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24th February 2008
68 Entries, 7 Tournaments, 33 Players, £2495 Prize Fund,
Murray Sharp wins The Bg in London WSOB Nordic Open Satellite 2008
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24 players were in-situ by 11.30am so the entry fee for a voucher
worth £1200 for a room for 5 night, registration fee and entry to
the Championship Division of the
WSOB and
Partouche Gammon sponsored
Nordic Open 2008 was just £50. Which 1 of those 24 players
would be off on a jaunt at the expense of the other 23 took 11
hours to determine. A further 9 bg players would join us
throughout the rest of the day.
We also included a £20 Optional Pool which if the winner won would
give him or her a purse to spend in Copenhagen. With 13 of the 24
players taking up on this the Pool came to £260. We also threw in
a Group Auction – 8 Groups, 3 players each and £185 was raised.
24 players is a good enough number – not quite a perfect 32 or 64
but a nice round tournament number to kick off with. 8 1st Round
matches in the top half of the draw and 8 players on byes in the
lower half of the draw meaning 4 2nd Round matches starting 2
hours before they were due to.
It was a very strong field. Off the top of my head I decided that
at least 15 of the 24 players had good chances of winning this
event. The strongest Auction Group on paper was Raj Jansari, Ian
Tarr and Barry McAdam and they went for a lot more than other
Groups did. Peter Bennet was with us, as was Michael Michael,
Stuart Mann and Shino. Or would it be Simon Barget, Murray Sharp,
Ian Tarr, Sean Williams or Zoe Cunningham? Zoe had a particular
interest in winning this because she was the finalist in both the
WSOB UK Masters Satellites in November – could she make it third
time lucky?
The Nordic Open is the best spoken of Backgammon Events in the
world. Not only does it boast the largest field of entrants, it
also boasts 4 flights and is spread over 5 days. Given that the
event is held in Denmark the standard of play is incredibly
strong. The event has the additional kudos of being filmed this
year by The WSOB with the winner gaining a seat in the WSOB Finale
in Cannes later this year. Monte Carlo might boast the title of
“World Championships” but if you’re in the know it’s The Nordic
Open that, these days, is the better prize.
When the first set of matches were played I opened registration
for other tournaments. There was in-sufficient interest in another
Satellite per say so I opened up 8 player, 7 pointer Jackpots. We
had 5 and a half of these over the course of the day so 6 players
walked out with at least a contribution to the Nordic Open should
they wish to go.
The Main Satellite progressed at a good rate with only a couple of
matches falling slightly behind my hoped for schedule. Neither
were so bad that I had to intervene and have shortened matches
played or clocks used and so the day progressed at its natural
rate making it a pleasant day of good competition.
In the Quarter-Finals of the Satellite Simon Barget beat Shino,
Zoe beat Ian Tarr, Stuart Mann beat Michael Michael and Murray
Sharp beat Cecilia Sparke. Had it been otherwise it could have
been 3 of the 4 Semi-Finalist coming from Bristol but as it was
there was only Stuart Mann remaining. He faced Murray Sharp but
lost to the London “boy.” Meanwhile in the other half of the Draw
Zoe had despatched Simon Barget meaning Zoe was in her 3rd WSOB
Satellite final. Surely fate would decree that her time had come
to win a final. But Murray is a been there, done that sort of man
(just look at the Keith Richards lines on his face) and was
approaching this with a sort of relaxed day at the office air.
The table was set, suitable chairs were selected and the
contestants had refreshments to hand. Murray took a healthy lead
but Zoe stuck to her task and ignored Murray’s jibes. A good crowd
of players watched on yearning for the young bright light to
triumph over the older maybe has been. Zoe clawed back and quietly
gave as good as she was getting or letting the unnecessary stuff
waft by her. As befitting of any good final the contestants
obliged and reached double match point. Accommodation and a seat
on the Nordic Open and would be decided to all intense and
purposes by a 1 pointer. Murray got some good early rolls and it
looked like curtains for Zoe. But she fought back; slowly she
rebuilt a prime of sorts while holding onto Murray’s 3 & 4 points.
Murray was having trouble but trying not to show it. After another
few moves Zoe hit one of Murray’s checkers and now that she had 5
points on her home board closed if Murray danced she could bring
her trailing checkers home. But Murray didn’t dance, instead out
popped a perfecto 3,6 to enter and scaly away. Zoe needed to
re-hit but didn’t and that was pretty well it all over.
Hard luck Zoe, I’m sure your day will come and congratulation
Murray, your day is still your day and we’ll be following you’re
progress in The Nordic Open with interest.
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