Backgammon Articles

In his first article for Ladbrokes, Lewis Deyong takes us back to the days of the Cold War - to the beginning of tournament backgammon.

Many trends in life are the result of measured evolutions, but the emergence of competition backgammon can be traced to one specific event: the 1965 International Backgammon Championship, staged at Lucayan Beach Hotel (Freeport, Bahamas).

The organiser was a Palm Beach aficionado of the game, Prince Alexis Obolensky and his idea proved wildly successful. It led to an explosion of interest in the game and a proliferation of such tournaments, first across the U.S.A., and later fanning out across Europe, although here most of the best events were held in private clubs, restricted to members and their friends.

After a few false starts elsewhere, Monte Carlo became the Continental centre of the game, and was supported by Merit, a cigarette brand from mega sponsors Philip Morris ( now Altria ). These parties decided to host the first European Open Championship in July 1976. Up to the last minute the organisers and sponsors were in a nail biting frenzy. Would our concept click? Happily the answer was a resounding "yes", as over 400 avid gammoners showed up, and "EuroGammon" was underway.

Naturally, a big quotient were Americans, (in those day they were indisputably the best players), but even so, "multiculturalism" was the order of the day. The British contingent was next in line, but large groups flocked in from Holland, Iran, France, Brazil and Italy plus one lone Australian.

Remember that in those days the Iron Curtain was still firmly cordoning off Eastern Europe, and with the exception of a rather jolly bunch of Finns, Scandinavian interest was far below the radar. As the Director, I was responsible to the Merit (Europe) brand managers for all aspects of the event. When asked why German attendance was so low, I tried to explain "their interest was just getting started", "not enough exposure", etc., all of which was cut off by an ironic "yeah, but they smoke, don't they?"

What helped most was media interest in our novelty, to the extent that one night we held a separate event for media only, with an attendance of about 30/40 press and T.V. people, including a few from Tele Monte Carlo which had featured several spots about our activities.

With various tournament dinners and cocktail parties, a tennis tournament, plus numerous private parties crammed into one very short week, by the end of it all exhaustion had felled most of the staff. Later, many of these aides became Directors in their own right. Robert Perry and Roland Jakober are now retired, but James Baillie still flies the flag in Monte Carlo, along with Patti Rubin. For the record, Joe Dwek (UK) defeated Kuimars Motakhasses (Iran) in the final, which included the first CCTV of backgammon in Europe

To my intense relief our efforts were judged a smashing success by players, sponsors and media. Everyone wanted more, and Open Backgammon was now on course for a very busy future.

Click here for the second article: Backgammon Legends