The tournament is now over for the term.
The Nick Ashley this term closely follows the last three Nick Ashley trophies. This time, Matt Fayers is running things, but I (Andrew Garrard) am maintaining the web pages; scores should be sent to both of us where possible.
The Nick Ashley Trophy is a singles league competition. That is each player plays a match consisting of a number of games of singles against every other player in their league. The league winners then play some sort of a final. Simple really.
Nine people have expressed an interest so the qualifying will consist of two leagues of five and four people, split with approximately even seedings in the two halves. People have been seeded into leagues according to a secret algorithm known only to the tournament organiser (Mr Fayers).
The winner and runner up of each league, will then play a 4 player league to decide the overall winner.
All matches from the qualifying leagues must be played and all results must be reported before the penultimate meeting of term. That is 8:00pm Wednesday 8th March. A four player all-play-all takes 3 rounds and so it should be possible to fit this in to one evening with a bit of luck. This will enable the results to be announced while there are still people around who might be interested. Also, conveniently, it should ensure that the winner is announced in Queens' Bar. It is convenient because I am sure that the winner will feel inclined to do a quick amigos and there is bound to be beer on hand. You might like to know that the trophy is a quart tankard. Just think, your entire Relle entry qualification in one fell swoop!
Matches should be played at a time agreed by the two contestants. It is up to the players to agree a mutually convenient time. If a match is not played by the relevant deadline then both players will lose the match with nil points. Of course we could all churlishly refuse to find a convenient time to play Matt just to make sure he loses, but I am sure that we are above such behaviour. Well if you think that someone is trying to pull this trick on you then rant at me and I will try ranting at them or possible take even more extreme action.
The only other rule about the timing of matches is that they may not be played between 8:00pm and 11:59pm on a Wednesday. We all have much more important winking to do then.
Note that there is no reason why the whole match has to be played in one session
Each match should consist of two games of singles winks. The scores from the 2 games are added together and the one with the most points wins. This is rather like the World Singles, only smaller. In fact the winner of the match is largely irrelevant because the final outcome of the league will be decided on P. P. G. but in the case of a tie I will wear a tie and the tie-break shall be number of matches won.
I would suggest that colours and corners are chosen at random for the first game and that you keep the same colours but swap corners for the second game. Alternatively you could use the 'winner of the squidge off plays yellow' convention. You are of course entitled to agree mutually any other choice of colours and corners, but if you can't agree you must use one of the above set-ups.
There is also a potential problem if you are playing without an umpire available. Should a disagreement occur you are required to attempt to behave like responsible adults. If this proves impossible then toss a coin.
I expect that if people get really petulant we could end up with half-hour rants about which mat to use (like that world singles in the Castle between Dave Lockweed and Geoff Myers). If this happens either grow up or each choose a mat for one of the games. You might like to sort this out when arranging the match time.
Results should be sent to Matt Fayers (mf205@hermes.cam.ac.uk). It would be most convenient if you could E-mail them to him, but otherwise give them to him written on a bit of paper. The winner of the match is responsible for reporting the result, but there is no harm in both players informing him. I will try to keep an up-to-date league table and a copy of the results of all matches played on this page.
If you can think of anything overlooked in these rules then please let us know. Kindly bear in mind that this competition is meant to be fun so all participants are requited to (try to) enjoy themselves.
Here is a list of the players, in seeding order:
| Placing last time (qualifying/final) |
Name | P.P.G. last time | Bluffer's guide |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1/1 | Matt Fayers | 51/4 | The crumpet's thinking man |
| 4/2 | Phil Carmody | 413/16 | Ed porter |
| 2/4 | Tim Hunt | 423/24 | Does anybody want those chips? |
| 5/- | Stew Sage | 437/72 | It's very important to know exactly what's going on |
| 7/- | Pete Keevash | 31/4 | Cheating bastard |
| 6/- | Andrew Garrard | 371/72 | Sorry I'm late, I spilt coke on my Newton |
| 9/- | Antony Proietti | 21/2 | Homer Projectile (Doh) |
| 12/- | John Haslegrave | 11/2 | Everyone laughed at something I said yesterday |
| 11/- | Patrick Driscoll | 115/16 | Blah blah cantankerometer |
N.B. The ppg last time is based on qualifying, not the final, and doesn't include those not participating this time. You'll note that this time placing and ppg are not directly related, so it's only there as a curio. I'm also being generous with ppgs and not counting unplayed games...
