Below is your monthly update from the EBU. Please note there are a number of important topics covered in the below. This email is also available on the EBU website, along with all past EBU Updates, here.
Competition Planning
Having seen acceptable numbers at the Easter Congress and good numbers at the Spring Fours, we are looking to focus our efforts on a smaller number of live events, as a result of which our next open face-to-face events will be
- The cruise in the Netherlands & Belgium at the end of May
- The Scarborough Congress (21st-24th July, incorporating a Seniors Pairs) running 21st-24th July
- The Eastbourne Summer Congress running 11th-14th August
Of the other events we have traditionally held
- The National Swiss Teams was planned to be online 14th-15th May but has insufficient entries and is cancelled
- The Spring Bank Holiday event this year will be reduced to a one-day, online, Swiss Pairs on Sunday 5th June
- We are planning for an online replacement for the Riviera Congress at the start of July - details will be published soon
- The date of Crockfords’ Final has been changed to 24th-25th September; County Associations which were planning to run events that weekend will have the chance to change their dates
The Competitions Working Group has set off three sub-groups to look at
- Issues around NGS and Masterpoints and the extent to which they do or do not encourage more bridge to be played
- The rejuvenation of our match-point pairs events with a particular eye on Simultaneous Pairs events and the National Pairs
- How to tackle falling numbers in events across the board
If you know someone who could make a positive contribution to one of these groups, please let us know (email to roblawy@gmail.com)
EBU Summer Meeting
The big bridge event of the summer will be the EBU Summer Meeting. We would request that all counties and clubs promote this event on their websites, here is a link to an advert that we have created that you can use. You can download the picture locally and then upload to your website. In order to create a clickable link on your website, you will need to include the following link when adding the picture https://www.ebu.co.uk/competitions/summer-meeting.
Bridgewebs
If you have not already, please consider sharing the EBU news section on your club or county bridgewebs site. To do so, log in as an administrator for your site, select Menu, Amend. There will be a list title "Add BridgeWebs Pages not already in your menu", under the option for Predefined Pages select EBU News.
Promotional Materials Play Bridge 2022
By now, all counties will have received your Membership Drive packs. Many clubs and teachers have already ordered packs from the EBU Bridge Warehouse. If you have not yet ordered your pack, please do so.
We are asking every County, Club and Teacher to put at least one Poster up with associated Leaflets, though more is fantastic. By working together we hope to introduce many more people to the game of Bridge.
Electronic versions of all items received in your Membership Drive pack are available to download for use online:
Reminders to Clubs
As reminder, if you have not already done so, please pay your annual subscriptions and club insurance.
Please note the current club terms of affiliation along with the updated UMS charges for this financial year, as agreed at the last AGM.
The Club Information Forms will be sent out the second week of May. Please complete and return these so that we can keep your club's information up to date.
Offers at Bridge Warehouse
Affiliated clubs receive £250.00 off either of these dealing machines!
Jannersten Duplimate VI Dealing Machine - Regular price £3,480.00 Affiliated Club Price £3,230. NEW - Latest machine - uses phone or tablet - No need for a computer!
*PLEASE NOTE* This Machine uses New type Duplimate Bar Coded cards only - Ask for details
Jannersten Bridgesorter Dealing Machine – NEW - Regular price £3,830.00 Affiliated Club price £3,580. You can use your smartphone or tablet for this machine - no need for a computer! Uses any bridge sized cards.
PLEASE TELEPHONE TO ORDER - 01296 397851. Both items have free delivery
For further information and details of no quibble guarantees etc, please see the Bridge Warehouse.
Education
The EBU Board wants to reverse the trend of declining numbers of those playing duplicate bridge in England. You will have seen some marketing initiatives aimed at this objective. The EBU Board has created an Education Working Group (EWG) whose broad aim is to determine what can be done in the sphere of bridge education to help achieve this same objective.
The EWG includes members of the EBU Board and EBU members who have an interest in Education. The EWG has provisionally set out its long-term ambition as: to ensure that any potential newcomer or improver in any part of the country can identify easily accessible routes to learning the game.
When the EWG considered what it might achieve over the short term it was influenced by that fact that many clubs face a difficult situation, particularly as we move back to face-to-face bridge. A survey last year indicated that many clubs and Counties lack an option to help potential newcomers learn the game, and indeed remain unaware of local or regional opportunities for finding and recruiting teachers.
The group has set out its provisional 2022 aims as follows:
- To ensure that learners can easily find all the learning options (f2f and online) which are currently available.
- To identify and promote options that facilitate quicker access to the game through combinations of online capabilities and local F2F support.
- To put in place a community of teachers to enable them to benefit from each other, and the roots of a programme to increase the number of teachers.
- To promote cooperation among us all, clubs, County Associations and the EBU in order to improve the available teaching options.
The EWG welcomes feedback about these aims and objectives and any assistance in providing information or help in meeting them. Please contact Adrian at adriandarnell@btinternet.com
EBED
EBED are looking for help with the editing of videos. Anybody willing to offer their experience should contact the EBED Chief Executive giorgio@ebedcio.org.uk
Updated EBUScore
We are glad to announce an updated version of EBUScore, 1.2.12. This is available from the My EBU area of the EBU website, for clubs and scorers. There are various fixes, including one for an issue on Windows 11 where displaying reports in Notepad gives an error message. Please update your version, especially if using Windows 11.
Social Media and Blogs
Please let us know if you would like to suggest a blog article that can then be shared across social media. There is no cost for this, and we welcome your ideas. Examples of blogs include:
- Interesting hands and conundrums
- Why your county is an attractive place to visit whilst joining in an evening’s Bridge or a local congress.
- Anniversaries – Lymington Bridge Club will be celebrating 150 years in 2022 and Chelmsford 70 years.
- Charity Activity in your county – perhaps a Café Bridge Event?
This is a chance to reinvigorate your Facebook Followers.
Please make suggestions to sam@ebu.co.uk.
Don't forget to like our social media pages, Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.
Affiliation offer for non-affiliated clubs
The EBU is currently offering free trial affiliation to clubs which have not been affiliated since the introduction of Pay to Play (now UMS) in 2010. This trial will give clubs most of the benefits of EBU affiliation but at no cost until end of December 2022. We hope that this great offer will attract many unaffiliated clubs to try affiliating and that they will then be impressed with the benefits of being affiliated to the EBU. We have had an encouraging response with more than ten clubs already signed up and many more showing interest.
Counties agreed to work in collaboration with the EBU on this project and it would be great if you would support this initiative by reaching out to your local unaffiliated clubs to make them fully aware of the offer and encourage their participation. Remember it is free and there is nothing to lose by allowing their members to experience membership of the EBU before making a final decision about affiliation.
For further details please contact Jonathan Lillycrop.