Yesterday, the last round of the European Team Championship league A was played on Pandanet. 2nd place Ukraine surprisingly lost to 7th place Finland when a tie was enough for them to reach the finals (and they were stronger on every board). A loss meant that Russia, who were in fifth place, could draw level with them and reach 4th place on board points. But in another upset, Russia only got a tie against the Netherlands and thereby stayed in 5th place. Especially the loss of Ilja Shikshin (1p with 2752 rating) against Geert Groenen (5d with 2474 rating) was a huge upset. That tie means they stay in 5th place while Ukraine drops only to 4th place. Having won 3 of the last 4 championships, it is quite surprising that Russia fail to qualify for the finals, especially given their line-up. Czechia won the league, with France in 2nd and Romania in 3rd place. The top 4 teams will play round-robin for the prizes at the European Go Congress this summer.

At the bottom of the league, Poland are relegated to league B next year, while Sweden will have to defend their spot in a play-off against league B's 2nd place. With one round left, it looks like Germany will win league B and Hungary will get 2nd place. The UK are already guaranteed promotion back to league B, having already clinched the top spot in league C, while South Africa are favorites to get 2nd place in league C in the last round and earning a play-off against Switzerland from league B.

Is there a link with results and tables?

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Still officially AGA 5d but I play so irregularly these days that I am probably only 3d or 4d over the board (but hopefully still 5d in terms of knowledge, theory and the ability to contribute).

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Dave Sigaty
"Short-lived are both the praiser and the praised, and rememberer and the remembered..."
- Marcus Aurelius; Meditations, VIII 21

League B is now also finished (there is still one game missing, but it will not really influence the result). Germany got first place and are promoted back to A league, while Hungary in second will play a play-off against Sweden, the number 9 from league A.

At the bottom, Slovenia are demoted directly to C league, despite a surprising last round tie against Denmark, while Switzerland will face the number two from league C in a play-off. League C play their last round next week, and South Africa look to have the best chance of getting second place (The UK is already guaranteed first place).

Is this still true if we don't turn up to the final game and get a load of penalities? We are struggling to field a team...

Edit: If we fail to turn up at all we get 5 board point penalities, and 4 board point penalties means 1 match point penalty so 18 down to 17 match points, and both South Africa and Bulgaria are on 15 so would go to 17 with wins.

@Uberdude: If you manage to field a single player, that is enough. As long as board 1 shows up, you can get only 3 penalty points.

We only fielded one player against Kazakhstan last year which was a shame and a bit disrespectful, hopefully we can find mutually convenient times to play this time around (they changed the date due to timezone differences to one we struggle to meet, South Africa is closer to Europe for online play!).

Well, I see the UK managed to field a team yesterday, and have therefore earned promotion to B-league.

South-Africa and Bulgaria both won, so South-Africa reaches the play-off against Switzerland based on board points.

...and we are still dead last in C league
damn those penalties

Well, at least there's no D league to be demoted to

servant in heaven/king in hell kind of dilemma (even though if there was a D league i'm not so sure we would be kings)
at least now we get to play with some dans

Well, no more promotions/demotions this year.

South Africa lost 4-1 to Switzerland and will spend another year in C league.

Hungary lost 3-2 to Sweden and will spend another year in B league.

The timing of these play-offs coinciding with the WAGC is unfortunate. Hungary could've really used Pal Balogh in this match.

I would not say unfortunate. I would say misguided.

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Still officially AGA 5d but I play so irregularly these days that I am probably only 3d or 4d over the board (but hopefully still 5d in terms of knowledge, theory and the ability to contribute).

I was expecting South Africa to qualify easily.

Yes, I'm a bit surprised by that, but I guess it shows the South African dan ranks are quite a bit weaker than European ones with 3 Swiss 1 kyus beating their 3 SA 2 dan opponents, though if you look at their GoR the Swiss are more like 1 dan. But I was more surprised that I beat Victor Chow 7d in the main tournament which meant the we (UK) won that crucial match . Looking back at UK vs Switzerland matches we have played 3 times with 1 win, 1 draw and 1 loss (and somewhat strangely we won with our weakest team and lost with our strongest).