What's going on in the Poloverse

Jess, I've posted links to the calendars in the OP

theres a calender?

Awesome, cheers John.

Last few games in the Euro-pre-qualifiers in Lyon.

http://challonge.com/fromlyontorouen

Valentin currently in 6th with Smoked Meat.

Not sure which team is Yorgo's.

Smoked Meat finish 7. I think that means they've qualified for the Euro-qualifier.

From Yorgo's facebook update I'm guessing they are Les Chacals, in which case congratulations.

Berlin, with Adam, Joanna, Rik, Johannes and Basti, win the German Bench Minor

Münster/Bielefeld, with Daniel of 3pmh fame, finish second.

Euros allocation is up...

La répartition des slots pour les Euros :

France : 8 (3 slots in the wildcard tournament)
UK + Ireland : 7 (3)
Germany : 7 (3)
Switzerland : 6 (2)
Spain + Portugal : 5 (2)
Italy : 5 (2)
Beneligue : 3 (1)
Poland/Austria/Croatia/Hungary/Czech Rep : 3 (3)
Wild Card : 3

For Organising, because people working on it want to be part of it => Paris : 1 (Rouen 1)

Well there we are, that's going to be tough.

So there are six (potential) wild card slots for UK teams (3 + 3), is that right?

Ow, allocated wildcards a toughy.

Strikes me as totally bonkers to have allocated wild card slots, why have a wild card tourney at all? Please correct me if I'm wrong/barking up the wrong tree...

So there are six (potential) wild card slots for UK teams (3 + 3), is that right?

No 3, those other 3 slots are for teams qualified from the wildcard.

I think it's probably wrong to call it a wildcard any more, it's a qualifying tournament. If you look at it like that, it does make sense, it's really just another round of the main tournament, as a way to get more teams in. What it does mean is there is no longer any space left in the Euros for teams that just show up, every single team will be there on merit.

I get it now.

Top 3 of wildcard go through, Britain allowed to send 3 teams to the wildcard?

Precisely.

3 + 3... Three UK allocated wild card slots and three open-to-everyone wild card slots, yeah? No?

Oh, I see... That will be tough...

No. We are allowed to send 3 teams to the wildcard. The top 3 from that tournament get a place in the Euros.

Yerp...

Tough breaks.

It's a bit like the football qualifiers for the Euros/Worlds.

Top teams go through to the main tournament, the next best teams meet up for an extra playoff round to qualify.

So the top ten teams at the UK & Ireland qualies go to Paris, top seven go straight in and the rest go into the wildcard... Meh...

Dunno if I'll bother going...

I'm suprised Switzerland have so many spots, I didn't realise that had that many teams. And France's 8 spots AND Paris and Rouen spots is a bit cheeky, but there are a lot of good teams in France.

Kind of takes the fun out of the wildcard, but I guess the aim is to bring up the standard of the Euros?

Personally, I prefer the wacky, quirkiness of an open wildcard format. Barcelona was great..

Allocation by country is a tough call, I think we should move to a regional qualification tournaments system (like NA) for next year (I guess people are already thinking about these kind of things though..)