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Post by Chris_Sav on Nov 21, 2014 20:41:11 GMT
Just got in, finally, after cancelled ferry crossing.
Nothing Earth shattering, will report in the morning.
Sav
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Post by Chris_Sav on Nov 22, 2014 9:27:32 GMT
I will be working on a full report to SETS during the next couple of days. It's been a very long few days and I need time to gather my thoughts.
Basically I had vague hopes that SETS would be a cavalry riding over the hill to save us with potential funding to help us run road-shows and other suggestions for new ways of taking our game to the next generations. That will not happen.
The conference was too wide a church with reps from massive associations representing hundreds of thousands such as the Highland Games and Irish Gaelic Games, reps from umbrella associations and - Bar Billiards, Bat & Trap and Table Skittles (not Devil Among The Tailors) from England.
The clue was in the title 'Sports and Games' They are sports and we are games. Sports have benefits that can be taken to schools and universities. They have their own heritage and traditions which are a selling point. The three English games have no tangible heritage and tradition, our heritage is basically based on the unique local pub tradition in the UK. Pubs and alcohol cannot be promoted to the younger generations. This equally applies to so many other traditional English games such as Shove Halfpenny and 'Devil Among the Tailors'. Thus the only recommendation to come from the conference was to take the English games out of pubs and into Youth Clubs etc. The conference was heavily based on the bigger picture, possible Olympic inclusion and umbrella associations and a lot of it whistled over our heads.
The final day was heavily based on UNESCO with a representative talking about UNESCO's work on preserving traditional games. Only one country in this part of Europe has not signed up to the conventions - yes, you got it! the UK. That thus had little interest to us. You might research it and write to your MP's as to why the UK is the only European government not to ratify the treaty.
On the positive side the conference was an eye opener with good contacts made with the other English games and we are going to look at possible cooperation between the English traditional games (and possibly others) and try to organise some cross pollination meetings that would have far more chance of attracting public attention than any of our games in isolation. Finance will be an obvious problem.
The three of us had dinner with the President of the European Traditional Games and Sports Association and that association has no pyramid structure of major and minor games, all are equal, it may be that ETGSA is the umbrella association that might interest us. I will be looking into this association further.
A lot if hard work went into the conference by the organisers and it was well run, though possibly the timetable could have been more flexible when important points had been identified. They certainly looked after us. We were the first of three conferences across Europe so there will have been a learning curve for the organisers.
Chris Saville.
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Post by barbelman on Nov 22, 2014 10:42:02 GMT
Well done Chris - sounds like an interesting, if unfruitful, few days. The sport/games thing along with the alcohol connection has always been our stumbling block along with the fact that our game is not that old!
I think the game itself will always have a future of sorts but I think our future in reality lies in small enthusiastic groups or leagues rather than an encompassing national organisation.
I cannot believe that the UK were the only country NOT to sign up for the UNESCO initiative and I really don't see what political or monetary advantage they gain from not doing so. Part of the Tory's European standoffishness to impress the UKIP-vulnerable electorate I suppose!
Tony
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Post by Deleted on Nov 22, 2014 12:25:41 GMT
I'd like to join Tony in saying "well done Chris, and thanks for representing our cause".
If there was any doubt before, I think that none exists now as to the extreme unlikelihood of any sort of cementing of relationships with the other European versions of our game: we credit the Belgians as being the foundation but presumably no nod from that quarter.
I would however cite "Azuritko' and "Slovakian bar billiards" as one which we could forge a link with some time in the future.
No hope for third party funding exists all the time we are grouped with pub pastimes such as Aunt Sally, Toads, Tiddlywinks, Shove ha'penny, Table skittles and the like. We have to extrapolate ourselves from that pigeon-holing. We are a CUE SPORT and a jolly skilful one at that so there is no comparison. As a cue sport we need to be grouped together with Snooker, 3-Ball Billiards, Pool and Bagatelle. Snooker and Pool have world-wide organisation, and if the ensuing generation is to expand our sport, it has to be the global picture: ie look away from Europe and towards our former colonies (sorry Tony !) the USA, Canada, Australia, New Zealand - and the way the world's going a country to which one day we may be just a colony ourselves: China.
I doubt if any of us on here have the appetite to expand beyond our existing limits, but that's the challenge for future generations. There is a thread somewhere where an ex-pat in Japan showed an interest and was willing to explore sponsorship from the various Japanese vehicle manufacturers...so far that has fallen on deaf ears.
A good point that has come out of Chris's visit is that the association with pubs and drinking has acted as a deterrent to the game being exposed to young people. Yet in this day and age many of us become teetotallers when having to drive, and the game has been taken at national level into a school (Surrey Open) and a church (Norwich Open). There's no reason why cheap tables couldn't be bought and bunged into a local community centre/youth club: I'm not inclined to do it in Crawley for fear of vandalism but it might work elsewhere.
Anyway, thanks for trying Chris and we hope some positives can be taken from your effort on the game's behalf.
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Post by BB Warrior on Nov 22, 2014 13:46:17 GMT
I agree fully with Tommo and Tony that much thanks is due to Sav for taking the time to go over there and putting our case forward. Not much to be very positive about although maybe some ideas will come from this and we certainly need to explore building relationships with other similar sports/games in the future.
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Post by daveuk1 on Nov 22, 2014 21:49:10 GMT
a big thanks to Chris for what he has done, not only over the past few days, but over the past years.
I'm a little bit miffed to hear our games relationship to pubs and drinking should be a stumbling block. In the Bay Horse I've seen children as young as 10 playing the game under the supervision of their parents and enjoying it, its far easier for the little youngsters to stand on a chair at one end of a bar billiards table and play shots rather than having to drag the chair round and round a pool table.
Also another game/sport comes to mind, I am certainly not a great darts fan, but it does seem to get its fare share of media coverage and when the cameras pan out to show the crowds of spectators who ages seem to range from babes in arms through to the older spectrum its hard not to notice the pint and wine glasses on the tables
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Post by bigtj on Nov 23, 2014 9:25:26 GMT
Thanks to Chris for his sterling work and lets hope we have a basis to approach others to try and build some bridges that will help the game both survive and flourish for the future, there is interest around as people do approach us in pubs and ask what it is all about a little bit of time spent may encourage them to have a go and who knows even catch the fever that is the love for this great game.
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Post by Chris_Sav on Nov 27, 2014 9:06:55 GMT
another game/sport comes to mind, I am certainly not a great darts fan, but it does seem to get its fare share of media coverage and when the cameras pan out to show the crowds of spectators who ages seem to range from babes in arms through to the older spectrum its hard not to notice the pint and wine glasses on the tables Darts has multiple natural crescendo points in a game with 180's and check-outs, that makes it a great spectator sport.
To achieve anything similar in bar billiards would require a complete re-write of the rules, What the layman night conceive as just another boring Oxford might be a brilliant shot with a stack of side on it to make an un-natural angle, that cannot be appreciated by the lay person.
We would need to shorten down the game into more than one leg, bring in a big excitement bonus shot, maybe 1000 points for the current 200 and make a break a fixed number of shots regardless of scoring, maybe six. Something along those lines would be more interesting for the underdog and audience than watching 20k sail past.
That's bar billiards Jim, but not as we know it!
Sav
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Post by Colemanator on Nov 27, 2014 9:44:29 GMT
What about following a darts type format? a check out could be a 50/30 50/20 50/10 50/100 shot.
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Post by Deleted on Nov 27, 2014 11:22:37 GMT
Perhaps we should have a separate thread specifically for suggestions as to how bar billiards may be tweaked to make it palatable for a TV audience........
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