Chester & District Bagatelle League

Chester & District Bagatelle League AGM Minutes 2013

Minutes of AGM held on 23rd September 2013 at the Talbot

Present: Chris Barlow, Dave Cooper, Neil Davies, Shaun Done, John Kenyon, John Lea, Mike Peacock, John Pritchard (minutes), Ted Randles, Barry Tipton, Nigel Walker.

Apologies: Gordon Vickers, Margaret Walker, Pat Wallace.

The Chairman opened the meeting at 8.10pm, welcomed all those present and thanked everyone for attending. A brief resume of the Agenda was given to those present.

1. Election of Officials

The first item on the agenda was the Election of Officials and the following people were nominated / elected:-

Position	Last year's Committee	Nominated / Elected for 2013 / 2014	Proposed by	Seconded by
Chairman	John Pritchard	John Pritchard	John Kenyon	Nigel Walker
Vice Chairman	Dave Cooper	Dave Cooper	John Lea	Barry Tipton
Secretary	John Pritchard	John Pritchard	Nigel Walker	Barry Tipton
Treasurer	Dave Cooper	Dave Cooper	Nigel Walker	Mike Peacock
Committee	Gordon Vickers	Gordon Vickers	Dave Cooper	Barry Tipton
Committee	Ted Randles	Ted Randles	Dave Cooper	John Lea
Committee	Barry Tipton	Barry Tipton	John Lea	Dave Cooper
Committee	Margaret Walker	Margaret Walker	John Lea	John Pritchard
Committee	Pat Wallace	Pat Wallace	Ted Randles	Dave Cooper
Committee	Ray Lamb	Ray Lamb	Nigel Walker	Mike Peacock
Committee	John Lea	John Lea	Ted Randles	Barry Tipton
Committee	Brian Welch	Brian Welch	Ted Randles	Dave Cooper
Committee	Mike Turner	Mike Turner	John Lea	Barry Tipton
Committee	Billy Williams	Billy Williams	Ted Randles	Dave Cooper
Committee	Neil Davies	Neil Davies	John Pritchard	John Lea
Committee		Chris Barlow	John Lea	Dave Cooper

Ray Lamb, Mike Turner, Gordon Vickers, Margaret Walker, Pat Wallace, Brian Welch and Billy Williams could not make the meeting tonight, but were nominated for the Committee again and were all duly proposed, seconded and elected. Chris Barlow volunteered to join the Committee as a representative for the Royal Oak and was duly elected. Welcome on board Chris!

2. Statement of Accounts

The Treasurer presented the Statement of Accounts for 2012-13 and copies were made available for those present. After everyone had had chance to look at the figures, Ted Randles proposed that the Accounts be accepted as a true record of the league's financial situation, this was seconded by John Lea and carried unanimously by all present.

3. Any Other Business

No formal written proposals were received for the meeting to consider, so the floor was thrown open.

First, John Lea brought up the subject of Away Team practice time and said that this was not being adhered to and may as well be scrapped. After some discussion, it was generally felt that the existing rule was ok as long as it was adhered to and respected by home players. The Secretary undertook to put out a sheet emphasising that Away Team practice time must be honoured by home players, and that Away teams must be allowed a minimum of 15 minutes free use of the table before the start of a match.

Second, Nigel Walker reminded the meeting that at last years AGM the Committee had undertaken to review the possibility of switching all league and cup games to Wednesday evenings and doing away with the summer league. He asked if any progress had been made. The Secretary said that, from a fixtures point of view, the idea was not very practical as he felt it would make the fixtures too complicated. Some general discussion took place, with Neil Davies pointing out that two teams do not play at all in the summer months (Union Vaults and St. Theresa's), and felt this might discourage them from entering anything at all.

Nigel Walker proposed that the meeting should vote on whether bagatelle should switch entirely to Wednesdays and the proposal was defeated by 4 votes to 3, with everyone else abstaining.

The possibility of playing some cup games on Wednesdays was then considered, but the secretary pointed out that there were only 4 spare Wednesdays between 23rd October (league start date) and 7th May 2014 (Chester Races), so moving even one of the cups to a Wednesday would mean there were no free nights for re-arranged games or a play-off game, if required. Going beyond Chester Races could impinge on the Summer League which normally starts in May.

The matter of "no-shows" in last seasons cup competitions was raised, and it was pointed out that no 'Yes/No' invitations were sent out last year, so teams could not indicate whether they wished to enter or not. Treasurer Dave Cooper explained that, as the �50 fee included entry to the League and all cup competitions, all teams were automatically put into every draw, and no invitation sheets were sent out last year. Secretary John Pritchard admitted this had back-fired spectacularly with quite a few "no-shows", which is both disheartening and inconvenient, especially where a landlord has prepared food. The secretary undertook to send out a 'Yes/No' invitation sheet to all clubs.

In addition, it was proposed that an additional �2.50 fee be introduced for the two main cup competitions, namely the West Cheshire Shield and the Northgate Cup, and this was agreed unanimously.

The net result of the discussions is that the format for this season will be the same as last year, ie. all cup games will remain on Thursdays, and a separate Summer League will be retained next year. The start date for the Winter League will therefore be Wednesday, 23rd October.

The 351 Competition will be retained this season, and Chris Barlow asked if a separate scoring sheet could be done as it was confusing last year. The secretary undertook to do this, and also suggested that to simplify the game and possibly help with the scoring, that a "normal" first half should take place with each player having two sticks until "half-time", and then when the half-time scores are known the format switches to one stick per player until a team finishes on exactly 351.

During the meeting, the Talbot served chicken nuggets with dips which were much appreciated and went down very well with everyone. Thank You!!!

There being no other business, the Chairman thanked everyone for attending and closed the meeting at 9.15pm.

Minutes taken by John Pritchard.

END OF MINUTES