Biba International Championship 2008

Report by Michael Crane

Friday 500 (20)
Not a bad turnout for a Friday night. Twenty players sat down to fight it out for the Weekend Break first prize. Notable first round losers were Roy Hollands and Paul Gilbertson courtesy of Gerry Enslin and David Nathan respectively. Last month's winner, Stewart Pemberton started well with a win over Costas Costi . . . this took him into the last 16 . . . and here he stayed after losing to Rosey Bensley!

Rosey made it to the semis where she played Nigel Merrigan, and Myke Wignall played against Ralph Eskinazi - returning after a couple of years. Fortunately for Nigel and Myke, Rosey and Ralph lost and we ended up with Myke vs Nigel. Myke took a very early lead after winning a gammon on a 2-cube, and although Nigel fought back it was to no avail as Myke won the Friday 500 and the Weekend Prize. This was just the start of Myke's weekend wins, see later for more of them!

Main (45)
A good turnout for this new event, and, apart from a HUGE cock-up from me, it got off (eventually) to a good start. I made a mess of the draw . . . twice, and had to halt proceedings until I had sorted myself and the spreadsheet out. Eventually I managed it.

Two notable 1st Round losers were sponsor, Tom Duggan and Lawrence Powell, two matches in which an 8-cube featured (one of which starred Myke Wigall).

Slowly the Last 8 are filtered: Adrian Jones and Gerry Enslin, both of whom benefited from 1st Round byes. Ralph Eskinazi and Peter Bennet joined them a bit later. Jeff Barber became our fifth entrant after defeating Mick Butterfield. Then came Stewart Pemberton and the final two to join were Ray Tannen, and Myke Wignall (another BIG cube job - this time on David Nathan).

The draw:

It was at this point I got some bad news . . . . all eight were in the Winner-Takes-All, which meant no Rollover this weekend!

Ray and Stewart emerged to play each other and Ralph and Peter made up the second semi-final. From these fixtures Ray and Ralph came out to meet in the final. Now, before we go any further I have a confession to make - I haven't had a lot of success this year recording final matches: Last month (Feb.) I failed to record the match that John Hedge won his 6th match in; and now this month the recorder ran on battery power (after I failed to turn on the mains power!) and it ran out (unknown to everyone) when the score was at 9-4 to Ray. I will try to input what I do have into Snowie, but I make no promises. Anyway, the outcome of the match was that Ray came out the winner and Ralph the Runner-up.

Ray and Ralph being presented with their trophies by Deena Fawcett
	Ray ended up with a bounty on his head after he stole it off Myke Wignall, and, because Ralph failed to stop him he took home a bounty of around £120 courtesy of Tom and Biba chipping into the bounty cashbox. It started out with Johnathan Powell and, each time its owner lost it they were awarded a £10 bounty and the new owner tried each time to defend it.

Consolation (41)
In the Consolation front runners from the non-prog side were: Tom Duggan, Nigel Merrigan, Fak Laight, Costas Costi, Richard Holdness and Uldis Lapikens. Uldis finally took out Tom in the semi (and deprived him getting one of his own trophies) as he played into the final - and here he waited for the Progressive finalist.

From the progressive side, Chris Ternel, Mick Butterfield, Neil Everitt and Dorothy Lee battled it out between them. Dorothy cleaved her way through a clutch of higher ranked players including Chris Ternel and Adrian Jones (from the Main Last 8) to find herself in the Final facing Uldis.

Dorothy's friends from DailyGammon were following her progress online via the Biba Live Updates service, and they no doubt were rooting for her after her 7-0 victory over Adrian. I wonder, are all DailyGammoners of Dorothy's calibre? Having beaten Adrian 7-0 she then did the same to Uldis in the Final! Well done, Dorothy . . . . and hard luck to Adrian and Uldis ;-(

Uldis and Dorothy

Last Chance (32)
After 3.5 hours of play we were down to our four semi-finalists:

Mardi prevailed and then he waited for either Rachel (an old hand) and Michael (a new hand. Michael and his dad, Larry joined Biba this weekend). Well, the 'new hand, made it and he now faced Mardi in the Final. What happened to Mardi? He ended up Runner-up to Michael! Mind you, Mardi's smiling - Michael wasn't in the pool.. but he's not too upset. He's won a trophy in his first ever Biba tournament . . . which is one more than dad!

Mardi and Michael

3.32 (32)
Tom's called this element the 3.32: It's a 3-pointer with an entry of 32, which makes sense now!. Starting at 1230 we were down to three in the semis: Ed Turner vs Nicky Check, and Myke Wignall was waiting on the results between Tony Fawcett and his mate, Arthur Wright. Tony won and he and Myke played for the place opposite Nicky who had beaten Ed. Myke made it and he sat down to play Nicky (who had recently refuelled on a plate of fish and chips). The fish and chips did the trick and Nicky came out the winner . . .and left Myke empty handed and empty-stomached!

	Myke and Deena
Nicky

Poker (16)
This weekend's TD was Paul Gilbertson and he had a nice two-table entry this weekend, which made his task a little easier; however, it didn't help him to great heights and he had to settle for 6th place. Fellow TD, Tony Fawcett faired a little better in 5th. 1st was Myke 'Mad Mullah' Wignall, 2nd was Vicky Pemberton (she was 1st last month), 3rd was Lawrence Powell and 4th, Ann Pocknell.

Team (8)
Not a big entry but at least it gave us a head-to-head final. My team - on two occasions - went 3-0 down to 5, to end up winning each match. In the Final it was down to Marcus Wrinch and me . . . an encounter from which me emerged the winner!

Finally
It was a satisfactory turnout with players from many different countries albeit domiciled in the UK. Perhaps next year we might be able to tempt a few genuine overseas players. I'd like to thank Tom for his generosity and sponsorship and the 44 other players who turned out to make the event a success. Oh, and I am sorry for the draw and the unfinished match recording!