Sheffield & District Chess Association

Established 1883

 

I<< HOME

Notices

 

 

16/02/2021

S&DCA Online Season 2

 

At an Executive Meeting held via Zoom on 11/02/2021, following the success of Season 1, and after feedback from clubs, it was agreed to run a second Season to commence on 11/03/2021.

 

This time the event is to be run as a league of three divisions of 4 or 5 teams, playing each other twice.

 

Again, the matches would be fortnightly on a Thursday evening.

 

Teams will be allocated to divisions based partly on their finishing position in Season 1 and partly on the estimated strength of their squad.

Bill asked about movement of players between two teams from the same club.

 

It was agreed that we would run a ‘Registered Player’ system as in the over-the-board league, with two nominated players at the start of the season and anybody that then plays on the top two boards can no longer play for a team in another division.  If two teams from the same club are in the same division (which will be avoided as far as feasible) then there should be no movement of players between the teams.

 

Results are not to be sent to the ECF for rating purposes, hence no EC membership considerations arise.

 

 

Geoff Brown has now sent out, to club secretaries and team captains, an e-mail call for entries, with more detail, as follows:

 

It's now time to submit your team entries for Season 2 of the S&DCA Online League.  Send them to me at the above email address no later than 28th February but please copy Phill Beckett in as well.  [E-mail addresses are on “Officers” page, if needed.]

 

At the Executive meeting last Thursday it was agreed that the Season 2 would be run as a league with three divisions.  Each division is likely to have four or five teams in it but the exact number won't be known until all entries are in.  Initial placement in the divisions will be based partly on where teams finished in Season 1 and partly on the expected strength of the teams.  We're not going to ask for squad lists this time but we would like an indication of the likely players in your team so we can gauge playing strength.

 

Where clubs have teams in the same division (we'll try to avoid that if we can) then the team squads must be separate.  Once a player plays for one team then he will no longer be eligible for the other team.  Where teams from the same club are in different divisions then we are going to run a 'Registered Player' rule like our normal Rule 17.  As this will again be over four boards then we request that the two strongest, regular players in the higher placed team be nominated before the season starts.  Those players will not be eligible to play for a team in any lower division.  Furthermore, if during the season, anyone other than those two nominated players play on either of the top two boards, even just once, then they will automatically become 'registered' and will no longer be eligible to play for a team in a lower division.

 

Matches will still all be played at the same time on Thursday evenings starting at 7.30 pm.  But we're going to try to release the team lists in a different way this time round.  In Season 1, team captains had to submit their team lists to Phill by 12 noon on the day of the match.  This time we want captains to play a bigger part and actually fill in their team lists on the ECF LMS themselves.  If we have set the settings correctly then the team lists will remain hidden until one hour before the fixtures start.  Then they become visible and, in effect, disclosed to the opposition.

 

For this to happen we need to get all of the team captains to register on LMS (go to LMS and, in the red box in top l h corner click on the LMS Contact hyperlink.  Then fill in your details and ask for a log-in ID.  Once you have it, then report back to me and I'll set you up from there).  We also want all players, who are likely to play in the league, to have their Lichess username linked to their LMS profile.  At the moment, I believe only Dave Latham and myself are authorised to do that and I'll start getting on with it.  Please let us know if any of your players object to this but the idea is to make Phill's life as arbiter easier as the game result from Lichess should automatically be transferred to LMS.

 

I realise there's a lot to take in so I'll not add to the confusion any further.  There will be an up-dated set of rules sent out in a couple of weeks or so but if anyone has any questions in the meantime then feel free to ask.

 

Best wishes

 

Geoff Brown

Gen Sec