Well, it’s been a strange
three years since our last Annual General Meeting.
On Friday, 13th
March 2020, we took the decision to put the league ‘on hold’, and within a
few days the rest of the country followed suit and the first lockdown
started. It quickly became apparent that we wouldn’t be getting back
to normal for quite some time. Eventually, following consultation
with clubs, the Executive decided to terminate the 2019/20 season and award
league trophies, and any promotion or relegation issues, based on the average
number of points scored by teams in the matches that had been played before
lockdown. Those trophies will be awarded at the Fixture Meeting on 20th
September.
Lockdown created a
chess void that was then filled by a splurge of online activities.
Oli Brennan set up Rotherham Chess Club’s series of individual online
tournaments. They continue to this day, and it is no longer just
local players that enter. He gets entries from throughout Yorkshire,
other parts of the UK, and, also from India!! Oli’s efforts earned
him the ECF’s Award for Online Contribution to Chess.
Although online
chess is not everyone’s cup of tea, the Association has successfully run
three online team league seasons in the last couple of years. Thanks
should go to Phill Beckett for overseeing the running of these
leagues. The facility to link a player’s Lichess profile to the ECF
LMS pages meant that games could be viewed online in real time, almost like
being in the match room itself. Online League Season 1 was won by
Hillsborough. For Season 2, we had three divisions which were won by
Nomads A, SASCA A and Nomads C. In Season 3, Nomads again won the
first division, with the other two divisions going to Nomads B and Clay
Cross.
Inevitably, over the
last three years, we have lost a few local players. I’m aware that
Pete Ballard and Andy Baxter, both of Rotherham CC, have passed away, as
has Mike Johnson of Chesterfield. There may well be others that I’m
not aware of. Sadly, Aughton Chess Club has closed down as well.
Slowly though,
we’ve seen some green shoots of recovery. Clubs started to open their
doors again last year, although I’m aware that some individual members are
still uncomfortable about returning. In the summer of 2021, when we were
allowed to meet in small groups out of doors, there was a series of
over-the-board events in pub gardens in and around Kelham Island. Jon
Arnott organised the Hope Valley tournament outdoors in 2021, along with a
few SASCA club nights. Jon has also run a series of one day events,
both open and junior-only ones. The YCA managed to run an otb 2021/22
season in which, sadly, Sheffield could only muster one team. I believe
we’ll have two teams in the 22/23 YCA league. Our own Association ran
an ‘interim summer league’ of four divisions this spring, in which eighteen
teams competed (see Alan
McIntosh’s separate report).
One positive spin
off from the pandemic is the extra time that people have found for
hobbies. It seems that the ‘working from home’ generation has taken
to chess, propelled perhaps by Netflix’s Queen’s Gambit series, and many
clubs are reporting a healthy increase in new members, albeit at the weaker
end. But clubs need to embrace these new people and make sure they
stay with us.
So, Covid may still
be lingering, but the time has come to look at restarting our main league
and cup competitions again. At the time of writing this, it looks
like we’ll have thirty teams spread over four divisions for the coming
season. Let’s hope it’s a success.
Geoff
Brown, 5th September 2022
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