Performance: A Look at the Results of EYC2026—Latvia. Part Four.

So today we’re publishing the final part of our analysis of the results of the European Youth Draughts Championship in Tallinn. We’re wrapping up this series of posts with an article on the prospects and level of development of the draughts movement, using Latvian clubs as an example. And contrary to the unsubstantiated and overly optimistic claims, we’ll take a look at the reality of the situation.

To fully understand the analytical material, let’s take another look at the basic criteria for Latvia’s checkers moves. So:

1. Historical Background: A very interesting set of values has developed in Latvia since time immemorial. As soon as someone took a leadership position in the federation, they immediately began drawing their children into it. Every Latvian leader or person close to the federation’s management considered it their duty to get their child involved in checkers, sometimes against the child’s will, let alone whether the child actually possessed the ability or talent for the sport.
   Over time, the federation’s sports policy became hostage to the self-centered goals of the new leader and dependent on the successes of that leader’s children. As you might guess, none of these children of masters, grandmasters, and leaders ever remained in checkers. And none of them contributed anything new to the development of the game. The entire policy of the leaders and those close to them boiled down to short-term, self-centered goals, stroking their own egos, and compensating for low self-esteem.
   The result: To this day, the federation’s sphere of sports activity lacks—and cannot form—a unified value system grounded in sporting, ethical, and other moral principles. If such a value system is not established or pursues purely self-centered goals, then the development of the sport and the achievement of results are impossible.                                                                      As of now: There is once again a parent in the federation who has not contributed a single cent toward the development of the checkers movement, but who consistently pursues his own self-centered goals regarding his son—giving the impression that he is raising a girl and is afraid of missing out on information about the timing of her wedding night. From the history of checkers in Latvia, we know of many unfortunate children who “ended up” playing checkers simply because their parents played the game…. Let’s reiterate the conclusion: The success of a single child of a federation official never contributes to the development of the sport. In this case—draughts.
2. Coaching Potential: During the early days of the draughts movement in Latvia, open championships were frequently held, drawing in specialists from other republics. The same trend was observed in coach training. It is worth noting that the successes of Latvian players are linked to coaches who were trained at other draughts schools: Zoya Golubeva—Minsk Draughts School; Olesya Misane—Bashkortostan Draughts School; and individual players—who took lessons from Russian and Belarusian grandmasters. Guntis Valneris’s coach, Emmanuil Merins, has long resided in Germany. NONE of the current local coaches (including grandmasters) are capable of developing, retaining, and passing on their knowledge at a competitive global level. It may sound like a joke, but Guntis Valneris has been the best in Latvia for 35 years and is in a league of his own. Prospects? It seems to us there are none—except for the coaches listed at the beginning of this paragraph.
3. Compensation: We’ve been saying for a long time that the federation in Latvia is like a religious cult. Just think about it! Children in this federation play for candy; the federation cannot fully cover the costs of competition entry for a SINGLE draughts player. And cash prizes are awarded in the form of payment for next year’s tournament, in which the current prize contender must participate. By way of comparison, the top prize in the women’s national championship is 150 euros, compared to 2,750 in the Polish championship. Question: Doesn’t this resemble a religious cult? Conclusion: You can’t build a well-developed sports structure by playing for cookies. Playing for cookies always ends up being a mess.

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We are basing our analysis on the standings without the artificial U10/U26 groups.

Of the 14 clubs that sent representatives, half did not win a single medal. It is telling that 6th place in the overall efficiency standings went to the most biased and utterly useless club in terms of achieving high athletic results—the DAB club. Time and again, they bring a huge number of draughts players and consistently demonstrate low performance. We have said more than once that this club is good for mass cultural—or anti-cultural—activities within the country. It is from this very club that you’ll find the largest number of signatories to letters calling for the disqualification of well-known athletes; it is this club that lobbies for its interests at the local level; and it is from this club that we received proposals to hand over our international tournaments to their “caring” hands. We wrote back then that the two clown brothers would never achieve anything.

If you pick the Baltais Kauliņš club—which happened to land in 4th place on the list—you’ll see a picture that closely reflects the reality of draughts in Latvia.

Conclusion: All level-headed draughts players understand that with the arrival and return of strong national teams to world competitions, the chances of Latvian athletes will plummet to zero. And that is precisely why almost the entire “clique” will stubbornly cling to a policy of persecution, disqualifications, and punishments. It’s just like a cult. The curtain falls.