[Rain]

How do the slots get decided? It says somewhere that the WBF people gather each BB and hold a meeting to determine the slots for next BB. Why won't this zone, with increasing number of players and quality of bridge get more entries?

This year, 12 countries here will fight for 3 slots. China is almost certain to get one, leaving just 2 for the rest.

Zones like Australia/NZ have 2 slots. Does this even make sense?

America is split into North, Central, South, each with some slots. Why so many for Central/South America?

I can understand Europe's 6 slots. Europe includes so many countries with a rich Bridge tradition and lots of players. To an extent, I can understand 2 slots for USA and 1 almost automatic qualifer for Canada; but it doesn't seem like some other zones have correct entries allocated to them.

And the first extra entry goes to Europe, then PABF. This PABF zone is a really bad one to be in.

If reallocation of entries by zone is too hard, can BB entries be increased by 2? At least 1 for PABF, and 1 other "Extra" one for an underrepresented zone (Africa?) or fastest growing or rotate between Europe and PABF.

[nickf]

essentially based on registered bridge numbers.

And Aust-NZ dont get 2 spots, we have to slug it out with New Caledonia, Samoa, Fiji, Tonga and other heavyweights from the south Pacific.

nickf
sydney

[Cascade]

nickf, on Jun 20 2009, 09:34 PM, said:

essentially based on registered bridge numbers.

And Aust-NZ dont get 2 spots, we have to slug it out with New Caledonia, Samoa, Fiji, Tonga and other heavyweights from the south Pacific.

nickf
sydney

New Caledonia and French Polynesia in this year's Zone 7.

[skjaeran]

The slots in the BB are generally allotted to the zones due to their number of members, with large zones (EBL and ACBL) being heavily underrepresented, and small zones (South America, Central America and Africa) being overrepresented.

South America, I believe, normally has 2 slots. Brazil having an extra slot as home team.

PABF is 50% larger than South Pacific, thus has 3 slots compared to their 2.

[helene_t]

Right now I am watching New Zealand - Singapore in the PABF champship. I don't get it, from this thread it sounds as if they were supposed to be in different zones? Or is this PABF champship not the BB qualification tourney?

[gnasher]

There seems to be a good correlation between the membership of each zone and the number of slots

Europe: 398k / 6 = 66k per slot
America: 167k / 3 = 55k per slot
Pacific Asia: 73k / 3 = 24k per slot
South Pacific: 47k / 2 = 24k per slot
Asia/Middle East: 9k / 4 = 4k per slot
Africa: 7k / 2 = 4k per slot
South America: 4k / 2 = 2k per slot
Central America/Caribbean: 1k / 1 = 1k per slot

The number of slots increases according to the membership, with a bias towards smaller zones. That doesn't seem an unreasonable approach. The WBF has one event (the Olympiad) where each country, regardless of size, gets one slot, and one event (the Rosenblum) where each country gets as many slots as it can fill; the Bermuda Bowl is somewhere between those two extremes.

See also the bottom of this page, where the WBF specified a minimum membership level for each zone to keep its current number of slots.

Regarding your specific comments:

Rain, on Jun 20 2009, 09:15 AM, said:

Why won't this zone, with increasing number of players and quality of bridge get more entries?

If quality of bridge were the main factor, North America and Europe would get about ten each, with the rest if the world fighting for the remaining two.

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This year, 12 countries here will fight for 3 slots. China is almost certain to get one, leaving just 2 for the rest.

Yes, it's generally harder the larger the membership of your zone. Equally I could say that Italy, Norway and France will take three of the European slots, leaving only three places for the remaining 44 countries, or that South Africa will take one African place, leaving only one for the other 13. This is a World Championship - it's not supposed to be easy to get into.

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Zones like Australia/NZ have 2 slots. Does this even make sense?

They have 2/3 of your membership, and 2/3 as many slots.

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America is split into North, Central, South, each with some slots. Why so many for Central/South America?

That also applies to Africa and Asia/Middle East. I imagine that the idea is to give them enough slots to make it worthwhile for them to participate. An alternative is to make a smaller number of larger zones, but then you run into problems with geography. I don't suppose you would want to return to the days when Africa, Asia, and the Middle East were all one zone, and perhaps have to fly to Morocco for the zonal championships.

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This PABF zone is a really bad one to be in.

It's worse than some, and better than some others. Surely it's easier for a player from your zone to get into the Bermuda Bowl than a player from North America (unless you're Canadian, perhaps), or Europe?

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If reallocation of entries by zone is too hard, can BB entries be increased by 2? At least 1 for PABF, and 1 other "Extra" one for an underrepresented zone (Africa?) or fastest growing or rotate between Europe and PABF.

If, as it seems, you think that more weight should be given to the number of countries in each zone, Central America is the most underrepresented, with 21 countries fighting for one place.

[Rain]

NZ/Aussie are in a different zone. But they always also join PABF as guests, for fun.

I think this year, Mongolia is also there as a guest, for fun. These 3 countries won't compete for the 3 slots.

[Rain]

How are members determined?

I live in USA and signed up for ACBL membership, though I consider myself Sing. I guess this means I contribute to ACBL membership number?

What I mean is, do the NBOs have to pay WBF for every member number they declare? Or can they just declare whatever.

[Hanoi5]

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America is split into North, Central, South, each with some slots. Why so many for Central/South America?

Yeah, you're so right, we Indians down here in your backyard should have no team in your big tournaments.

[skjaeran]

Rain, on Jun 20 2009, 01:35 PM, said:

How are members determined?

I live in USA and signed up for ACBL membership, though I consider myself Sing. I guess this means I contribute to ACBL membership number?

What I mean is, do the NBOs have to pay WBF for every member number they declare? Or can they just declare whatever.

Each NBO pay a fee to the WBF for every member. The amount pr member decrease with increasing number of members. And there's a minimum fee.

[Gerben42]

So how strong is Singapore compared to other non-qualifiers like Iceland or team Welland?

Probably any zone would LIKE more slots...

[matmat]

gnasher, on Jun 20 2009, 06:26 AM, said:

Europe: 398k / 6 = 66k per slot
America: 167k / 3 = 55k per slot
Pacific Asia: 73k / 3 = 24k per slot
South Pacific: 47k / 2 = 24k per slot
Asia/Middle East: 9k / 4 = 4k per slot
Africa: 7k / 2 = 4k per slot
South America: 4k / 2 = 2k per slot
Central America/Caribbean: 1k / 1 = 1k per slot

As an honorary penguin, I find it disturbing that Antarctica is so underrepresented.

[Apollo81]

matmat, on Jun 23 2009, 11:40 AM, said:

As an honorary penguin, I find it disturbing that Antarctica is so underrepresented.

There's a guy on BBO who has the userid "penguin" who plays $5RR tourneys. Perhaps you and him should form a team.

[Fluffy]

The idea of creating Andorra's Bridge League to play European bridge Championships with friends is something that appears from year to year whenever I talk to portuguese or italian friends. But its just like a joke.

If there was actually a slot for a country where nobody plays, I am sure some very rich people would afford the costs of forming a NBO there and put the team he wishes in order to play BB.


Off topic: On Saturday, playing Trivial (very hard version) with non bridge friends they asked my team: The World Championship of what is know as Bermuda Bowl?

I couldn't stop laughing.

[Gerben42]

Fluffy, people already have.

Some players entered the Maastricht Olympiad for Neth. Antilles, although they really live in the Netherlands.

The Luxemburg team for the European Championships is made up of players mostly living in Germany.

I am sure there are other examples.