European Amateur Poker Festival - November 2009

[duke3016]

I"m quite frankly bemused at the fuss that seems to be made here.

I think some of the selections last year by the captains were IMO a bit dubious, but this was only on the basis that they had hardly played in any APAT events that year. To suggest that the captains weren"t picking the best team available and were picking "mates" is quite frankly, laughable.

The captains have to pick a team based on a number of factors and to do this purely by formula would be folly and would of course make the captains spot redundant. Could you imagine Capello dropping Gerrard for Carrick because Carrick had better Opta Stats?

As for the selection of the captains, then this year has been much fairer than last years as people last year were invited to be captains, whereas people this year have been invited to throw their hat in first. This has been on the forum for weeks now and if people haven"t looked at the forum, or spotted it then that is no ones fault other than their own.

England FTW!!

Wot he said (apart from the last bit of course)

[Honeybadg]

I don"t think there is any fuss ... upfront selection basis better in my opinion.

I didn"t do any APAT last year ... (so nothing to go by)

The comment was made that teams might be bespoke based on Heads Up ability ... tough to measure that within the APAT tournaments.

Louis

[APAT]

Can"t speak for anyone else but I saw no MAJOR advertisement for Captains. The MAJOR advertisement on the homepage has only appeared now that the Captains have been chosen.
  Therefore, the Captains will choose the players they know, or "friends" to put it another way.....IMO.
Why are the teams not chosen using rankings etc ??
Maybe that would be too obvious and then the "wrong" names would crop up ??

I would have thought this sort of comment was beneath you Brian.  I"m actually very surprised by it.  APAT isn"t in the "friends" or "wrong names" business and you should withdraw that remark unless you have some evidence to back it up with.

[APAT]

We advertised for Captains some weeks ago, the post should be below this one on the team board.  APAT selected Captains from those showing an interest.

As stated above, the Captains will choose their teams, based on ability.  Some may refer to this year"s rankings, or last, and some may select players based on specific events or strengths in Sit "N" G or Heads Up play.  I guess we"ll find out as players are selected throughout the Autumn.

I expect a more objective selection method might be preferable.

Louis

The UK & Irish Captains may choose to pick their top four players in the rankings.  I"m sure each Captain will outline their plans seriously and objectively in the coming weeks.  I can assure you each of the 16 Captains will be selecting players that they believe will support their team mates throughout and ultimately win the event.

[APAT]

I don"t think there is any fuss ... upfront selection basis better in my opinion.

I didn"t do any APAT last year ... (so nothing to go by)

The comment was made that teams might be bespoke based on Heads Up ability ... tough to measure that within the APAT tournaments.

Louis

This is not a wholly APAT focussed event Louis.  We are inviting teams from all over Europe.  The German, French and Hungarian teams who took part last year were amongst the first to enter this year"s event; demonstrating how much they enjoyed their APAT experience, and in addition we will be announcing further European entries very shortly.  This will increase the prestige in this event and in the European Amateur Championship (individual) also.  

[Swinebag]

IIRC, all the UK and Ireland captains went to great pains to justify their inclusions and had clearly put a great deal of thought into it. I dont think too many people felt the selctions made weren"t warranted.

Of course there were ommisions that people felt were maybe unfair, but show me an England (for example) profesional cricket, rugby or football team where the country / media has not been divided on certain selections.

[MAIR]

........Therefore, the Captains will choose the players they know, or "friends" to put it another way.....IMO.....

This didn"t happen last year, so why assume that it will this year ?

Last year all captains deliberated for a long time on who they wanted on their teams, all done fairly, and all made excellent choices.  Not an easy job, but the captains who have been selected to represent their country are top peeps and I look forward to seeing their picks.

[APAT]

Congratulations to Ivar Garvik who will Captain the Norwegian Team in the European Amateur Team Championship.  Ivar has travelled from Norway to APAT events in England, Scotland and Ireland over the last couple of years.

[APAT]

Congratulations to Stephan Kalhamer who will again Captain the German Team at the European Amateur Team Championship.  Germany secured the Bronze in a very exciting finish to last year"s event and Stephan was the most tactical of all Captains.  Germany may start favourites in November.

