2020 TAGGS AGM Minutes DRAFT - WordPress

2020 Annual General Meeting MinutesDate & VenueWeds 4th November 2020, Zoom call due to Corona Virus PandemicPresentSteve Pickford (Chair), Andrew Courtney-Smith, Graham Rose, Robert McLean, John Owen,Stuart Rae, Andrew Henshaw, Robert Slater, Daniel Dunn, Tim Jordan, Mike Tabernacle,Shaun Jenkinson, Neil Titchard, Mike Davidson, Tony Sharp (Captain), David Hudd.1. Apologies Hugh Logan – passed on his appreciation for a job well done to the societyofficers.Dennis McDonald, Steve Occleston, Richard Hudd (card carrying technophobe).2. Minutes of AGM 2019Accepted - Andrew Courtney-SmithSeconded – Robert Slater3. Officers ReportsChairman – Steve PickfordI would personally like to thank all the TAGGS members and officers for their patience andunderstanding and support of this year’s Captain during what has been an exceedinglydifficult and testing time for all. Congratulations Mr Captain for managing to deliver golf inthe face of pandemic adversity.Captain – Tony SharpIt has been a year of many firsts:1) First year we have had to conduct monthly meetings via Zoom (including this AGM!); whohad even heard of Zoom in 2019?!!2) First year we have only managed to play 6 days out; 2 events (Conwy GC and Huyton &Prescot) were cancelled outright by the Covid Lockdown! (or "The Plague", as our HandicapSecretary prefers to call it!);3) First year we were not given access to clubhouse facilities to enjoy the important socialaspects of TAGGS after our round; I have dearly missed the banter at the end of the day,when we share our stories of “what might have been” .and celebrated the day’s bestgolfers with our unique warmth!For the rest of you, it must have felt positively bizarre being asked to arrive at a course onlyminutes before your tee time for me of course, this was just a regular TAGGS day out!!4) actually, it is the first year since I was last Captain, that I have arrived at venues ontime (don’t worry Dan, that is unlikely to continue next year!).5) First year that we ventured as far south as Taunton to play golf; thankfully, the weekendaway made up for a lot of the social interaction we had missed all year! Many thanks indeedto Rob Slater in particular, for arranging such a brilliant trip for us. I had an absolute blast,and we even stayed dry throughout! These annual weekends away form the highlight to mycalendar each year, and I am always amazed how they manage to get better each year!6) Sadly, it is the first year since 2017 that the captain has failed to win his own Captain’sDay .and I am very proud to have let Viking win!!

Rick has kindly listed all of this year’s winners in his report, so I shall not duplicate thatinformation here. What I can say is that we had an average turnout of 24.3333 players foreach of our days’ out; our highest attendance was 31 players in the pouring rain at Preston(the first event for 3 months, following the lockdown in Spring!); our lowest attendance cameat Reddish Vale in August with 18 players (who enjoyed a truly awesome "MacKenzieMajestic Package” of food & golf!).I would like to thank everyone for being so flexible to the seemingly-endless changes to ourgolfing restrictions, many of which were imposed upon us at the last minute .from fulllockdown, to Tier 2, to not touching the pin, to the agony of the ball rebounding off the baseof the new “thicker” pins (whose ball-retrieval mechanism invariably failed to work asintended - resulting in one having to reach into the cup to grasp the bloody ball!) .torecording all scores on one card, and texting Rick with results as you drove out of the carpark (no loitering on club premises permitted this year!).I’m so sorry that most of our respective trophy winners did not get to enjoy the full warmth ofapplause (and heckling) that they deserved this year, so I would like to propose that MrChairman arranges for us to try this out via Zoom this evening!Talking of winners – the 2’s from the Captains day 2 of them to D Hudd who wins 20.Winner of the Captains Day Shaun Jenkinson wins 25 and he also wins another 25 for theCrawl to Carden.Many thanks also to Rick, John, Pinky and Stu for their great contributions to making thisyear run as well as it did; you did a great job guys!Thank you for your very generous support to this year’s charity too can’t wait to see whowins the Luke Donald raffle prize tonight (if I do, it will be the first thing I’ve won all year!).I would like to wish Dan the very best of luck in his forthcoming captaincy year; it strikes methat he has all the required attributes! May 2021 see the return to normal proceedings forTAGGS and for us all in our lives fingers crossed!Competition / Handicap Secretary – Richard HuddFirstly, let us recap this year's winners. I have included the scores they won with, thehandicap they played off and the handicap adjustments they received.Hillside - A Henshaw. 38. 31 -5,5 (Score. Handicap. Reduction.)S & A - Sean the Viking. 32. 27. -2,4Then the plague struck .Preston - D Clarke. 37. 11. -3,6Huddersfield - H Logan. 42. 15. -2,1Reddish Vale - R Hudd. 32. 13. -1,5Weekend away - D Hudd. 63. 10. -2,7Anniversary trophy - R McLean 31. 5. -1,4Ryder Cup - R McLean (therefore defends it for another year!)Rose Bowl - J Owen. 38. 21R Hollis Trophy - D Smith. 36. 3Captains Day - Sean the Viking. 35. 28. -2,8Singles KO - D McDonaldPOTY. K Daniels & D ClarkeA good year for the high handicap members. Especially the Viking who won twice. He musthave served up some rubbish between his wins as he won captain's day off a higher markthan his early season win. Generally speaking, the honours have been shared out againwhich is a good sign that the handicap system is working.We introduced a new change to the handicap system this year. Namely that a daily winnerwould get an extra hit for winning depending upon his handicap category as follows.

