roll out and force a twelth end!
So by the end of Friday and after the first complete round robin it was MacDougall on 4 wins, Dixon on 3, Malton on 2, Maycock on 1 and Fowler on 0.
The second half of the competition was due to begin at 0830 on the Saturday but an extra hour was found from some ice cancellations and the weary warriors trooped back on at 0930. The key game in this session was that between MacDougall and Dixon as a win for the former would open up a two win cushion between him and the chasing pack. And so while Malton sent Maycock off after seven ends for an early bath after an 11-3 win, all attention turned to sheet A and a thrilling game that was all square after 6 ends (3-3) and 8 ends (5-5) and which hinged on a 9th end where a complete miss by MacDougall gave Dixon a stolen 1 and a one shot advantage going down the tenth, but without the hammer.
Probably not the best position to be in and so it proved as MacDougall was eventually left with a straight draw to the rings for 2 and the game and a buffer between him and the opposition. Now he would have to lose both of his remaining games to take the competition to a tie break.
The first of those two games was in theory going to be the easier – against winless Ben Fowler, but it proved to be a tough battle only won by running the opposition out of stones deep into the tenth end and by a 6-4 scoreline. In the other game Neil Maycock’s team (now skipped by John Brown) went down 4-9 to James Dixon.
And so to session 8 and would we see the crowning of the champion - a simple win would do and this was achieved by 8-4 against John Brown, though once again the first half of the game was close and finished at 4-3 before Alan stole a couple of 2s to make things safe. It was irrelevant therefore that Jamie Malton finished with a repeat 10-3 win over Ben Fowler.
So an unbeaten campaign gave Alan MacDougall, Andrew Reed, Andrew Woolston and Tom Jaeggi their second championship in a row and they will head to Moscow in December hoping to improve on their 21st place in Champery.
Fiona Hawker and Anna Fowler first played together last year and they continued their partnership this year as one of only two entries for the women’s Championship. After eight years of representing England at the Europeans Kirsty Balfour had not entered and Fiona’s opposition came from the team that will represent England at the World Seniors in St Paul in April, skipped by Sandra Moorcroft who plays lead stones while Susan Young throws last stones.
The fomat was a best-of-5 rubber but only 3 games were necessary as Fiona won 13-1, 15-9 (12-6 after 5 ends!) and 14-4. Included in her team is Angharad Ward who will become the youngest player to represent England in a major International Championships at just 16 years and 4 months. The fourth player in the team is Debbie Hutcheon.
One other Championship was settled at the weekend. If you have been following this blog you will remember that the ECA Senior Men’s Championships was unfinished back in December after all three teams tied and only one tie break was possible. The final tie break took place alongside the main National Championships and was won by Michael Sutherland who defeated John Brown 9-0 after just 4 ends. It was one of those games that I was never going to win.
And so Michael Sutherland returns to the World Seniors for the first time since 2008 and is joined by Tommy Campbell, John Summers and Phil Barton. Only John Summers is new to the Worlds as Tommy (2002) and Phil (2006 and 2009) have previous experience there. The defeat brought to an end the amazing record of John MacDougall who had qualified for every World Seniors since they began in 2002, though the ash cloud meant he could not get to Russia last year to play in his ninth event.
Monday, January 24, 2011
Reflections on the Four Nations
Phew!
In addition to all the reporting from Bob on his blog from Fenton’s here are just a few thoughts from me on what was a successful weekend.
A lot has been written and said about the actions of the RCCC with respect to their selection policy and then the decision (later overturned) to withdraw their trophies from the competition. Ultimately this had no effect on the actual running of the weekend as we still had to deal with four teams curling, eating, drinking, needing transporting to and from airports and hotels.
Obviously it had an effect on how I used my time in the run up to the weekend, at least until the Scottish team had organised themselves, as it meant that I had an additional task of trying to raise a team to fill the gap which had appeared in our schedule.
At no time were the ECA ever intent on showing up the RCCC or causing them or certain individuals to suffer some of the name calling and vitriolic comment appearing on other Fora. Yes, we were disappointed by the RCCC’s late decision not to send a team but with the other countries having already booked flights and hotels, with the ice booked for the whole weekend and with a dinner and band booked, we had to run a viable competition or lose a lot of friends and money.
As president, secretary and competitions convenor of the ECA for many years combined I have often had to struggle to raise teams for the Four Nations when it is held in Scotland because of previous commitments and the time and cost elements so I can appreciate the difficulties which the RCCC had at this busy time of year. The difference may have been what each of us then did when the usual channels were not successful. I am not ashamed to say that in years past I have used Scottish friends living locally to the venue of the event to bolster the English teams (and also to help out the Welsh and Irish teams)!
