EBU South West Regional Club Committee.
NOTES ON THE INAUGURAL MEETING

Present A Krys, Dave Latcham (Somerset & Wiltshire), Sue O’Hara (Avon), Mike Booth (Cornwall), David Simonson (Gloucestershire), Dick Andrews (Devon).

What does your county do for your clubs?
Wiltshire has introduced a "novice" league which, in it second year, has achieved 18 teams. Another county has also introduced a "novice" league which is run simultaneously with the advanced league and has proved very successful.

Education
It is a good idea for the county to designate a youth officer with the objective to introducing bridge in schools etc. To be successful a club needs to have teaching within the club. It should not be accepted that nobody is interested in doing it because that is often not the case. LEA funding is no longer available for bridge teaching and clubs need to pick up the omission; clubs can teach duplicate and encourage students to join the club after they have completed their tuition. An example was quoted where the club pays the teacher and the lessons are free. Other counties pay for the venue and the students pay for the teacher etc. Somerset invite experts to give seminars three times a year and these are subsidised. Cornwall run a competition (pairs) for those have fewer than 1000 master points.

Krys outlined what makes a successful club: teaching, a friendly atmosphere and a progressive committee. Other members gave examples of good practice such as bridge and lunch, or even bridge interrupted by an evening meal.

Updates

1. The EBU are running future simultaneous pairs events instead of ECats in order to reduce costs.
2. The EBU are introducing "blue" points for use in sim pairs events instead of green points and clubs can use "blue" points for their congresses. Three "blue" points equate to one green point.
3. The EBU are introducing a national grading scheme. Players will be assessed over their most recent 1000 boards, depending on the standard of their opposition, and will be graded from Ace (over 62%) to Two (13 grades).
4. The EBU issue a club management handbook for affiliated clubs.
5. Many people have joined the EBU purely because the magazine is so good. They also issue a Club Focus for those involved in the running of bridge clubs and the EBU have requested that clubs pass this on to scorers and TDs etc.

Dave Latcham was appointed Chairman.

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