Romania won the right to have the congress in 2014 by 13-12 score.
What was the main reason?

I noticed bad language skills of our representative. Was it possible to win in case of the better presentation? With better English

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I think it is.
The pitch to stage the EGC is just that - a pitch. At attempt to sale the idea. A better salesman makes a better pitch. Fluent language is part of that. It also helps to offer better conditions, of course.

Not saying that this is the case in this case, though. Maybe there were other reasons, and its hard to tell before we know the details of the two proposals. Was the Russian proposal significantly better than the Romanian? If so, why? Was it worse? If not, its just a lottery, somebody had to win, and this time it was Romania.

I remember the preparations for making such pitch within the PSG, and I only got a small part of that via the mailing list... Seems a complex issue, yes sir!

Anyways... what do I know.

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- Bantari
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WARNING: This post might contain Opinions!!

Our federation prepared presentation, pictures, printed booklets. Catalin Taranu said that he forgot his papers. So, it's a bit strange for me that Romania won.
Politics, maybe?
I noticed that some countries always vote against Russia - in every possible cases

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Maybe Politics, I don't know...
As I said - impossible to tell unless I know the merits of the proposals.
Forgotten papers or not, it Romania had something to offer that Russia did not, this might have had an influence on the decision.

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- Bantari
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WARNING: This post might contain Opinions!!

Ah, it's the Eurovision song contest all over again

I believe that a major factor is that we had the congress in St Petersburg not that long ago, in 2003. The congress has not been in Romania since 1998 and it's also not going to be in the same place as then. When I discussed the matter with my own compatriots, this was important, several went to the 2003 congress and felt that Romania would be an interesting place to go.

Some were not so happy about the way the 2003 congress was organised. But the Russian presentation for 2014 was good, I think we generally thought it looked promising.

Finally I think that many may have confidence in Catalin as congress organiser, I believe he has achieved successful events and has also been successful in finding sponsors.

I wouldn't think that language skills were that important.

best regards,
Henric

I watched the video of the meeting.

The Russian presentation was impressive - but it was not clear to me whether the quoted price of 20 Euros a night in the hotel was for single occupancy or would only apply to two people sharing a room - ie 40 Euros in total - so I had a doubt in my mind. I also did not like the suggestion that this offer was only for 2014 - it seemed as if we were being held to ransom.

It would be great to go to St Petersberg, but I think all Europeans would need a visa and this would definitely cause me to think twice about going (I didn't go in 2003 because of this).

In contrast, Catalin's presentation was "off the cuff" and unconvincing so I was surprised at the result. Everyone knows where St Petersberg is but I had not heard of the town in Romania where it will be now be held - and I cannot remember the name either. I would have thought that he could bring a flash disk with a presentation.

Maybe at the meeting someone said something bad about the last tournament in St Petersberg also.

In summary, the visa issue puts me off and perhaps that applies to some of the delegates. Of course this is a political problem between governments that works against the people of Russia and Europe and reflects nothing upon the quality of any tournament you might run.

The town you had not heard is SIBIU, however the town where the congress will be held is not yet known Everything was about Sibiu but ... maybe you didn't notice that Catalin said that the location is not yet decided. He said that there are other cities that bid for the congress too (Tg. Mures, Pitesti)

On the other hand, the name of the city was not always important. Check the history, don't you know that old saying? ... the history repeats itself. Examples: in '96 I've been in Abano Terme (Italy). I never heard about it before that EGC and I bet that the biggest part of the officials who voted for that town... where in the same position like me. In '97 I was in Tuchola (Poland). Again ... I never heard about that town before I'm not going to argue whether choosing an unknown town is good or not, but this is the history.

There must be another reason (or reasons) for this decision.