Garry Jones

This, the third Worcester Intermediates Open, was well attended by a full field of 64 players from across the country, many trying to increase their tour points total, but the majority just out for a good day of backgammon.  The highs and the lows of this incredible game.  Will the dice go my way?  Will I play to my true potential?  Will they have those lovely cookies like last year?

The usual team of Sean Jones, David Sanders and Kevin Jones are present to make sure things go smoothly to ensure a good player experience.  Every year at this competition someone is playing in their first tournament because it is a good tournament to experience what a tournament is all about.  Those seasoned players that have been to many tournaments already know and appreciate the intensity of the play, but for new players who have not experienced this, the Worcester Intermediates is a great tournament to be a part of.  With a very low registration fee (fifteen pounds with lunch) and an entry fee of twenty pounds it is a relatively inexpensive day out in Worcester with lots of backgammon to play on the day.

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Main Winner: Robert Breen
Main Runner-up: Hannah Parente
Main Semi-finalists: Mark Smyth, CJ Uttley
 
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Elgar Trophy Winner: Art Williams
Elgar Trophy Runner-up: Serban Murgu
Elgar Trophy Semi-finalists: Michele de Havilland, Philip Cherrington

 
Severn Cup Winner: Nick Close
Severn Cup Runner-up: Shof Miah

​Unlucky 8 Winner: Sarah Jolliff
 
  
One great moment of the day was the pure joy shown by Shof Miah who won her first tournament trophy.  More delight was never seen in someone coming runner up!  It is a lesson to all, to enjoy those special moments that are so hard won in the game of backgammon.  It was a real intermediate moment to be so proud and delighted to win a first trophy!  Intermediates are arguably the future of backgammon and must be encouraged to keep going.  The delight of Shof makes everyone hopeful and strive to get that trophy!
 
Traditionally, at the end of the day, when the tournament directors are winding the tournament down, pizzas are ordered while the last few finals are played.  One story was funny, as Art Williams, who won the Elgar Trophy and personally commented on how beautiful the trophies were, drove back to his hotel only to realise that he had left his trophy behind!  We were well into our pizzas when Art turned up again to reclaim the trophy after having to drive right across Worcester to retrieve it. 
A great day, some great competitors, some fine gameplay, and no issues.  Intermediate tournaments are where the basic foundations are laid down; how to roll dice, how to use a clock, what does ‘Legal Moves’ or ‘Responsible Moves’ mean, what is a premature roll and how is it dealt with, how many hands you can use to play, which way to bear off with the clock and so many other particulars of tournament backgammon play are learned. 
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Worcester’s next tournament is the infamous Turkey Tournament, from the same people that brought you the Intermediate and Bunny Bash Tournaments.  Worcester’s favourite tournament and longest running tournament (10th Year), The Turkey Tourney is a tournament run specifically to raise money for a Charity.  Register soon! 
https://worcester-turkey.weebly.com/
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On Saturday 8th of April, the bunnies congregated at the Royal British Legion Club in Cornmeadow Lane, Worcester.  The new home of Worcester Backgammon Club has now hosted several tournaments and for this we are grateful.  The Turkey, Intermediate, Turkey Earthquake Appeal and now the Bunny Bash (NB. Bash in no way suggests cruelty to rabbits, but refers to a party!)  Apologies for the ‘woke’ statement! 

It is crucial to the life of backgammon to have venues to meet in that are relatively inexpensive.  It is important never to take them for granted.  Simply supporting what the venue does to keep it going is not asking a lot.  Purchasing drink or food is necessary to the life blood of the backgammon community, to enable us to run relatively inexpensive tournaments and allow us to continue to grow the beautiful game.

