| EBU Affiliation & Membership |
We are affiliated to the English Bridge Union (EBU) and under the terms of that affiliation all members of the club are automatically enrolled as members of the EBU. We submit a record of the players who compete in each of our qualifying* duplicate sessions and pay a small levy to the EBU based on the numbers participating. This arrangement is their Pay2Play Scheme.
Members who participate in at least 12 duplicate events per year will be entitled to the full benefits of EBU membership including a free EBU diary and the bi-monthly magazine called English Bridge. They will also be entered into the EBU Master Points award scheme and will be eligible to enter any of the open tournaments or competitions organised by the EBU, or the other Home Unions (i.e. Wales and Scotland) and the various County Associations.
You can find more information about your EBU membership on the EBU Website
* Rubber,mentored, tuition or supervised practice events do not qualify
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| EBU Masterpoint awards |
The EBU operate a scheme whereby players' performances are recognised by the issue of Masterpoints. Because of our EBU affiliation we award these Masterpoints at all of our duplicate sessions apart from tuition and supervised practice sessions.
We award points to all qualifying players, both members and visitors alike. All awards are processed electronically and are credited directly to your EBU record without the issue of any paper certificates. Where appropriate any new members or visitors will need to advise us of their EBU number. There are no longer any arrangements to issue paper certificates.
Masterpoints are usually processed within four weeks or less. Members can arrange to access their record on-line by logging on to the EBU website.
The organisers of Simultaneous Pairs events issue additional Masterpoints for positions in the overall event, these are over and above any points we have issued as a club. Providing we have been able to supply them with your EBU number these will also be credited directly to your EBU record but will not be processed until the results have been finalised, which will often be several weeks after the event was held.
There are different types of Masterpoints and with effect from January 2013 a new category of Blue Masterpoints was created. We intend to issue these for our major club championship, the Eileen Webster Shield, with effect from February 2013.
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| Master Points Earned |
For a summary of the Master Points earned recently, in the form of a club ranking, please click here.
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| EBU Website |
The EBU launched a new Website in May 2013.
The website has a private area that can be used to:
- Check your personal Masterpoint totals and your ranking
- Check your grade in the National Grading Scheme
- Manage your personal contact preferences and address etc.
- Access recent editions of the EBU Magazine
To access the private members area on the EBU website you will need your EBU number and your password which should have been sent to you by the EBU with a welcome letter. If you have lost, mislaid or or forgotten your EBU number the club can help you but we cannot assist with missing passwords which are only known to the EBU. If you are having difficulty the following page on the EBU website explains what can be done.
Would members please note that the EBU website is independent of the club. Personal records on the EBU website are not maintained by the club so we cannot implement any change of address etc. Members should advise the EBU, either through their website or directly, of any changes to their personal contact details. If you access your records online you will be given the option to allow the club limited permission to update some of these details in the future.
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| National Grading System |
The English Bridge Union introduced a National Grading System in February 2012, the aim of which is to rank players according to their recent results. The scheme differs from the pre-existing Master Point Rankings which are based on cumulative lifetime achievement because it gives precedence to recent results and depreciates older results. Master Point Rankings continue to apply. The two distinctly different schemes operate alongside each other.
The EBU calculates players' grades from the results that we submit to them under the Pay to Play regime and does some complex number crunching to produce the grades with no further input from us. They have published various guides, which can be found on their website, but the full guide extends to 57 pages including some detailed mathematical formulae, which are probably beyond most of us. The most succinct explanation is in their "Very Brief Introduction" where it explains that:
"When you play in an event your expected score is based on the average of your and your partner’s current grades and on the average strength of the players against whom you are competing. The amount by which you over (or under) achieve this score is used to determine your ‘session grade’ for that session."
When we play a single winner movement the calculation effectively compares your overall score with all of the other players in the event taking into account their current grading and how well you and your partner might have been expected to do. When we play a two winner movement the comparison is only against those playing in the same direction as you.
The National Grading Scheme gains in maturity as more results become available and has recently been introduced as an alternative to determine eligibility for certain ranked competitions.
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