COUNTY LEAGUE FOR CLUBS 2023-24     

RULES, ADVICE AND INFO FOR TEAM CAPTAINS

Teams may be club based or consist of members of two or more clubs when the team will be identified by the Captain's name.

County League fees are £40 for 1^st division (play 9 matches) and £35 for 2^nd and 3^rd divisions (play 8 matches).

Captains or club treasurers should pay by bank transfer to

SORT CODE 30-98-45 ACC NO 03080007                               

To comply with EBU rules players in all except the 3^rd division must be EBU members.

A player may not represent more than one club, but may play for two teams of the same club for a maximum of three times for each team .

Teams must make every effort to play matches on the set evening, but if a Captain cannot raise a team for a very good reason such as sudden illness they must inform Tony Russ and their opposing Captain as soon as possible and offer alternative dates. If difficulties arise please refer to 'rules re arranging online matches' in the county league menu. Bob Warrender, John Cockram and Tony Russ must be given details of this.

The default platform for rearranged matches is Realbridge, but if both Captains agree BBO may be used and matches of 18 or 20 boards may be played.

The result (together with names of players of both teams) of any match played privately must be sent by the winning Captain to Bob Warrender.

Teams are strongly discouraged from withdrawing without completing their matches.

CONDUCT OF MATCHES

Matches are of 24 boards on Realbridge on fixed dates.

Players use a link on SCBA website and sit at the table allocated to their team.

Realbridge moves the EW players of both teams to their opposition table against whom the first 12 boards will start at 7.15 pm.

When both tables of a match have completed 12 boards Realbridge will return players to their home table.

The away team (sitting at the even-numbered table) will automatically be switched  (NS become EW and vice versa) for boards 13-24.

If there are any problems during the match please call the director.

Play will start at 7.15 pm even if some players have failed to log on.

A missing player may join at any stage, but if a match is unable to complete boards the team missing a player loses 3 IMPs for each board not played.

If a match cannot be played because a team never has four players present the offending team is given 0 VPs and the non-offending team their end-of-programme average VPs.

In exceptional circumstances the match may be rearranged as detailed in paragraph 6 above.

Genuine misclicks are allowed in bidding but not in play.

As in F2F bridge your partner must announce and alert your bids (unlike BBO when you alert your own bids)

Permitted conventions are at EBU level 4 in 1^st and 2^nd divisions, but level 2 in 3^rd division.