VENUE AND TIME

The tournament will be played 8-10 April 2005 at the SAS Rezidor Park Inn Hotel located at Brunnsgatan 13-15 in Jönköping.
Players shall gather in the playing-area latest 13.45 on Friday April 8. Play will start promptly at 14.00 according to the schedule published separately on the homepage.

TOURNAMENT DIRECTION

Carl Ragnarsson is the Tournament Director.
Decisions involving bridge-judgement are taken after consultation with available experts, and can thereafter be appealed only to the Laws Commission of the FSB.
The usual EBL procedures concerning alerts, written explanations, movement of the bidding-tray etc. for play with screens will be observed.
All play will stop at the end of the alloted session-time (based on 8.5 mins per board) . For any board that has not been completed in time a score will be assigned, essentially according to Duplicate Law 12C, with any doubt resolved in favour of the party less culpable (if this can be determined).

FORMAT

8 teams are playing a complete round-robin of 10-board, single session, matches. The IMP-results are converted into Victory Points according to the table below. The total no. of VP collected will decide the ranking. Ties are broken first based on the result(s) in VP of the direct match(es) between the teams involved, secondly based on each team's total IMP-difference, thirdly based on each team's total IMP-quotient.

The top 4 teams (A1-A4) qualify for play-off A, the bottom 4 teams (B1-B4) for play-off B.
A1 and B1 can chose their Semifinal opponent among A3/A4 and B3/B4 respectively.
Within each group A and B, Semifinals and 1st/3rd place Finals will each consist of 2x20-board matches, with compulsory change of opponents at halftime. For the purposes of tie-breaking, the home team will get a 0.5 IMP carry-over.

HOME/AWAY TEAM AND SEATING RIGHTS

In the round-robin the team listed first is considered the home team, and has seating rights. Each team will be the home team in 3 or 4 out of the 7 matches, as determined by a random draw.

Throughout the play-offs the team with the higher ranking from the round-robin will be considered the home team, and has seating rights (essentially determines the order in which the pairs will meet).

SYSTEMS

HUM systems are not allowed.

Brown Sticker (BS) conventions are allowed. Written defenses against BS conventions are allowed and may be consulted at the table at any time, as if they were part of the opponents convention card.

LANGUAGE

English is the official language and shall be used in any documentation and any time the cards are out of their sleaves, including for written explanations of bids and plays.

VUGRAPH

The tournament will be broadcast live on the internet via BridgeBase Online. Two tables from each session (not necessarily from the same match) will be covered. The organizers will decide which tables will be on Vugraph each session, and players cannot refuse to play at such tables. The players at those tables are requested to take extra care to expose their cards clearly during the play of the hand, so that the operator does not have to guess what cards were played. The players are also asked to cooperate with the operator's requests to see the players' written notes explaining conventional bids.
The spectators, commentators and operators will all appreciate the players' cooperation in putting on a good vugraph-show.

IMP/VP CONVERSION TABLE

IMP-DIFF.    VP
0-1         15-15
2-6         16-14
7-9         17-13
10-12        18-12
13-15 19-11
16-18        20-10
19-21        21-9
22-25        22-8
26-29        23-7
30-33        24-6
34-37        25-5
38-41        25-4
42-45        25-3
46-50        25-2
51-55        25-1
56 +        25-0