What this year has done is, and it may be only temporarily, to raise the profile of the Four Nations so that for at least next year there will be a lot more scrutiny about how the teams are selected, particularly in Scotland. What is important is to know that the Four Nations is not one competition, it is simply a convenient way of packaging seven individual trophies into a time and money saving package – but it works. I am sure that the four of us will sit down or hold conference calls to decide on the future of the weekend in the light of this year’s events.
While the happenings of the last month will continue to have a high profile in Scotland, as far as the ECA is concerned what is done is done and we can look back on a very successful weekend. We raised a lot of money for the Make-A–Wish charity from our raffle – approx £1300 I believe and the first prize of the laptop was won by Ross Barr (ENG), the £100 M and S voucher went to Richard Pougher (WAL) and the third prize of a silver necklace to Catriona Cooper of Scotland – all very equitable so far. Unfortunately for the Irish the fourth prize of a bottle of brandy went to Bob Cowan! The Irish team apparently only bought green tickets but only one was drawn out throughout the whole raffle which featured more than 20 other prizes.
The shot of the weekend was undoubtedly Lana Watson’s draw to lie three within the four foot against Scotland which pinched the Connie Miller Trophy back from Scotland, but it is also pertinent to say that in the next session she took seven at one end off an Irish team skipped by…….no that would be unfair – he knows who he is!
My apologies also for the lack of scores on any website owing to an administrative cock-up involving cooks and soup – and not the ones producing the stovies, toasties and breakfast rolls!
As to who won – well all the countries won at least something but interestingly six of the seven trophies changed hands this year and only one was retained by last year’s winners. The Irish were the most successful, winning all three of their contests but only by the smallest margin of one shot against England and Wales and relatively comfortably by seven shots v Scotland. Wales beat England and Scotland, England won one (the Connie Miller Trophy v Scotland) and Scotland won one (the Tom Ballantyne Trophy v England).
So on the whole a successful weekend but one that I am glad we do not have to repeat for four years!
In addition to all the reporting from Bob on his blog from Fenton’s here are just a few thoughts from me on what was a successful weekend.
A lot has been written and said about the actions of the RCCC with respect to their selection policy and then the decision (later overturned) to withdraw their trophies from the competition. Ultimately this had no effect on the actual running of the weekend as we still had to deal with four teams curling, eating, drinking, needing transporting to and from airports and hotels.
Obviously it had an effect on how I used my time in the run up to the weekend, at least until the Scottish team had organised themselves, as it meant that I had an additional task of trying to raise a team to fill the gap which had appeared in our schedule.
At no time were the ECA ever intent on showing up the RCCC or causing them or certain individuals to suffer some of the name calling and vitriolic comment appearing on other Fora. Yes, we were disappointed by the RCCC’s late decision not to send a team but with the other countries having already booked flights and hotels, with the ice booked for the whole weekend and with a dinner and band booked, we had to run a viable competition or lose a lot of friends and money.
As president, secretary and competitions convenor of the ECA for many years combined I have often had to struggle to raise teams for the Four Nations when it is held in Scotland because of previous commitments and the time and cost elements so I can appreciate the difficulties which the RCCC had at this busy time of year. The difference may have been what each of us then did when the usual channels were not successful. I am not ashamed to say that in years past I have used Scottish friends living locally to the venue of the event to bolster the English teams (and also to help out the Welsh and Irish teams)!
What this year has done is, and it may be only temporarily, to raise the profile of the Four Nations so that for at least next year there will be a lot more scrutiny about how the teams are selected, particularly in Scotland. What is important is to know that the Four Nations is not one competition, it is simply a convenient way of packaging seven individual trophies into a time and money saving package – but it works. I am sure that the four of us will sit down or hold conference calls to decide on the future of the weekend in the light of this year’s events.
While the happenings of the last month will continue to have a high profile in Scotland, as far as the ECA is concerned what is done is done and we can look back on a very successful weekend. We raised a lot of money for the Make-A–Wish charity from our raffle – approx £1300 I believe and the first prize of the laptop was won by Ross Barr (ENG), the £100 M and S voucher went to Richard Pougher (WAL) and the third prize of a silver necklace to Catriona Cooper of Scotland – all very equitable so far. Unfortunately for the Irish the fourth prize of a bottle of brandy went to Bob Cowan! The Irish team apparently only bought green tickets but only one was drawn out throughout the whole raffle which featured more than 20 other prizes.
The shot of the weekend was undoubtedly Lana Watson’s draw to lie three within the four foot against Scotland which pinched the Connie Miller Trophy back from Scotland, but it is also pertinent to say that in the next session she took seven at one end off an Irish team skipped by…….no that would be unfair – he knows who he is!
