Backgammon is a great game full of great people. We all get on pretty well. Tournaments are well attended and fun. I have made some incredible friends through the game.

First time visitors to this site may not get that impression!

The tone of debate on here has become increasingly barbed recently. I have been as guilty of that as much as anyone else. It is hard to really understand nuance over the internet and it is easy to give and take offence where none was meant to be given or should have been taken.

Can I make a plea that we all think really hard about the language of the comments and posts we make on this site? I will try very hard to lead from the front on this. Let’s be respectful towards one another. Kindness and tolerance are self-perpetuating.

In the spirit of the above I met with Danny Cohen for a drink in the Lockside Lounge in Camden today. Some of you may remember the Lockside from the glory days of Backgammon in London when it was run by the redoubtable Mike Main. Danny and I had a great talk and cleared the air. Any misunderstanding between us relating to the video has been resolved. Neither Danny nor I will be talking further about the video and we request that others do not either.

What unites us is so much stronger than what we disagree on.

We have 10 great candidates for the Board. Let’s fight hard on the backgammon table not off it. Let’s keep the questions and comments friendly and good-natured. Let’s assume the best of people not the worst.

We will all be happier and stronger for it.

Yours,

Sean

Anna Price wrote to me late last night announcing her withdrawal from the election for the Board of the UKBGF.

Anna’s name will remain on the ballot but votes cast for her will not count. In the event of Anna being in the top 7 at the end of the election process we will take the 8th placed finisher and put them on the Board.

I said to Anna in my email accepting her resignation:

‘The vast majority of backgammon players are great people. There are a small minority who can make life very, very difficult for the rest of us. I, personally, do think that bad behaviour can disproportionately affect women and that we as a community need to take tougher action. As you have noted, Richard Biddle is leading the way on this and we have much to learn from him. I am sorry to learn of your withdrawal and hope that you will continue to contribute to the backgammon community in different ways as you have much to offer.’

While the current Board only has three months left of its tenure there is still a lot that we want to do in that time. I wanted to update members on our proposed activity. Three months is one eighth of our total time in office!

First, and most importantly, we want to elect a strong new Board – one that will set the agenda for UK backgammon through to 2019 The first part of this process is to ensure that we get enough good quality applicants and applications. Please do consider standing. You have one day left to self-nominate. You can find details of how to do so here: http://ukbgf.com/elections-ukbgf-board-2017-8/ It won’t take you more than 15 minutes. UK Backgammon needs you. We will publish the voting details once we have all of the nominations in. We would expect to know the new Board by mid-October. Please stand.

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