[bigredders]

the thing is with this that everybody says that the top of the rankings should have a place, yet the rankings are mostly online and this is a live tournament?! we had this conversation last year, there is no obvious way to do this! dan is a clever lad, he has won a live apat tournament and has played every one ( to my knowledge) ever since....surely he is more qualified than most and not because he is an apparent favourite.

i seriously think that having saying that some people are going to feel hard done by, at the end of the day england is by far the most populated of the countries and there are a lot of good players, but how do you quanify everyones ability?

[Honeybadg]

I don"t think there is any fuss ... upfront selection basis better in my opinion.

I didn"t do any APAT last year ... (so nothing to go by)

The comment was made that teams might be bespoke based on Heads Up ability ... tough to measure that within the APAT tournaments.

Louis

This is not a wholly APAT focussed event Louis.  We are inviting teams from all over Europe.  The German, French and Hungarian teams who took part last year were amongst the first to enter this year"s event; demonstrating how much they enjoyed their APAT experience, and in addition we will be announcing further European entries very shortly.  This will increase the prestige in this event and in the European Amateur Championship (individual) also. 

Fair play - I was reading the stuff on APAT Vision and the two sort of go together.

I spoke(briefly) to Stuart in Walsall about representing Scotland (in the future) and how picks were made.

Upon reflection I would prefer an objective system (in the future) as it would give all the home based players something to "fight" for through the APAT season.

The Euro teams might have other criteria.

Aside - I am sure I am a long way from being a top 4 pick for Scotland at this stage.

I would weight "live" performances over online (where I do much better) - but going forward I would expect my "live" form to continue to improve.

Vision part - if the APAT becomes much bigger (I hope it does) then you might need more of a system.

My angle on Captaincy is that the bigger things are the harder it is to pick a team because you may not have full information.

Analogies regarding Pro Sport don"t quite match for me - because there is full(er) info on performance.

It is pretty tough to rate people"s heads up play - even looking at final tables - because often the blinds are so large.

I am sure all the Captains will make the best picks based on the info they have.

My own preference going forward would be to make things objective perhaps with a playing captain. State the criteria at the start of the season and run from there.

Louis

[BOINGBLITZ]

PRETTY OBVIOUS REALLY......winners of English, Scottish, Irish and Welsh live events qualify period......if they all are say English for instance, then so be it.
 I just feel that this "selection process" of Captains was not widely publicised.
 Also, if more than one person applied for the Captains job, who made the choice ??
And in a team of just 4 players, surely all of them should be recent winners of live APAT events ?
Personally, as an online Champion I would love to be included myself. I just don"t see it happening and also having spoken to other Champions, they don"t think that they will either.
 My mate Swinebag talks about Capello earlier......a good analogy Rob......but he doesn"t play either.

[AMRN]

PRETTY OBVIOUS REALLY......winners of English, Scottish, Irish and Welsh live events qualify period.

OY!!!!! What about the UK live event???

[lukybugur]

That was just a Mickey Mouse tourney

[Jon MW]

...
My angle on Captaincy is that the bigger things are the harder it is to pick a team because you may not have full information.

Analogies regarding Pro Sport don"t quite match for me - because there is full(er) info on performance.

It is pretty tough to rate people"s heads up play - even looking at final tables - because often the blinds are so large.

I am sure all the Captains will make the best picks based on the info they have.

My own preference going forward would be to make things objective perhaps with a playing captain. State the criteria at the start of the season and run from there.

Louis

You"ve essentially provided the arguments against your own system.

You won"t have the full information, you can"t judge people"s heads up play, and pro sports rankings are hard to judge even when they have more complete information.

Given how persuasively you"ve argued about how much information is missing, how can the teams be selected objectively?

From a basic statistical point of view there just isn"t a large enough sample size.

So basing any selection on any kind of apparantly objective criteria, isn"t actually objective, it just means people with good variance at the right time get picked.

This only really leaves judgement,  intuitively it seems right that there should and could be a place for the national champions, world champion etc. but at the end of the day if there is no record to objectively measure the best people for the teams (and their isn"t) then leaving it as the Captain"s responsibility - and the Captain"s glory if they win - is the only realistic way to proceed.