07-08-2014, 11:48 AM
harrymarron Wrote:Is this the same world youth event that were talking about not sending kids to this year cause its too far away and too expensive? Not really sure how that fits together Robin. Of more concern than the format would be the fact that we lost 30 of the 36 Stokes matches and failed to win a single game in the Gilbert. This should raise questions for Clubs, Coaches and Selectors as we are clearly not good enough at these ages. Let me make it clear that I' a big fan of young people who do their best, this is not the fault of any of the kids taking part who I'm sure all tried their hardest. Well done to everyone for the effort and the Glorney and Robinson teams who performed solidly.
This year is a bit of an exception as Robin has already highlighted (the euro youth is in georgia which is similarly awkward/marginal on safety). Changing the format is unlikely to happen(and I don't think Robin is suggesting this as a panacea or anything close!) but if it did to Robin's suggestion the stokes players would be more experienced as they would have probably played in the u10 squad in previous years. His point about u16s often not getting to play for Scotland for a few years till they are 17/18 is extremely valid and certainly resonates with my experience a few years ago.
Regarding the Stokes, I would like to point out that it wasn't really a case of Scotland having a bad year but rather the other countries having a good year. Look at the grades of last years stokes competition - Scotland is roughly the same standard but the others are not : <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.chessscotland.com/event2014/Stokes_Cup.html">http://www.chessscotland.com/event2014/Stokes_Cup.html</a><!-- m -->
With that in mind I think a more positive outlook is appropriate. Rather than berating ourselves for a bad result (that was quite possibly made to look worse by variance), we should be asking ourselves what the other countries, particularly in my view Wales, are doing right. Might seem a bit of a strange choice but when I played my first glorney then I was told by a friend who had played the glorney that so long as I beat the welsh player then I hadn't disgraced scotland. The next year Wales did considerably better, winning the u14s and the only player I didn't register a win against was the welsh player!
Another point is to look at the standard of our u14 team - the top 4 boards would all have been serious contenders for selection for the world youth even if they had been in the u18 age group when I was 18! I think this shows the strides we are making, and I think this is partly due to the online coaching scheme.
That said there is plenty of opportunities for improvement if we all row in the same direction and make positive suggestions rather than putting ourselves down without any reason.