Hello everyone

I thought I would use this forum post to clarify some information on the County Championship on chess.com

First of all, this is a chess.com competition, and therefore your results will not alter any over the board ECF grading you may have.

We have entered three competitions, an open competition which any player in the club can enter, and some rated restricted tournaments an under 1,600 competition and also an under 1,200 competition. We hope therefore this gives competitive matches and something for everyone, regardless of their existing skill level, and I would encourage members of this club to take part and play in the various matches.

Open competition

In the open competition we are in division two (at the time of writing we are in third place.) In the 2021 competition the Staffordshire fixtures were as follows: (With the results, latest scores, and start dates where applicable.)

Team London 11-23 Team Staffordshire - Win, completed

Team Staffordshire 9-16 Province of Ulster - Loss, 1 result still to come

Team Staffordshire 12-12 Team Dorset - Latest score, 2 results to come

Team Staffordshire 18½-7½ Team Birmingham - Won, 4 results to come

Norfolk Knights 9½-4½ Team Staffordshire - Loss, 4 results to come

Renfrewshire Rooks 0-4 Team Staffordshire - Latest score, 10 results still to come.

All of the above matches have already started and therefore it is too late to join them. However we still have a couple of matches left.

Team Staffordshire v Team Surrey - Starts 7th June, We have set a challenge to Team Surrey and are waiting for them to accept. As soon as Team Surrey accept, I will encourage players to take part.

Team Cheshire v Team Staffordshire - yet to start.

As you can see we are therefore playing against a range of counties from all over the United Kingdom.

Under 1,600 competition

As mentioned we are also in an under 1,600 competition. We are in division two of this competition. The fixtures, with results, latest scores etc are as follows below:

Somerset Wyvern 6½-½ Team Staffordshire - Latest score, 7 results to come. I am hopeful of two wins in my own matches in this match.

Hertfordshire County Chess 0-0 Team Staffordshire - Literally just started now (Friday 28th May,) whilst I was writing this post. Good luck if you are playing in this match.

We will also play matches against Team Birmingham, Munster, Team Connacht, London, and Lancashire Lads and Lasses.

So again, as you can see we are playing against county teams from across the United Kingdom.

Under 1,200 competition

As also mentioned at the start of this post, there is also an under 1,200 competition which we are in. We are in group C of this competition. The fixtures, with results and latest scores etc are as follows:

Province of Ulster 0-3 Team Staffordshire - Latest score, 3 results to come

Leinster v Team Staffordshire - We have got a default win.

Matches will also be against Derbyshire County Chess, Munster and Team Buckinghamshire.

At the risk of repeating myself, you can see that in this competition again we are playing against a range of counties from across the United Kingdom.

Overall

So as you can see there are some good competitions, between the counties and hopefully as I said at the start of the post, something for everyone at every skill level to have a competitive match. Think of it more like a league than a tournament, but although some of the matches in the league have already started, some are still yet to come, so you can still take part.

I would also like to add at the very end of this post, as we are now starting to look like we are coming out of lockdown, why not see if you want to join a local over the board chess club if you have not been part of one before. Clubs will really need help after lockdown has finished and I encourage anyone to go and join their local over the board chess club.

Team Staffordshire

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