The Four Nations Chess League does not accept responsibility for the content of other websites, to which this site links.
This website includes information on participants in the Four Nations Chess League in respect of name, grade, title, nationality and sex (team registration lists), as well as telephone number(s), email address(es) and postal address(es) in certain circumstances (team captains/managers, management board members, arbiters etc). Participants wishing this information not to be included on the website should contact the webmaster to have it removed, but should be aware that in this event they will not be permitted to play in the league.
2009/10 Season
Details of arrangements for next season (dates, venues, format, prizes, entry fees, and the like) are now available here.
And the league rules for the forthcoming season are here - last (and hopefully final) update 14/6.
We'll keep a running list of who's entered here - last updated 1/7.
The next Richmond Rapidplay event will be held on Sunday July 19th at the White House Community Association. Click here for details, including an entry form, previous results and forthcoming events.
21/6
Szombathely
Perhaps this will be of interest to 4NCL players:
GM and IM closed tournaments will take place from 15th to 23rd August in Szombathely, Hungary. Two Open tournaments are also going to be held from August 20th to 25th at the same place.
The GM tournament is planned to be around Category 10 and the IM event will be around Category 3-4. It should be a good chance to make GM or IM norms.
1st Big Slick Chess Congress, 26th-28th June at the Big Slick Poker Club, Unit 10 Royal Oak Centre, Brighton Rd, Purley, Surrey.
FIDE Open: This event will be FIDE rated, it will also be the last chance to qualify for the British Chess Championship. The highest placed player not already qualified will qualify for the 2009 British Championships in Torquay.
This is a 5 round tournament held over the weekend. Guaranteed Prizes: If entries exceed the expected amount then the prizes will go up: 1st £200 2nd £100 3rd £50 Rating Prizes: 2100-2000, 2000-1800, Below 1800
Full details can be found here. This includes a list of participants and an online entry form.
The chess events will be taking place in the day, separate to the poker. You can have a look at the poker club here.
The venue is about 20-25 minutes by train from Victoria.
The Masters event offers players (preferably 2150+) the opportunity of 9 competitive games of chess with the the chance to secure that all important IM, WGM or WIM norm.
The Challengers event offers players 9 competitive FIDE rated games for players rated above 2000 and for unrated players (graded 130 plus), the opportunity to obtain a full FIDE rating in one event. The winner of the Challengers will receive a superb package of free entry to the next Uxbridge Masters, together with free accommodation at the venue for the duration of the event - a package worth £300. A great way to pay for your entry to the Masters!
The Get Me Rated is aimed at players rated below 2000 or graded below 140 and is designed to get unrated players a full FIDE rating in just one event! Players will be placed in groups of 10 according to rating / grade so that all the players in a group are of a similar strength.
By playing in any of these events, an unrated player will be assured of achieving a full FIDE rating as long as all the unrated players score at least a 1/2 point.
All these events are scheduled so as to only require 3 days off work, and one lot of travelling - with special discounted rates for players staying in the hotel.
In a nail-biting finish to the 2008/09 season, WOOD GREEN HILSMARK KINGFISHER 1 secured the Division 1 title by holding GUILDFORD-A&DC 1 to a 4-4 draw.
In a similarly close climax to Division 2, OXFORD 1 pipped PANDORA'S BOX GRANTHAM to the championship on tie-break. POISONED PAWNS 1 and JUTES OF KENT were also promoted.
In Division 3, AMCA DRAGONS were runaway champions, whilst LITTLETHORPE 1, POISONED PAWNS 2 and WHITE ROSE 2 were also promoted.
Division 2, Round 9 games in PGN or in game viewer 15/5 - includes correction to the Borrowdale vs. Moore game score Division 2, Round 10 games in PGN or in game viewer 13/5 - includes corrections to the Pandora's Box Grantham vs. King's Head match Division 2, Round 11 games in PGN or in game viewer
With thanks to Neville Belinfante, Claire Summerscale, Dave Thomas, Malcolm Armstrong, Feliks Kwiatkowski, Jack Rudd, Ian Kingston and Graham Borrowdale.