Cat 1. Extra 0,2Cat 2. Extra. 0,3Cat 3. Extra 0,4Cat 4. Extra 0,5The idea being to ensure that somebody finishing second would not take a bigger hit thanthe winner. Has it worked? I would say yes. There have been some big winners who havesimply got a bigger hit but on two occasions it has ensured that the winner was penalisedmore than second place.At reddish vale, me and ACS scored the same stableford. ACS lost one shot and so would Ibut for the extra 0,3 I got which meant a two-shot loss. The same happened at Huddersfieldwhere T Jordan in second lost 1 shot. Meanwhile the winner H Logan would also only havelost 1 shot but the extra 0,3 caused him to lose 2 shots.On balance I would say that this new change has had a positive effect and we should keepit. However, it is having the effect of slowly driving members handicaps down. I have an ideato rebalance this and therefore propose the following slight change to the handicap systemnext year.ProposalIntroduce a one-shot buffer zone above the daily average where anyone in this zone wouldnot face a handicap reduction. Deductions would continue as normal for stableford scoresabove this buffer zone.Example of how it would work for someone off 10Daily average 30Player scores 29 increase of 0,3Player scores. 31 no changePlayer scores. 32. reduction of 0,6Player scores 36 and wins reduction of 2,1I have looked over the last two years to see how many golfers would fall into this new bufferzone. It is fair to say some months it would apply to nobody but equally some months therehave been two or three who would get no reduction. There have been 18 events in the lasttwo years where handicaps have been amended. In that period 19 golfers have landed inthe proposed new buffer zone. So basically, averaging one per event who would avoid areduction to their handicap. This would have desired effect to balance up the extrareductions that winners are now getting hit withPOTYThe plague caused havoc with this format this year. We had to amend the best five scoresfrom eight events to 5 from 6. It was really the only way to have a meaningful comp. We gotjoint winners which is a rare event. I don't see that joint winners is an issue. If a playoff canbe arranged great. If not, joint winners seem logical to me unless members have a strongview to the contrary.I do not propose any changes to the POTY format.Hope the above makes sense. I am happy to field queries prior to the AGM.The Society would like to acknowledge and thank Rick for all his hard work.Accepted – Steve PickfordSeconded – Daniel DunnTreasurer – John OwenJohn Owen presented the accounts for the previous 12 months (see below).

*Prize fund at Reddish Vale 40. Food not taken/paid for at Carden Park 66**Comprised byDonations - Stu 10, Slates 45, Dave Hudd 10Fantasy League 75, TWAT Auction 75, TWAT donations 230, Raffle 195These show a healthy balance with no reason increase subs for next season.Accepted – Andrew Courtney-SmithSeconded – Robert SlaterEveryone thanked John for his efforts.Secretary – Stuart RaeNo significant issues to report with communications during the season. The follow is anupdate on channels: Official TAGGS email listThe official TAGGS opt in email list remains as the “gold standard” and should be used forany messaging intended for all members. Following requests to remove the “spam” from thischannel there has been good compliance and less use of “reply all”.TAGGS WhatsApp usageThe “TAGGS Official” WhatsApp group exists with has the same objectives as the email listbut does not reach all members.