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Giving Status

Not all our tournament players will get their chance to represent this country playing bridge. It’s a neat feeling to have done so. We want if possible to give as many players as possible the chance to represent and if that is not to be their country, then representing their region or representing their club in a Regional Club competition are good alternatives.

That is where the Inter-Provincials and inter-club competitions fit in. In the former, there is some degree, in some regions quite a large degree of earning one’s place in a regional team. The latter, because of the size of most of our clubs, tends to be a case of “who wants to play”.

 

 The Auckland-Northland Region ran recently a Clubs competition, with 12 club teams. A "team comprised 4 Open, 4 Intermediate and 4 Junior players. Pictured is the winning team from Royle Epsom,

(back)Barbara Imlach, Carolyn Patterson, Angela Royle, Barry Whale, Andrew Michl, Kinga Hajmasi and Annette Martin. (front)Rae Robinson, Jay Kim, Joy May, Jody Whale and Gill Atcheson.

They would have loved the opportunity of representing their club and also the thrill of winning.

If there is, and indeed there certainly is, a status, a good feeling in playing for one’s country, then we should feel the same level of satisfaction and give such status to our Inter-Provincials.

We are achieving that slowly though not entirely yet. It was neat last year to see one region in the finals wearing the same T Shirts, creating a unity. It certainly is a step forward to reserve a whole week-end in all seven regions for their trials. They are no longer “fit in somewhere in the calendar” events. Being able to announce all the successful pairs the following week was also nice. I am sure all those who are participating as well as many who are not would have looked to see the names of the successful pairs.

It is arguable as to whether the finals would have more status at or really just before our National Bridge Congress as they were or on a stand- alone week-end at the end, the climax maybe, of our annual Bridge calendar. When the finals were in Hamilton, the final between the top two regions was broadcast on Vu-graph, even Bridge Base On-line, and created some interest among those who arrived for the National Congress. We now neither have a final nor a Vu-graph. An event without a final does seem to lose a little status even if a double round-robin is a very fair method of determining the winner. Players’ travel arrangements seem to make a final impractical within its current format. However, I wonder if we could generate some interest amongst the local bridge players if a Vu-graph commentary was tried for two sessions (24 boards). That has not been tried since the event left Hamilton.

Since leaving Hamilton, teams have dropped in size from 6 players to 4 players with now a chef de mission managing all four teams from a region. Other than perhaps the Intermediates, we do not need three pairs in a team for just a long week-end’s bridge. Also, one advantage (maybe the only one) in having a bye each round is that it does give the players a break.  There was more cause for the extra pair when the event preceded Congress. The drop in the number in a team came about because of space issues even at some of our larger bridge clubs and also to keep the cost of travel down to manageable levels.

 It has, though, brought about one situation which does nothing for the status of the event. That is the question of substitutes. I am not saying we have to go back to 6 person teams though I hate the concept of local players having to fill in in a major event because mainly of sickness. Bring an extra pair for the Intermediates but maybe an extra player from each region that along with the chef de mission can play in the other categories. That would mean the chef de mission would not need to be 60+ and female. Having 2 extra players from each region (including the chef de mission) to cover the three categories feels more satisfactory if we are to have to just have 4 players per team.

It would be nice to get rid of the bye, caused by having seven regions. There is no satisfactory equitable alternative short of finding an 8^th region. One suggestion has been to play our three international teams in the Open, Women’s and Seniors’ events and a team from the host club in the Intermediate event. Such a team would not be eligible for the overall Dougal McLean Trophy but I quite like that idea in principle.

When the event left Hamilton, it was intended to stay within the three main centres, Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch. The cost of flying to and from cities outside these three is greater as I think we will see this year as the players head for Dunedin. That leaves open the question of how much funding should be available for this event. If the National Body and the Regions pay all or a considerable portion of the players’ travel and accommodation costs, as is currently the case, that is a large sum of money. I think the answer is that it is a fact of life that players will have to pay a proportion of the costs of playing, even if they are representing their region. We can argue what is fair. I would argue a minimum 25% of the travel costs, maybe 50% accommodation costs which still leaves a considerable investment from New Zealand Bridge. Some regions have been successful in getting grants to cover the accommodation.

I believe that investment is worth it, a reward for many regular tournament players who contribute not just financially but in many different ways voluntarily to our game.

Coming back to status, there is a “good feel” about seeing 16 players, and their chef de mission, going up to receive the Dougal Mclean Trophy, an achievement to which all have contributed, or indeed winners like Royle Epsom above in local inter-club competitions. While players enjoy increasing their master-point total, for once in the bridge calendar, it would be nice to see the common goal of regional/local success being more important.

The timing of the event for both trials and finals is now good. All three host regions have so far done the finals proud. We are on the way of making, maybe remaking the Inter-Provincials a worthy event. It would be better if we could get more pairs to trial, solve the bye issue and maybe only have a substitute player from within that region. We also want to have players all over the country take an interest in, maybe be able to watch on-line, some of the finals. Having a quality Inter-provincials competition will help retain interest in our game and will allow many of our players to have that neat feeling of representing. We have no better model in our country of that than having been an All Black. That is worth much more than money….or A Points.   

Richard Solomon

 

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