The Director of Technical Affairs, David Sanders, prepares the desk. Having already done the spreadsheets and google sheets, he has tested them to ensure they work.  Testing is done a few times with different scenarios depending on the number of players and the whimsical decision making of the Tournament Director, Sean Jones.  It is known that in the run up to a tournament David does turn his ringtone to silent!   So, logic and creativity work hand in hand to produce the groundwork for a successful tournament.
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The players arrive, the anticipation is palpable.  The Directors mandatory speech is due.  Registrations and side pools sorted; Sean Jones gets up.  The room goes silent (as if!) and a pin can be heard drop (you are making this up!)  One player came up for a special mention.  Having recently turned a milestone and still challenging people around the country in his play.  A man with quite a unique story.  An engineer, author of several Haynes manuals, helped to build some nuclear stations, travelled around the world working on ships and, by his own admission a gigolo!  Mervyn Bleach reached eighty and is well known for helping wherever he is and popular with all tournament directors for his practical assistance.  The spiel continues… Dice… side of cup… Clocks… sportsmanship… timings… fire… eggs… and after some time it ends.  The games begin.

The Bunny Lady
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Behind every great tournament director is (or at least should be) a Bunny lady.  Would be incredibly missed if not present-imagine; no coffee, milk, sugar, biscuits, eggs and many other little details that can be missed if someone doesn’t get it done.  The Bunny Lady had her ears on full display and being detachable they ended up on the heads of some other people.

The Swiss

The blessed forty-eight begin the four rounds of backgammon.  The aim is three wins or three losses depending on your target.  Fastest way to consolation is three losses!  To accentuate the positive, qualification to the consolation in the least painless way could be considered a win.  However, for those serious players the route is three wins, no losses to get to the top six and automatic qualification to the last 16.

​The most notable round was round three, the culling of the couples.  By chance a couple of couples ended up playing each other.  Cheryl Oliver played her husband Robin and he managed to get the better of Cheryl.  As it happens Robin continued to succeed and made it all the way to the semi-final only to be knocked out by Jamie MacPherson, the eventual Bunny Champion.  Mike Wood fared the same fate as Cheryl and was beaten by his partner Anne.   Would not want to be in the car on the way home!!!

Hi-Lo?
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In tournaments there is often a period where you are hanging around a bit waiting for your next match.  This can never be eliminated, but Sean had a plan to keep the top six who only need to play three matches and the bottom six who only needed to lose three matches to either be in the last sixteen or qualify for the consolation tournament.  He created a mini tournament for these twelve players as they did not need to play the fourth round of the Swiss.

​CJ went on to join Jamie MacPherson in the final.  Jamie won the match and the crown of Bunny of the Year 2023.

Consolation
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Concurrently with the last 16 the Consolation tournament was underway.  This ended in a battle between Rachel Rhodes and John Georgiou.  John used his Jedi mind tricks and won.

Another great tournament by the team at Worcester.  This time an event held to raise money for the awful tragedy in Turkey brought together at short notice.  A good response from the friends of Worcester means that we raised a total of £1520 for this cause. 

A tournament borne out of a simple Facebook post.  One of our members had to withdraw from our usual online tournament to mourn the loss of family, friends and their fellow citizens.  ‘I can’t play during 6 weeks depend on mourning. I lost my friends and members of family. Pray for to Turkey Thanks.’ 
The tragedy became very immediate. 

Not just a story on the news, it was something that affected someone close to the club, someone relatively new to the club, who had joined us for our intermediate tournament and had won the final chance.  The touch of the human tragedy was palpable and Mochy was mobilizing in his own way an online tournament to raise funds for Turkey-Syria.  We could not see why we shouldn’t do something too, to raise funds at this crucial time for our friend and her people. 

Ever the action man, Sean Jones decided to buy an ArtGammon board and offer it as a prize and Ian Gwynne, always the generous sponsor of Worcester Backgammon club, offered food to the tournament and David Sanders offered his professional expertise in putting together a website and the necessary spreadsheets etc. to get the registration and donations recorded and coordinate the tournament during the day.

