European Universities Championship

[ClaceyJ]

This is partially a rant, and partially seeing what other people think of a particularly annoying situation.

 

This October the European Universities championship will take place in Croatia. Myself and my friends, as Oxford University, won the right to represent England by winning the Portland Bowl, the English Universtities knockout competition. Many well known English players have represented England and their university in international university competitions as a result.

 

Only we can't go.

 

The European University Sports Association accepts entries from individual countries University sports federation. It does this as it believes bridge to be a sport, therefore runs the competition.

 

The British University Sports Association refuses to enter us as they dont think bridge is a sport.

 

Neither will budge. (EUSA wont take an entry from the EBU, BUSA refuses to enter us anyway) Therefore this universities championship will take place with no english team present, barring some last minute dec

 

On a personal level, I've put a lot of effort into university bridge, and this is my first opportunity to play. As a medical student with ever reducing free time, it may be my last. To be denied to play either because of peoples unwillingness to compromise, or partly because of the campaign to get bridge named a 'sport' (which is fundamentally where the problem originates from) seems grossly unfair.

 

I dont think writing this will help, but it's something I feel people should know about.

 

Thanks for reading.

 

Joe

[NickRW]

Obv. this is wrong. Not sure which party you should shoot, probably BUSA.

[hrothgar]

Silly question(s):

 

How was this handled in years past?

Has England ever competed in this event before?

If so, how did folks manage to address this same issue?

 

If worst comes to worst, it would be interesting to understand precisely what defines an individual county's University Sports Federation.

 

In theory, is there any reason that you and a couple like minded friends couldn't create a new University Sports Federations that reconized bridge as a sport (and didn't recognize anything else)?

[ClaceyJ]

Not particularly silly questions.

 

Yes England has participated almost all previous years.

How was it handled in the past?- I dont know the exact answer, but I know in the past someone has backed down (EUSA usually I believe) This year it seems noone is willing to. I think this backing down may have led people to avoid solving the problem permanently.

 

Im pretty sure setting up our own organisation wouldn't work (I suspect you would have to play quite a fee to join EUSA, even if they would recognise two organisations from the same country(which I dont think they would))

[hrothgar]

Not particularly silly questions.

 

Yes England has participated almost all previous years.

How was it handled in the past?- I dont know the exact answer, but I know in the past someone has backed down (EUSA usually I believe) This year it seems noone is willing to. I think this backing down may have led people to avoid solving the problem permanently.

 

Im pretty sure setting up our own organisation wouldn't work (I suspect you would have to play quite a fee to join EUSA, even if they would recognise two organisations from the same country(which I dont think they would))

Sounds quite annoying.

 

Is there anyone that you can sue?

Personal lawsuits often grab people's attention.

[Fluffy]

I had this very same problem in Spain years ago, I didn't find the answer.

 

Try complaining to the event's organicers. I remember participating once (not sure if it was this exact event) without my "individual countries University sports federation" ever noticing.

[PeterGill]

If I were you, I would email Anna Gudge anna @ ecats.co.uk as soon as Brazil is over - she would be very busy in Brazil. Anna works for the WBF, is English, and is a wonderful organiser and trouble-shooter who at least will always give you a prompt answer and try her best to put you in touch with the right person to solve this ridiculous situation. She has fixed up many such probems for the WBF before, without anyone even hearing about it becoming a problem.

[Jlall]

Yeah in USA the answer would just be to get a lawyer to send a letter to the BSA threatening a lawsuit. Usually this would get them to back down. I understand that in other not-so-litigous countries this is not a reasonable option.

[Echognome]

Normally when you hear one thing from party A and the opposite from party B, you try to get A and B together to resolve the problem. Is there anyone you can get a conference call together with the parties. It's a preferable option to email, where people can ignore your mails, but that may be your only recourse.

 

I do like the suggestion made by Peter of getting someone involved that has a lot of connections. They may be able to help you with the situation. I would think it would be in the EBU's interest to also get this resolved. Maybe one of the higher ups in the EBU can reach out to EUSA and/or BUSA?

[Fluffy]

Yeah in USA the answer would just be to get a lawyer to send a letter to the BSA threatening a lawsuit. Usually this would get them to back down. I understand that in other not-so-litigous countries this is not a reasonable option.