15/5
Game viewer
Many thanks to our technical guru, John Saunders, for bringing the webmaster's attention to a new game viewer. It is like the old one, but has additional capabilities such as allowing the user to have black pieces at the bottom of the screen, change background and board colours and even move the pieces and try out different variations on the board.
Thanks to Jonathan Rogers for the following musings on the events of the recent season, particularly the final Guildford vs. Wood Green match - click here.
Hard to believe, but some folks may want to plan ahead to the season after next ... dates and venues for 2010/11 are announced here. We've also updated the Hotels page to show the room rates that will apply.
"I will be away at the weekend, arbiting at the Frome Congress. I invite submissions from anyone interested for games for my reports. Any annotated games that reach me by whenever I get back on Monday will end up in the appropriate report."
his amazing game against Gabor Pinter ... click here.
1/5
Girls' Day School Trust Championship
From Claire Summerscale
The 5th Girls' Day School Trust Chess Championship, supported by the 4 Nations Chess League, took place on the 25th April. You can read a report on this tournament here.
28/4
The Fastest Chess Player in the World
From Claire Summerscale:
Rosalind Kieran, a former Women's World Amateur champion and member of the Pride & Prejudice 4NCL team, is now the fastest chess player in the world!
Completing the 2009 London marathon in 2 hours 53 minutes and 30 seconds, running each mile in less than 7 minutes, she finished the women's race in 29th position. An amazing achievement.
FIDE Open (Open to all). This event will be FIDE rated and the highest placed player not already qualified will qualify for the 2009 British Championships in Torquay.
From David Cooper, former captain of Warwickshire Select 2:
Anyone who captained a 4NCL team 4 years ago may remember, with some annoyance, how often the mailing list was systematically targeted by peddlers of the "Nigerian scam", looking for victims to sting for an advance fee by promising a share in a non-existent fortune. It may still be going on to this very day.
Not being minded to tolerate their tricks, this led me take up the art of scambaiting - to its practitioners, a game with strategy and tactics of its own - and I recently had a book published, featuring a number of examples, under the title "Revenge on the Scammers" (£7.99 from Amazon), using the nom-de-plume Cazzy Jones, the central character that I created to take on the scammers.
Unfortunately my one and only chess based scambait to date, which co-starred a villainous trainer of my creation called Boris Chigorin determined to promote his pupils by foul means (coded yogurt etc) was rendered unfit for publication when the scammer - who had rather naively called himself Michael Adams! - latched on. However, the six tales in the book are all perfect working examples of baiting, and one of these days Boris Chigorin may reappear...
Click here for the FIDE crosstable for the season up to round 8 (Microsoft Excel spreadsheet). The spreadsheet shows players' FIDE rating performances.
The seven columns at the end are: A - score B - games against FIDE rated opponents C - score in games against FIDE rated opponents D - average rating of FIDE rated opponents E - expected score against FIDE rated opponents F - (actual score minus expected score) against FIDE rated opponents G - Tournament Performance Rating
In line with FIDE regulations all calculations are based on the October 2008 list, which was the active list when this season's league started.
Results for the league so far have been submitted in two batches. Rounds 1 to 4 for rated players went into the January list and are on the web here.
Rounds 5 and 6 for rated players went into the April list and are here.
Rounds 7 onwards for rated players and all results for unrated players will be submitted after round 11 finishes in early May, and these will be included in the July list.
Anyone who believes they are in with a chance of getting a norm this season should contact Neville Belinfante so that he can check what they require. He believes that Stephen Gordon and Mohammed Tissir (7.5/8) are virtually guaranteed GM norms, and Andrew Greet has a good chance as well.
With thanks as always to Neville.
CONGRESS ORGANISERS Whilst we are happy to display entry forms for forthcoming congresses at the 4NCL weekends, please send any such information to Dave Welch. You can find Dave's address here.
Previous news updates can be found in the Archive.