A lot goes into arranging a tournament.  At Worcester we have all the skills to bring together a tournament at short notice.  With a lot of support from our sister club in Birmingham, we had a good number of people register and many donated even though they knew they were unable to attend.  It was a real inspiration for the club to see the support we got from players around the country as well as our own club members.  One very brave member made this the first tournament she attended, and hopefully not the last!

We all arrived in the morning hopeful of taking the ArtGammon board home with us, but that is not in the slightest bit true!  I should be a BBC reporter!   We were all there to have some fun and raise money for a good cause.  Sean started by explaining how to roll dice (again).  Then got to the substance of the day, raising money for the earthquake victims.  An issue with charities is you do not know which ones to trust.  Sean explained his POA (Plan of Action) for the money raised.  He had been given the name of a non-governmental charity with a good track record in helping victims.  We also had our friend who was taking stuff out to Turkey, direct to the victims.  It was agreed with those present that we would send the first thousand pounds raised to the nominated charity and the rest to our friend to spend on items to give directly.

The tournament started as a round robin group stage followed by a straightforward knockout.  This meant a lot of matches for the players.  In the end the finalists were Julian Minwalla and Ian Gwynne.

After some excellent and enjoyable matches, the final was played between Ian Gwynne and Julian Minwalla on the prize board. The match had more twists than a crafty corkscrew, particularly in the last two games with multiple jokers and anti-jokers, until eventually Julian came out as the victor.

The XG transcript of the final can be downloaded here:  ian_gwynne-julian_minwalla_9_point_match_18-03-2023_replay.xg

The full results are available on the website at
https://wbgc-earthquake-appeal.weebly.com/brackets.html

If you would like to donate to this cause, please contact Sean at [email protected] and we will make sure your kind donation reaches those in need. Many thanks.
TEAM WORCESTER.

Reproduced here with kind permission from Phil:

​Here is why I NEVER complain about the rolls, or luck:

1. It's rude.  It suggests your opponent is only winning because he is lucky and implies that he is not skillful.  It is just very bad form and insulting.
2. Nobody cares.  Everyone is tired of hearing it.  Everyone only sees their own bad rolls and forgets their great ones.
3. It's often NOT TRUE that you are unlucky.  Everyone rolls the same.  If you think you are rolling more than your share of bad rolls, you're probably playing badly and not realizing it...because the worse you play, the more bad rolls there are and the more good rolls you give your opponent. 
4. If you concentrate on your bad rolls, YOU WILL PLAY WORSE.  Complaining focuses your mind and energy on the wrong things.  You think about  how bad you are rolling, or how good your opponents roll, instead of what you really should be concentrating on: what is the right decision? 
5. Complaining makes the game less enjoyable.  For you.  The more you make an issue of your bad luck, the more you will remember the bad luck and the less fun you will have playing.  Even if you win.

Bottom line, I NEVER complain about a roll, or bad luck.  Ever.  And I am sure my opponents appreciate it, and I am sure I play better and am happier as a result.  And when someone tells me how lucky I was, I give them my standard reply:  "Yes, I was lucky I got you for an opponent!"

Worcester players gave a good performance at the local Midlands Open, held at our sister club, Birmingham Backgammon club in Moseley this past weekend.

Jamie MacPherson (pictured above, 2nd from left) was runner-up in the Consolation final, and Worcester pair John Georgiou and Maz Maszlag (not pictured) once again made a strong showing in the doubles competition, coming in as runners-up.  Two Worcester players, Sean Jones and David Sanders, made it to the final 16 of the Main competition but unfortunately couldn't progress further.

Congratulation to the team from Birmingham, Matthew, Alex and Michele for organizing an enjoyable weekend tournament, great prizes and the sweet taste of honey jars for all attendees.

The next local tournament is the Worcester Intermediates on 12th November as part of the UKBGF tour.  Make sure you are registered at worcester-open.weebly.com/ as places are filling up fast!