The Golden Jubilee Corona Mini-League Cup will run on a similar basis to football's Champions League except obviously on a rather smaller scale. It will otherwise run on exactly the same basis as the league normally runs. There will, as usual, be a one point score per frame won and a one point match win bonus.

There will be three groups of three teams with each team facing the other two teams in their group once each home and away, so four matches over a six week period from 4th October (see fixtures). The three group winners and the best group runner up will advance to the semi-finals, the draw for which will take place in week 7, with the matches to be played in week 8 and the final in week 9 at a neutral venue. So the competition should conclude, on that basis, by the end of November.

The best group runner up will be the team that accrues the most points and, if two or three group runners up all have the same number of points, the best placed will be determined by the order of options listed in Section 4 of the League’s Constitution.

There will then be discussions about commencing a regular full season with an Annual General Meeting in early January and the league commencing hopefully in late January, subject of course to Covid restrictions in place at the time.

There are a couple of issues to mention;

The Smeta Club is currently closed. At present, they do not know when the club will reopen. So they will have to play two away matches in October and two home matches in November which has the knock on effect that one team in their group must do the reverse – apologies for that to The Kings Mitcham. At the time of writing, it is not certain if the Smeta Club will be open for their home matches so they may have to play them at an alternative venue – if this proves to be the case, the relevant Captains will be informed of the venue details in good time, at least several days in advance.

The second thing is that the Marquis of Lorne team have decided they need to play from a different venue. They will be playing from the Prince of Wales in Lyham Road as that venue's second team, at least for this competition. For ease of reference and, again, just for this competition, I have named them as Marquis @ Prince. If that’s not to their liking, I apologise.

The following information sets out the group details, the fixtures and the contact details for the venues and the Captains.

The groups were drawn from scratch at the Officers and Captains Meeting held on Monday 20th September 2021 by two independent people so it was the same for everyone, and the order of matches has been simply determined. The groups are as follows;

Group A: Conquering Heroes, Duke of Edinburgh, Sultan A.
Group B: The Kings Mitcham, Marquis @ Prince, Smeta A.
Group C: The Sultan, The Vale, Prince of Wales.

Please ensure that you keep your Match Results Sheets safe – Captains are requested to bring their Match Results Sheets with them to the Officers and Captains meeting. We have not included Appeal Forms with this letter – if you have an Appeal you wish to lodge, please record it in the usual way and contact the Secretary in the first instance as soon as possible after the end of your match.

Please ensure there is no abuse of Referees during any game, or any match. Such abuse is not allowed by players, other team members or other supporters. Abuse of Referees can lead to
frames being forfeited and, in serious circumstances, to deduction of points or expulsion from
other competitions. In extreme circumstances a player or team could be suspended or expelled from the League if the incident justifies it in the opinion of the Officers and Captains.

It is very important for the sustainability of the League that everyone assists in trying to increase the number of teams in the league next season – please help us by encouraging others to bring pool teams in. This will be a subject for discussion at the Officers and Captains meeting in November.

Please note that, once again, postponements will ONLY be permitted in exceptional and/or compassionate circumstances and, in line with the calendar for the competition, the ONLY date on which those matches can be played will be Monday 15th November unless the Captains agree to play it on another day of the week in advance of 15th November and notify the League Secretary or Assistant Secretary accordingly. We appreciate that this could result in a clash with the aforementioned Officers and Captains Meeting but aren’t worried about that at this stage.

There is no need for Captains to inform us of names of players they will be using for this competition or new players that join them during the competition. The only stipulation is that no player may play for more than one team during the competition.