Hello all,
Great to see some interest in Team England here, I'm passionate about the team and love it when people show even a passing curiosity. Unfortunately it would be remiss of me to ignore the elephant in the room. Geoff (Podfrey) has started this discussion mainly it seems because he is sore about not being picked for Team England in Wales. I have sympathy with him and anyone else who missed out on the team. But no one coach is bigger than the team, and some recent behaviour from Geoff just isn't cricket. Unilaterally closing the Team England forums should not be any one person's decision to make, and pointedly refusing to shake Lycos's hand after winning the NAFC last week was an embarrassment.
That said, the communication this year was a bit lacking as a number of people have mentioned, and it is a shame if people felt they missed out. Lycos has never been one for constant online promotion, preferring to talk to people individually. Although it must be said that there were 22 coaches who put their name forward for selection this year, which is double what we had last time. Clearly Lycos's methods weren't a total failure.
As a framing comment I would repeat something said here already: "
If it ain't broke don't fix it". Team England have just won a ludicrous fourth Eurobowl in a row, whilst still including at least one new cap every single year. English coaches are travelling to foreign tournaments in greater numbers than they ever have, and people seem genuinely delighted that they are making the effort. In just a couple of weeks there will be 15 English coaches at the Lutece tournament in France, only two of whom have played for TE. Most of them will be there because of word of mouth from the TE regulars who blazed a trail and went there first, many after reading Purplegoo's fantastic blog.
What more do we want?
On to more specific responses, the first thing I would say is that just because somebody hasn't been picked for England doesn't automatically mean there is some grand conspiracy. Some of the names the more casual observer might expect to have been involved have been absent of their own choice. To give one example - regular tournament winner Besters has been asked if he wanted to put his name forward for TE several times, but declined because of the travel involved. There are many other coaches who have been encouraged to put their hat in the ring again and again, but have declined for one reason or another.
With regards to multiple communications channels, unfortunately that is a fact of modern life IMO if we want to reach as many people as possible. As with so many things with this topic, we are damned if we do and damned it we don't. Try to reach as many people as possible and there are too many channels. But if one person misses a post then we aren't making enough effort to communicate.
Is selection representative? Of course that is subjective, but 'representative' of what? Are people more representative of the English community if they play ten small tournaments within 50 miles of their house, or five big tournaments around Europe? Is running the NAFC worth more or less than turning up to a one-dayer in your home town? Do the thousands of hours of my spare time I have spent doing work for this community no longer count because I only play ten tournaments a year rather than twenty? I think this is why having one captain is a good system, they can make these decisions to their own standards.
On the matter of qualification: be careful what you wish for! Not only is this a terrible method for determining the 'best' coach in general, more importantly it would create a new hyper-competitive environment in the English scene. All the TE hopefuls would be forced to take their Tier 0 teams to lots more tournaments, to 'power game' more often, to generally be more ruthless. Is that what we want? Awarding a spot to the NAFC winner is an even worse idea. Blood Bowl is a highly volatile game and winning any one given tournament is almost a lottery.
I was captain last year for Porto, and was keen to have a EurOpen team be part of the official Team England squad, having seen it work so well for the French. I approached numerous likely candidates over the months before selection and was rebuffed time and again. It turned out that if people were to play in the EurOpen they much preferred to have the freedom to create their own allegiances and make their own plans.
Gorgoroth wrote:1) How well do you have to play and for how long in order to challenge for a place?
2) Are tournament wins or placings taken into consideration?
3) Is NAF ranking taken into consideration ie if you are top English coach with a particular race for instance?
4) Any other factors, or am i barking up the wrong tree?
Hi Owen, I'll answer this one directly as it cuts right to the heart of the matter IMO. As with everything in a system with one captain having sole power, much of it is subjective. But at least for me:
1) I guess you have to play clearly better than the 8th best coach on the team for long enough for it to be noticed. If people think you are equally good as the worst coach on the team they may plump for the known option.
2) I would say one tournament win is meaningless as it could be fluke, but two in a year probably makes people at least notice your name. Obviously the tournament standard is a factor. In theory Eurobowl quality coaching would make finishing 4th at ten tournaments in a row a seriously noteworthy record, but in reality that less likely to be noticed. But generally tournament results are the advertising not the product. Playing well is more important.
3) I would say not at all, except that it is hard to have a good record without also having a high NAF ranking. It is pretty easy to game the system by only playing at weak events and hiding your ranking. Whereas conversely if you constantly attend tough events and put your ranking on the line it is much harder to maintain a very high number over a long period of time.
4) The most important thing is making your interest clear. Once the people in and around the team know you are keen they will pay more attention to your performances. There are a lot of tournaments and a lot of of coaches around, so putting your hand in the air is very important.