My apologies also for the lack of scores on any website owing to an administrative cock-up involving cooks and soup – and not the ones producing the stovies, toasties and breakfast rolls!
As to who won – well all the countries won at least something but interestingly six of the seven trophies changed hands this year and only one was retained by last year’s winners. The Irish were the most successful, winning all three of their contests but only by the smallest margin of one shot against England and Wales and relatively comfortably by seven shots v Scotland. Wales beat England and Scotland, England won one (the Connie Miller Trophy v Scotland) and Scotland won one (the Tom Ballantyne Trophy v England).
So on the whole a successful weekend but one that I am glad we do not have to repeat for four years!
Saturday, January 08, 2011
Czech and Norwegian Juniors for Perth
It started at 8 am and finished just a shade after 7 pm and in another extraordinary day at the curling club in Prague the local boys team skipped by Lukas Klima climbed back from the depths of despair yesterday morning after losing to Germany and seeming to be out of the competition only to be rescued by Austria beating Italy, to win the European Junior Challenge and the last place in the World Junior Championships in Perth in March. To do so they had to play and win four hard games of curling – beating Italy 8-5 after an extra end, Poland 6-4, by means of a three at the last end, Estonia 6-5, having to repel a great fightback, and Russia by 8-4 as a result of a four scored at the sixth end through a double take out by the skip.
In contrast the Norwegian girls skipped by Kristine Davanger and including Pia Trulsen (two Olympic gold medal winners’ daughters) had it easy as they only had to beat Italy 5-4 and Germany 6-4!
As for the English teams, the girls finished sixth in the final rankings on 3 wins and 5 losses while the boys were fifth in their group just ahead of Wales, both teams on 1 win and 5 losses. Overall this equated to ninth for England and twelth for Wales based on comparative draw shot challenge distances against the other group.
And now it is time to party.......alcohol free of course!
You can find all the results and standings on the event website here.
In contrast the Norwegian girls skipped by Kristine Davanger and including Pia Trulsen (two Olympic gold medal winners’ daughters) had it easy as they only had to beat Italy 5-4 and Germany 6-4!
As for the English teams, the girls finished sixth in the final rankings on 3 wins and 5 losses while the boys were fifth in their group just ahead of Wales, both teams on 1 win and 5 losses. Overall this equated to ninth for England and twelth for Wales based on comparative draw shot challenge distances against the other group.
And now it is time to party.......alcohol free of course!
You can find all the results and standings on the event website here.
Friday, January 07, 2011
An extraordinary afternoon in Prague
An apology and an update from Prague
Apologies to Russian and Estonian readers as I was wrong in my assertion that Netherlands had already qualified for the semi-finals of the Junior Men’s Challenge here in Prague in my piece last night. I had ignored the one possible option which ultimately came to pass and saw the three teams finish on 5-1 records. Today Russia beat Netherlands and Estonia won both their games, easily against England by 11-1, and against Slovakia by 6-2. This brought the Draw Shot Challenge into play to decide who had automatically qualified. Before Estonia’s last game – they were one session behind - their DSC distance was 30.5cm while Russia’s final DSC was 39.6 and Netherlands was 45.1. So For Harri Lill, the Estonian skip, there were two challenges in his final game – mainly to beat Slovakia but also to ensure his last stone draw before the game was closer than 75.8cm to the centre, which would keep his DSC distance below Russia’s and give him direct entry to the semi-final and make Russia play the Netherlands again. The first part he completed in style by covering the hole for the second game in a row and then he played a fairly clinical game to earn that place in the semi-final. So first thing tomorrow morning Russia will try and repeat their victory over Netherlands.
In the other group Germany qualified by beating the host nation in the morning session and then the stage was set for a remarkable finish to the round robin play in the final session. The one basic outcome was that if Italy beat Austria they would qualify top as they had beaten the Germans way back in the very first session of play and no tie breakers would be needed. As the session progressed Italy were 5-2 up on Austria and Poland were similarly edging ahead of France. But then things changed and Austria came back to 5-5 going into the last end (Italy had last stone) while Poland led France 5-3 and were lying first and third shots when their skip went to play his last stone of the game – and lo and behold he jammed the French stone he was trying to remove onto his own shot and then the French skip drew for 2 and an extra end. This would be the third extra end in 5 games for both teams – Poland had won both of their previous ones while France had lost both of theirs.