Happened on Friday 24th March, in the Bowett Room, Queens'.
| Name | Qualifying P.P.G. | A | B | C | D | Total | P.P.G. | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| A | Matt Fayers | 57/8 | - | 10 | 5 | 14 | 29 | 45/6 |
| B | Tim Hunt | 415/16 | 4 | - | 3 | 12 | 19 | 31/6 |
| C | Phil Carmody | 49/16 | 9 | 11 | - | 4 | 24 | 4 |
| D | Stew Sage | 33/8 | 0 | 2 | 10 | - | 12 | 2 |
So the trophy was retained by Matthew Fayers (Trinity).
| Pos. | Name | Played | Won | Drawn | Lost | Pts for | Pts against | P.P.G. |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Matt Fayers | 4 | 4 | 0 | 0 | 47 | 9 | 57/8 |
| 2 | Stew Sage | 4 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 27 | 29 | 33/8 |
| 3 | Patrick Driscoll | 3 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 171/2 | 241/2 | 211/12 |
| 4 | Pete Keevash | 3 | 0 | 0 | 4 (3) | 141/2 | 271/2 | 113/16 (25/12) |
| 5 | John Haslegrave | 3 | 1 | 0 | 3 (2) | 14 | 28 | 13/4 (21/3) |
| Name | A | B | C | D | E | Total | P.P.G. | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| A | Matt Fayers | - | 12 | 11 | 13 | 11 | 47 | 57/8 |
| B | Stew Sage | 2 | - | 9 | 9 | 7 | 27 | 33/8 |
| C | Pete Keevash | 3 | 5 | - | 0 (4) | 61/2 | 141/2 | 113/16 (25/12) |
| D | John Haslegrave | 1 | 5 | 0 (3) | - | 8 | 14 | 13/4 (21/3) |
| E | Patrick Driscoll | 3 | 7 | 71/2 | 6 | - | 231/2 | 215/16 |
| Against: | 9 | 29 | 271/2 | 28 | 321/2 |
(Actually in reverse chronological order)
| Pos. | Name | Played | Won | Drawn | Lost | Pts for | Pts against | P.P.G. |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Tim Hunt | 4 | 3 | 0 | 1 | 391/2 | 161/2 | 415/16 |
| 2 | Phil Carmody | 4 | 3 | 0 | 1 | 361/2 | 191/2 | 49/16 |
| 3= | Andrew Garrard | 4 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 29 | 27 | 35/8 |
| 3= | Antony Proietti | 4 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 29 | 27 | 35/8 |
| 5 | Allen Rand | 4 | 0 | 0 | 4 | 6 | 50 | 3/4 |
| Name | A | B | C | D | E | Total | P.P.G. | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| A | Phil Carmody | - | 41/2 | 11 | 8 | 13 | 361/2 | 49/16 |
| B | Tim Hunt | 91/2 | - | 4 | 12 | 14 | 391/2 | 415/16 |
| C | Andrew Garrard | 3 | 10 | - | 4 | 12 | 29 | 35/8 |
| D | Antony Proietti | 6 | 2 | 10 | - | 11 | 29 | 35/8 |
| D | Allen Rand | 1 | 0 | 2 | 3 | - | 6 | 3/4 |
| Against: | 191/2 | 161/2 | 27 | 27 | 50 |
(Actually in reverse chronological order)