The Inter-County Leagues National Final was conceived by Graham Jepson, who ran the event for the first five years of its existence.  Up until 2020 (when Covid intervened) the event was run by Ian Mitchell in a personal capacity, but he decided that it needed the backing of a more official organisation, and Warwickshire CBA agreed to take on the reins.  Ian will nevertheless continue to be involved.

(n.b. although this is a "National Final", and sanctioned by the English Bridge Union, the organisation of this event has nothing to do with the EBU).

The event is a one-day teams-of-eight event open to the champion counties of each division of the five Regional Inter-County League Teams-of-Eight events:

The Northern Bridge League;
The Midland Counties League;
The Eastern Counties League;
The Western League (South West);
The Metropolitan Cup (South Eastern Counties).

Each of these regional events has a slightly different format, but the common feature is that they all consist of three divisions, with every county generally having one team in each division (i.e. there is no promotion / relegation, but every county ‘A’ team competes in Division 1, etc.)

The National Final consists of three events (divisions).  Division 1 (or 'A' Division) is contested by the five champion teams of the respective 1st divisions of the Regional Leagues.  Similarly the five Division 2 champions (county ‘B’ teams) and the Division 3 champions (county ‘C’ teams) compete within their own categories.

For obvious reasons, we have had to cancel the 2020 edition.

Arrangements for 2021 have yet to be formalised, but we hope that we will be able to invite 2019-2020 Regional Champions to the 2021 finals, in addition to 2020-2021 Champions (where regional events have taken place)

Approximate Timetable (retained for future F2F events):

12.00 – Coffee and tea
12.30 – Session One (24 boards)
15.30 – Meal
16.30 – Session Two (24 boards)
19.30 – Finish

The entry fee is £??? per team of eight.  This includes Tea / Coffee on arrival and the meal in the interval.

the Midlands league was interrupted with a match to go.  In brackets are the 'provisional' champions.
One or two matches in the Easter Counties League were also unplayed, for which artificial results were included to complete the league.

In 2020-21, the NBL & ECL did not take place.  The Western League ran an informal event, which they didn't consider to be a qualifier for the NICLF.

(Standard face-to-face format may need to be amended in 2021 for the online edition)

Each Division will be divided into two sections, e.g. "Red" & "White" in the 'A' Division. Counties have one team-of-four in each section, a North-South pair and an East-West pair.  North-South pairs will be stationary throughout the day.

In each session a full American-Whist-type movement will be run within each section, with four six-board rounds; i.e. each county will play six boards against each other county.  After the interval, the two East-West pairs in each team-of-eight swap sections, so that by the end of the day every pair will have met eight different opposing pairs, two from each county. Counties will have completed a 12-board match against each other county.

(The numbers above assume full attendance of five teams in each division.  Should teams not be able to attend, and no substitutes found, a similar format for four teams will be followed).

Since 2015, by popular demand, we have used the 'Cross-IMPs' method of scoring, converted to Victory Points:

(note - this might be amended for 2021, to cater for the limitations of the online platform)

Each N/S pair compares their scores with both of their E/W team-mates.  Thus on each board there are four IMP comparisons.  The IMP scores are added together for each 12-board match, and converted to VPs using the latest VP scale recommended by the EBU (the WBF 'discrete' scale).

As of 2016, this event is fully Green-Pointed, with awards for matches won as well as a bonus to the leading team(s).

In addition to the trophy for the overall winners in each division, modest prizes will be awarded to the top two teams.

The entry fee is £xxx per team of eight.

County treasurers, please note that, although sanctioned by the EBU, this is not an EBU event.  Payment should be made to WCBA (details to follow).

The event is intended to be a non-profit-making venture (except inasmuch as the TDs on the day are paid at 'Union Rates').
Any surplus will be set aside to guard against future losses, and to postpone, as far as possible, the need to put up the entry fee.