Survey Results and End of Season Party Plan

The Captain's SURVEY saythe s let’s kick-on from

The End of Season Presentations on April 28th at

The Mexican.

Catering for our larger league, Dennis and team are preparing a fantastic Mexican food buffet for our Trophy Presentations Party. Robert Dagger & Johnny Walker, our resident Masters of ceremonies, are making it happen.

The Kick-on bonus is an “After Party” at

The Pickled Liver.

This also promises be loads of fun too, with Lee Shamrock, as master of ceremonies, entertaining us until late.

Many thanks to those who responded to the survey and other feedback on chats.

At Mar 31 we had 31 responses which, added to the Captain's workshop discussions etc, gives the league some really solid feedback to plan with.

You can download a full copy of the survey results from the survey page on the web or here   https://goo.gl/6IVVnX

The breakdown of responses saw 12 of 34  captains ( one-third)  and 17 of approximately 200+ players / others, most from the same teams, responding.

Overall 4 teams with multiple responses comprises 60 % of replies.

We have left the survey open, if you still want to have a say.

As we mentioned at the outset, this survey is not a vote but more about an ongoing conversation we need to have to keep everything healthy. On specifics we still need in depth analysis, but here are some high level observations on the analysis so far.

Generally, the replies indicated the overall happiness with the league as most captains indicated at the meeting anyway. That includes additional items added about direction and how we can work with other leagues.

Admin changes on clarity were positive too. Specific attention on catch ups is needed and most want easier web reports for phones.

There were some excellent suggestions from those who took advantage of the narrative options to say more. The last item below is a potentially a great new idea that suggests a way get registered players feedback each week, to reflect the get-together happiness.

Here are some excerpts:

Do you have any suggestions on how to improve our current Sukhumvit Social Pool League - Definitions, Etiquette & Rules.(responses)

• have captains family day and other social parties as semi-social events to get people more involve cross-team collaboration and other social interactions e.g involving wives and families

• No It seems to work fine

• Cancellation within 24 hours is forfeit

• A quick search on Google provides a host of definitions, etiquette, and rules that can be plagiarized

• Maybe allow plastic racks in 9 balls but not allow golden breaks.

• Better Web format - easier to comprehend

• An easier points system for Mondays. Teams unable to play forfeit or catch up games played in 7 days or forfeited. Perhaps instead of colored grading for teams, there could be 1st, 2nd divisions etc or grades eg A grade, B grade etc. maybe players ranked too.

• Our team thinks Mondays should be 8 Ball & Wednesdays 9 ball

• Team captain need to brief players on push shots. Numerous push shots are played without being called.

Any other suggestions on how to co-exist well

(responses)

• get them registered in our league so we can be seen by them warts and all and as a courtesy and send them this survey

• Have in off season some matches. Hire top players to teach techniques to better themselves

• As in football - leagues fall under one another, avoids confusion and provides targets to aim at...

• I personally believe the Bangkok pool league has had its day so no need

• We already co-exist well. However, if the different leagues make their schedules match/align it would be better. it gives a player a chance to swap out at the end of a season.

• The current system works well but could arrange inter comp matches.

Other Items noted

(responses)

• Those that just want to play for fun already have that facility.

• I am a strong believer that a Grand final would make a great showpiece event for the best players in the league to demonstrate their skills

• Simple is best!

• Keep the SSPL the way it is. A lot of fun we don't want to mix the leagues and have a lot of very good players kicking our ass every week. KEEP IT FUN AND CASUAL

• I would prefer 8 Ball only on Mondays as Wednesday is 9 ball only. My team prefer 8 Ball and having a mixed format on Mondays mean that 75% of games are 9 ball
• Make this survey shorter and cut out duplicate and irrelevant questions for non-captains

• Would lIke other scoring options. (include more information at the end of this survey), Games won by both teams on a night should count. With the winning team receiving a bonus point for the win. So if a match finished 19-18, winning team gets 20 points and losing team 18. There could be a 2 point bonus for winning by more than 10 games. So if a team wins 19-7, the winning team gets 21 and losing team 7

• Introduce an anonymous host and guest ranking system to reflect the get-together happiness

On the scoring,.

Wednesday format and scoring seem fine as-is with most saying no change.

For Monday it is mixed.

In the detail, it shows captains and players combined were 65% in favour of keeping points as the measure. This combines the answers of 1 & 3 which are basically the same.

Here is a team by team breakdown of responses for both nights from captains.

The respondents option to answer 1 oe 4 indicates, most captains understand the points lead to the win, but players in answering the simpler question just make the distinction that accumulated points determine the match win anyway which is what we do now .

It seems clear no change to Monday Match scoring is needed,  being based on Sets and Games. however with 30 % indicating other preferences it is clear that set points and how games make up sets are not well understood and needs to be addressed.

The issue remaining, however, is we cannot compromise our objective to keep matches alive and fun to make a win on a night count so it means something.

That is 2 Fixed formats earning 5 points each so last set, played just on games, can give underdogs the chance to square up.

We have looked at several options including extending the games but it still comes out the same.

i.e Games won can still be more for the game set and match loser and games only can make the match less fun.

Changing from a majority win to a race on games does work on Wednesday 9 Ball but is has never been tested on Mixed formats.

The bottom line is it is always possible for majority systems for one teams to win more sets and the other win more games. That is because as games needed to win a set can vary as shown in the next table.

In international head to head championship these are decided on the number of sets won, regardless of the games won in each set. E.g Team 1 wins 2-1 sets as tabled:

In Sukhumvit Social Lool League our nuance is set points scoring is not based on just 1 point for a set win. Ours is varied to cater for 4 games of doubles sets when drawn of one each of one two points and 5 game singles sets get three points.

That means each of the 3 formats including the last choice of format set with 5 games with one point per game, get an even 5 points each. In the in the end majority of the available 15 points is the same as three sets with just one winner overall too. (same in tennis and other sports.

A separate paper is now being drafted for captains consideration. This outlines how we might handle this.

On continuing friendlies, the length of the season and allocation of teams to competitions, the feedback saw most were happy with the as-is.

That of course depends on how many teams and how see arrange the scheduling for next season that will be drafted by April 11th, We can look more then .

SOCIAL EVENTS

In the survey, we asked for feedback on social events including the presentation nights and other events.  it seems most if not all like the spread of events ideas.

The big bash idea was given a resounding YES. But that of course is for the future,  pending alternatives to the current rotation system or a hybrid that sponsors can also agree on. Now the key catch-ups are concluded, we can now proceed with completing the first rotation, but with an added feature is an after party this season to make it even better.