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I was nervous about setting up this 2nd Doubles Tournament
to run from August to September because of summer
holidays, but I also wanted to keep the ball rolling; a 2
month gap between the 1st and 2nd and players might have
lost interest. So I ploughed ahead though I decided not to
play in this one in case we had problems. Good thing I
did.
A Consolation Tournament was added for this 2nd Doubles.
I'd done a survey of players and the majority had voted
for it. Some hadn't, but I felt I had to go with the
majority. The prize fund was split to suit and this time
12 of the 32 players would walk away with a profit. Dod
couldn't make it for the auction so Will took this over
and did a mighty fine job of it too. Thank you Will.
We didn't have our defending Champions - Emmeline has
moved to the countrie so Brian played with Gerry - both
strong players, but would this benefit them in Doubles
play? Stef was away so Paul teamed up with Will (who I'd
partnered in the 1st). Sean the Gasman was away in Canada
so Mick V paired up with Al Hogg who hadn't played in the
1st.
We had 8 repeat pairings which suggests that they had
enjoyed the 1st and were up for doing it all again. They
were: Dan & Phillippa (finalists in the 1st),
Simon G. & Sonia, Simon M. & Martha, Sue P. &
Vianney, Andy K & Susan, David Naylor & Chrissie,
Le Patron & Lawrence, Alef & Justin Le P.
There were 5 brand new teams: Zoe & Sean W, Martine
& James, Viviana & Helen, Sue K & Justin
J and Geoff C & Geoff O.
Not everything ran as smoothly as it might have done. Sue
Keeble had paired up with Justin Joseph at the last minute.
They had never met each other before, Sue had missed out on
the 1st Doubles Tournament and Justin had been in regular
attendance at The Fox for about 4 weeks before this
Tournament kicked off. On the face of it it seemed like a
reasonable pairing. However it didn't work out that way.
Justin disappeared having arranged their 1st match time /
date / venue. A hasty ruling by MMM and Robbie decreed that
they should forfeit the match. It later turned out that this
was an incorrect T.D.s decision: Sue should have been
allowed to play on her own. Then Dan and Philippa split up
and Philippa withdrew. Dan was allowed to play on his own.
In-consistent ? In hindsight yes, but it was decided that
these two situations were different and hence the two
differing decisions. So the T.D.ing was not as good as it
could have been. Sue was apologized to and accepted the
apology (and a drink). Not only have players learnt more
about Doubles play though these tournaments, but so have I
in running these tournaments. I do not profess to be the
best Backgammon T.D. in the world but I do do my best and
try to learn by my mistakes. I was very pleased that players
understood this. I'll do better next time.
The thing that really pleased me was that the tournament did
not go according to what was generally reckoned to be the
likely outcome: The stronger players Brian Walker, Paul
Lamford, Dan Boxall and Andy Kindler did not feature in the
finals. This is not to say that I'm pleased that some of the
top dogs didn't win. My point is that the underdogs (and
some strong players including Simon Gasquoine and Lawrence
Powell) won through to the finals. Had the tournament been
dominated by the stronger players the not so strong players
might have thought twice about entering future tournaments.
So it's true that in theory not only can the weaker players
do well but in reality that have done well. This boads well
for future tournaments.
Likewise the auction did not go according to the form book.
Both James Ferguson and myself bought weaker teams more out
of a sense of community than out of any realistic hope of
them winning. Indeed James had never met the team he bought.
We cleaned up. :-)
Another thing that impresses me is that players doubles play
is improving. The weaker member of teams are learning more
quicker than they would do otherwise and the more
experienced members of the teams are looking at situations
in simpler lights. Everybody seems to be enjoying themselves
and that to me is the whole idea of playing backgammon.
Good.
The
Main Tournament
was
won by
Martha
Littlehailes and Simon Morecroft
Hit
Loose and Fancy Free
The
Consolation Tournament
was won by
Le
Patron and Lawrence Powell
Two LPs
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