Children in Need - Tuesday 12th November |
ECATS “Children in Need” fund-raising week 11th-15th November
Our Club has a tradition of supporting this ECATS initiative generously and willingly. This year, we will be holding just the one Simultaneous Pairs ECATS event, at the evening session on Tuesday 12th November. No table money will be charged for this session, but participants are requested to bring CASH and to donate to Children in Need at the session, with a donation of at least £3 per person in mind.
At the other sessions during the week, members will be charged the normal table money in the usual way, but will have the opportunity to make a CASH donation at the session as well.
Members may also make donations at other times, by cash given to a Club office-holder, or by credit transfer directly into the Club account, tagged “Children in Need”. This should be done within the next two weeks or so.
Members are encouraged once again to give their support to this important and worthwhile charity and ECATS initiative.
Michael Metcalf
Chair, SBC
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Shelley 2024/25 - Second Round to be played Thursday 21st November |
Second round to be played on Thursday 21st November at Haling Dene, please arrive by 6:45 for play to start promptly by 7 pm. Captains please ensure Terry and David know of any changes to teams in good time for handicaps to be calculated.
First round played in October a good news/bad news day. Bad news, one team was unable to play on the night, good news the other four teams had no problem with the tablets so the raw results before handicaps can be seen here and after handicaps applied here, Terry had gone overboard to ensure an easy movement by dealing 4 sets of the cards so no dependence on speed of others slowing things down, the 24 boards completed by 10 p.m. Including handicaps first Janet's team raw +79, handicap -26, total +53, second Carol's team, -29, +20, total -9, third Ann's team -58, +37, total -21 and fourth the Metcalf team +8, -31, total -23, .Thanks to David for directing, everything ran very smoothly, everyone enjoyed the evening.
Hopefully a fifth team with be able to join in the next round, 21st November, t eam captains please be sure Terry knows which, if any, reserves playing in good time for him to work out the revised handicaps. Please be sure that David has your email address if you are down as a team member or a reserve as David would like to be able to pass relevant information direct to all taking part.
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IMPORTANT NOTICE - FRIDAY EVENING SESSIONS |
From Friday 8th November, Friday evening sessions will take place at Holmcroft Youth and Community centre, 22-38 Newland Avenue ST16 1NL
To find the Centre, turn eastwards into North Avenue at the traffic lights at the A34 (Stone Road) junction with North Avenue and Holmcroft Road. Take the first left into Newland Avenue. The entrance to the Centre is on the right. (Do NOT confuse this Centre with the Stafford North End Community Centre in Holmcroft Road!!) The reason for this change is to spare members from having to use unlit country lanes during the upcoming season of long dark evenings, mists and frost, and hopefully thereby to encourage and enable a bigger regular attendance on Friday evenings.
Michael Metcalf
Chair
Players are welcome to come on a Friday Evening without a partner but it would be very helpful if you could let Ann know beforehand so she can attempt to have a partner for everyone when the session starts. Click here to have your say if the Holmcroft YCC venue will suit you
A good turn out for the first session at Holmcroft on 8th November 2024, several old faces who have not managed to get to Friday sessions since May to be seen and finally the tablets performed well despite time pressures to get them up and running! Please note everything must be cleared away by 10:30 pm so play must start promptly at 7 p.m. and finish by 10:10 pm, beware the timer will be back in action and enforced!
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Morning Lessons, 10 a.m. Thursday and Friday mornings |
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Lessons are now at Tixall village Hall, ST18 0XT at 9:45 for 10 a.m.
Lessons:
- Robin's intermediate lessons: Thursday morning lessons. On 1st Thursday of the month this will will normally be played as a duplicate session.
- Terry's Improvers lessons: Friday morning lessons. On 3rd Friday of the month this will will normally be played as a duplicate session.
Robin has produced plenty of material for the website, including one on Splinter bids, Gambling 3NT, CRO, Redoubles, Trial Bids, Jacoby and his all time most read page on McKenny signals and Discards. Summary of his lessons can be seen here with links to the individual lessons.
Robin's Thursday morning popular lessons for intermediates start at 10 a.m. (please contact Robin if you would like to attend) as do Terry's Friday morning lessons for improvers (please contact Terry if you would like to attend those). Please contact Ann if you would like to join beginner's lessons.
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Results emails from EBU |
The EBU is introducing a new service for members, by which members will receive an email after each game submitted to the EBU within 3 days of play provided the EBU has a current email address for them. This email will include both their results and information on master points awarded, NGS impact, and other statistics such as how many times they have played and how their performance compares with others at the same club. It is a fun and friendly email and the EBU congratulate all players regardless of how well they score. Stafford Bridge Club has opted in to this new system; members can individually opt out via "Account" button on myEBU page.
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OnLine Bridge |
If you would like to give Bridge Club Live a try click here for the basic instructions, around 35 SBC members are active on BCL. A Stafford BCL virtual SBC club runs on Thursday evenings and a friendly BCL club runs on Tuesday mornings. The SSCBA set up a County wide Bridge Base Online virtual club that meets on Wednesday evenings, see here for advice on how to get started with BBO. A new third option is RealBridge where Newcastle Under Lyme, EBU and Midlands regional events take place. Please don't see these as either/or options but rather as different ways of enjoying online bridge which add variety to your game.
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Bridge Timer |
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Timer has had a bit of a change after Flash was withdrawn but back in action now ready for long suffering Friday night players to test!
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