Over on Sheet D Austria were determined that things would not be easy for Italy and when their skip drew a perfect draw behind a guard it needed a gentle tap back from the Italian skip to win the game, but unfortunately for him he was heavy and slipped through the house. Cue scenes of equal despair and delight as the Czechs were let back into the competition with at least a tie break against Italy. But things were still going on on Sheet B and with a Polish stone biting the front rings it just need a hit and roll from the Polish skip on a half guarded French shot to win and enter the tie-breakers. This was successfully achieved and what’s more their DSC distance gave Poland the bye to the second tie breaker leaving Italy and Czech Republic to fight it out in the first!
And now the story was – when would the tie breakers be played. For some reason there is only one time slot in the programme for tie breaker games – Saturday morning, but as two are needed would it be fair to ask either Czech Republic or Italy to possibly play 4 games in one day? Other options were play the first one late tonight (Friday) or delay the finals until Sunday. In the end there were no objections to starting early tomorrow morning and so the first tie breaker is at 8 am.
So to summarise: Tie Breaker 1 in Group B is Italy v Czech Republic, winner plays Poland, winner plays Estonia in semi-final. In Group A tie breaker 1 is Russia v Netherlands and winner plays Germany in semi-final. So how about the girls – well it was all rather tame and over in the first session of play today – Norway, Germany and Italy all won and finished in that order and so Germany will play Italy in the semi-final and the winner will play Norway in the final. The second session was all about bragging rights for those teams below. Final report on what will be a long day tomorrow though I shall be spending a lot of it anywhere else than the curling club as I try and see more than one square mile of Prague!
Apologies to Russian and Estonian readers as I was wrong in my assertion that Netherlands had already qualified for the semi-finals of the Junior Men’s Challenge here in Prague in my piece last night. I had ignored the one possible option which ultimately came to pass and saw the three teams finish on 5-1 records. Today Russia beat Netherlands and Estonia won both their games, easily against England by 11-1, and against Slovakia by 6-2. This brought the Draw Shot Challenge into play to decide who had automatically qualified. Before Estonia’s last game – they were one session behind - their DSC distance was 30.5cm while Russia’s final DSC was 39.6 and Netherlands was 45.1. So For Harri Lill, the Estonian skip, there were two challenges in his final game – mainly to beat Slovakia but also to ensure his last stone draw before the game was closer than 75.8cm to the centre, which would keep his DSC distance below Russia’s and give him direct entry to the semi-final and make Russia play the Netherlands again. The first part he completed in style by covering the hole for the second game in a row and then he played a fairly clinical game to earn that place in the semi-final. So first thing tomorrow morning Russia will try and repeat their victory over Netherlands.
In the other group Germany qualified by beating the host nation in the morning session and then the stage was set for a remarkable finish to the round robin play in the final session. The one basic outcome was that if Italy beat Austria they would qualify top as they had beaten the Germans way back in the very first session of play and no tie breakers would be needed. As the session progressed Italy were 5-2 up on Austria and Poland were similarly edging ahead of France. But then things changed and Austria came back to 5-5 going into the last end (Italy had last stone) while Poland led France 5-3 and were lying first and third shots when their skip went to play his last stone of the game – and lo and behold he jammed the French stone he was trying to remove onto his own shot and then the French skip drew for 2 and an extra end. This would be the third extra end in 5 games for both teams – Poland had won both of their previous ones while France had lost both of theirs.
Over on Sheet D Austria were determined that things would not be easy for Italy and when their skip drew a perfect draw behind a guard it needed a gentle tap back from the Italian skip to win the game, but unfortunately for him he was heavy and slipped through the house. Cue scenes of equal despair and delight as the Czechs were let back into the competition with at least a tie break against Italy. But things were still going on on Sheet B and with a Polish stone biting the front rings it just need a hit and roll from the Polish skip on a half guarded French shot to win and enter the tie-breakers. This was successfully achieved and what’s more their DSC distance gave Poland the bye to the second tie breaker leaving Italy and Czech Republic to fight it out in the first!
And now the story was – when would the tie breakers be played. For some reason there is only one time slot in the programme for tie breaker games – Saturday morning, but as two are needed would it be fair to ask either Czech Republic or Italy to possibly play 4 games in one day? Other options were play the first one late tonight (Friday) or delay the finals until Sunday. In the end there were no objections to starting early tomorrow morning and so the first tie breaker is at 8 am.
So to summarise: Tie Breaker 1 in Group B is Italy v Czech Republic, winner plays Poland, winner plays Estonia in semi-final. In Group A tie breaker 1 is Russia v Netherlands and winner plays Germany in semi-final. So how about the girls – well it was all rather tame and over in the first session of play today – Norway, Germany and Italy all won and finished in that order and so Germany will play Italy in the semi-final and the winner will play Norway in the final. The second session was all about bragging rights for those teams below. Final report on what will be a long day tomorrow though I shall be spending a lot of it anywhere else than the curling club as I try and see more than one square mile of Prague!
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