H. European Youth Team Championship
The European Youth Team Championship will include four separate competitions, an open competition and a girls competition, both in the category U-12 and U-18.
H.1. Participation
H.1.1 Each ECU federation shall be entitled to participate with teams in the open section and in the girls section. These teams may represent the national federation, a region, a city, a club or a school.
H.1.1.1 The teams in the open section shall consist of four players, the teams in the girls section shall consist of two female players.
H.1.1.2 Each team is entitled to have one reserve player.
H.1.1.3 The playing members of the team shall not have reached the age of 12 or 18, depends on category, by January 1st of the year in which the tournament is held.
H.1.1.4 All players of a team have to belong to the nominating federation.
H.1.2 The organising chess federation may decide to enter more than one team or to invite more than one team from the same federation, but finally the number of participating teams shall be an even number.
H.2. Organisation
H.2.1 The competition shall take place between July 1 and September 15. In exceptional cases the Board may accept other dates.
H.2.2 One month before the scheduled start of the Youth Team Championships, each participating federation shall send to the organising federation and to the ECU Tournament Director the basic team lists. It can be changed not later than one day before the Technical Meeting.
H.2.3 The organiser shall provide suitable accommodation for the ECU President or his nominee, and the Tournament Director of the European Chess Union. The organiser will also pay their travel expenses.
H.3. Tournament Regulations
H.3.1 The Championship shall be held on the Swiss system in 7 rounds, with one open section and one section for the girls teams, considered as separate competitions.
H.3.2 If there are eight teams or less in a competition, the competition will be played as a Round Robin tournament. In such case the drawing of lots will take place at the Captain’s Meeting.
H.3.3 ECU will approve relevant system of play after the final number of the participating teams is approved.
H.3.4 The tournament may have a free day.
H.4. Titles and Prizes
H.4.1 Titles.
H.4.1.1 The winner of the open competition receives the title “European Youth Team Champion 20..” in respective category.
H.4.1.2 The winner of the girls competition receives the title “European Youth Team Champion for Girls 20..” in respective category.
H.4.1.3 The winner of the combined category of the competition (sum of the match points from both tournaments, then, if equal, sum of the game points) receives the title “Absolute European Youth Team Champion 20..” in respective category.
H.4.2 Trophies. For each competition the Organiser shall provide Cup for the winners.
H.4.3 Every member of the winning team (players and captain) shall receive a gold medal. Similarly, members of the team finishing second and of the team finishing third shall receive silver and bronze medals, respectively. Additional prizes may be offered by the Organiser or by the sponsors. Conditions of their award shall be announced to the participants before the start of the competition.
H.4.4 In the case that teams end with the same number of match points, money prizes shall be shared according to the Hort system (among such number of teams which corresponds to the number of advertised prizes).