Last year I concluded my editorial with this statement:

If you help yourselves and seek our help we can succeed in reaching a better understanding of one another, our goals and needs and truly promote our wonderful sport.

We emphasized these ideas along the years and demonstrated our own willingness in Verona, during the Congress Meeting to find the means to work together for the good of bridge.

Every National Bridge Organization (NBO) may consult the promotion and communication plans we have provided, showing that we have to take care of all categories of the bridge population: adults, as well as senior and youth.

However youth must be a priority.

This was the conclusion of the brain storming session held by the WBF Executive counsellors during the first three days of the meeting at Verona.

The reasons for that are quite clear:

• One is purely arithmetic : if we do not renew the bridge population with youngsters, bridge will simply die, even not being stagnant with the people who will come to play at the age of 60 or more when they retire.
• The second one is the competition with other sports whether physical or mental ones. They all are based on children and youngsters, and bridge can not appear as an exception for older people.
• The third one is the consequence of the two previous ones: our own image and real development. If we do not have the youth playing bridge, we will never be part of the modern society and appear in the media as we deserve.

I really and sincerely hope to be able to convince all of you, bridge administrators, of the primary importance of the action towards the youth.

I must confess that I was very pleased with the attendance of adults and seniors in Verona, where the publicity we got was tremendous due to the presence of Bill Gates and other VIP’s like Antoine Bernheim and Romain Zaleski.

However, I was even happier when I saw the juniors playing in the World Pairs Championships in Slovakia –with two beautiful girls winning- which attracted a lot of television in their country: Sweden. And later on with the World Junior Teams Championships in Bangkok where we also got a very good exposure, the same in Tianjin (China) for the World University Championship organized with the FISU where 15 different newspapers and TV channels reported on the event.

On these three occasions, the WBF has shown its support to the NBO’s helping some of them in their participation.

Now we are ready to do much more. Indeed our ambition is to include only the Youth in the next World Mind Sports Games, which will be held in October 2008 in Beijing (The International Bridge Teams Olympiads for Open, women senior and mixed will be held at the same time but separately)

Every country, every NBO has been advised in July about this event, that is to say that they have more than two years to prepare a junior team to participate in this event among Chess, Draught, and Go players which undoubtedly will be quite young too. Here we come back to the beginning: help yourselves, we will help.

Indeed the IMSA (International Mind Sport Association) will hopefully take care of all expenses of the teams – flights and full board accommodation for six players (boys or girls) plus a captain. or coach who will attend also the Congress.

What else can we do to help?... knowing that you have at your disposal the teaching program on our site : www.wbfteaching.org.

Still you have to form and educate this team and then you will be pleased to see that this will revive bridge in your country.

Please do it. Do not desperate me as I am already considering the very few answers I received to my first letter.

You can count on me

I count on you

José Damiani

Editor’s note: Mr. Damiani is also President of IMSA (International Mind Sport Association)