This is the route that the spannish bridge federation (or should I rather say, the president himself, since he takes all decisions without asking anyone) has taken trying to force "Consejo Superior de Deportes" to accept bridge as a sport.

 

Taking a legal action against the guys who are suposed to give us some money when we become a sport is not working by now. More likelly the contrary, they hate us.

[kfay]

This makes me sad :D

[helene_t]

Justin has it right. Lawsuits don't grap anyone's attention.

 

Peter's and Gnome's suggestions sound better. I would try both.

[gnasher]

Asking Anna Gudge for help is certainly a good idea, if she isn't already involved.

 

Another (more divisive) possibility is to apply pressure on BUSA from above. Assuming that this organisation receives taxpayers' money, a sympathetic MP might be able to achieve something. You could try contacting bridge-playing MPs, such as the ones mentioned here:

 

http://www.ebu.co.uk/general/news/2008/lordsvcommons2008.htm

[Hanoi5]

So the country where Bridge somehow originated won-t accept it as a sport. How nice.

 

As someone else mentioned it is the BUSA whom you have to pressure the most. You should probably try a newspaper or something, try to use the media. Maybe appeal to patriotic feelings, too.

 

Write to the WBF, too and see is they can convince EUSA, but the problem will reamin in England so give your best shot to change BUSA.

 

Many countries have accepted bridge as a sport and being in one that has I suppose the problem with accepting bridge as a sport is that you accept you will have to give them money from the budget some time.

[david_c]

Some of these posts surprise me: I think BUSA is blameless. Maybe bridge should be considered a sport, or maybe it shouldn't - either decision seems reasonable. But once it has been decided that bridge is not a sport for BUSA's purposes, then they can no longer claim to officially represent bridge. A BUSA staff memeber no longer has the authority to send off applications relating to bridge. They can pretend they have the authority, but that would be a lie, and very unprofessional, and it seems rather unfair to put pressure on them to do this.

 

Surely EUSA are the villains here. They must know perfectly well that not all sporting organisations include bridge as a sport, and yet they only accept entries through those organisations? That's mind-boggling. It comes across as EUSA being less interested in staging a bridge event, and more interested in using bridge players as pawns in the game of getting national organisations to recognise bridge as a sport.

[Finch]

This is completely absurd.

 

I played for England in this event the very first time it was held. I don't remember anything like this being a problem; I think our entry was sorted out by the EBU at the time.

 

I agree with others that the best hope of success is by getting pressure put on both organisations to come to an agreement. Other possible suggestions:

 

- Do other countries have this problem? It seems Spain do, is there anyone else? Are EUSA going to run out of entries if they remain pig-headed?

 

- Is there anyone senior at Oxford who likes bridge or is involved in their sporting organisation who might be persuaded to get involved on your behalf? In particular, has anyone dealt with one or both of EUSA/BUSA on behalf of other games/sports? Make it clear that you aren't actually trying to promote bridge as a sport, you just want to play in this event.

 

- Would anyone at the Portland Club be able to help? They still sponsor the Portland Bowl, after all... I don't know anyone there myself.

[jeremy69]

I don't think BUSA are being consistent. They are also being absurd. If they look back in their record books (admittedly very many years) they did recognise bridge because there was some funding granted for a couple of University Championships and the university I was at would not award colours for bridge until it was recognised. In addition to contacting Anna as mentioned I would also contact the EBU General Manager (Barry@ebu.co.uk) to try and enlist his help.

[ClaceyJ]

It appears that someone has decided to be kind.

 

Through no action of the university associations, we have been given permission to go. Someone on the organisation committee of the championship has taken it on themselves to make an exception for us, due to the (insert word here) views of the sports organisations.

 

This personally has made my day, and restored some faith.

 

However, this is still something that will need sorting in the future, as not everyone may find someone to take pity on them. I really appreciate the advice and thoughts of people, its helped. I am also lucky to have some hardworking teammates who have never given up.

 

Thanks to all

 

J

[gwnn]

nice to hear that m8! good luck, you should win now to make them think twice next year :D

[Fluffy]

Good luck dude. Have fun and enough beer :)

[NickRW]

If medical students these days are anything like they were in my day there isn't much risk of not enough beer. The vet students were worse, but not much else.

 

Nick