ESSDA Board decision following the EGLSF Annual General Assembly held 15th – 17th March 2019 in Budapest:

Eurogames Roma 2019 Update

As most of you are probably aware there have been great concerns over Eurogames Roma 2019 and as such the EGLSF called for a members vote on various aspects of the games that were currently unsatisfactory to both the EGLSF and its Members. As part of this membership vote, online registration has now been suspended until further updates and clarifications are received from Team Roma which are due by 30thMarch 2019.

ESSDA to date has spent a considerable amount of time conversing with Team Roma to try to find a mutual agreement for the European Championships. Although recently we felt we had a fully complying agreement between both parties, we were still extremely concerned at the low level of registrations for the Eurogames as a whole and without any form of financial backing/sponsorship how Team Roma were going to be able to finance the level of cost involved with hosting a European Championship. We decided to wait for the outcome of the AGA to see if there were any clearer financials shared by the Roma Board. There were no clearer concrete financials presented.

Michal Vanicek represented the ESSDA board in Budapest and provided the Board with up to date information on Team Roma’s presentation both yesterday and today. Communication and clarity of information has been a huge concern not only for dancing, but right across the board amongst other sports – some of which have now been cancelled with immediate effect due to low registration. As a consequence, the organisation of, and registration to all of these sports has not been as productive as all parties involved would have hoped.

The European Championships has a high price, and so does the reputation of ESSDA in respect of the professionalism and commitment it holds to ensuring the desired outcome of such a prestigious Championship within our competition calendar. Although we have been fully supportive of Team Roma to try and achieve a desired outcome for everyone, we still lack confidence that they can legitimately provide the finances required to deliver a successful Championship Title. We have had our dance community at the very heart of every decision along the way, and it is with this same ethos that the ESSDA Board have agreed not to pursue the possibility of a European Championship as part of Eurogames Roma 2019. 

The Board are fully supportive of the EGLSF’s steps towards still trying to achieve a successful Eurogames but felt it prudent to request they hold their own dance competition (without the European Championship attached) to help reduce their costs and increase the likelihood of establishing enough registrants to fulfill a successful competition. To date, only 66 participants have registered to dance which is extremely low compared to previous European Championships. 

With recent scars of the financial fallibilities of International Multi-Sport events we had to be 100% sure that this competition was viable to protect both our organisation’s reputation as well as the finances of our members and our wider competitive dance community.  An assurance we were never able to achieve from Team Roma.

Whilst we know that you will all be hugely disappointed with this news, we felt we had to protect further financial loss should the games not proceed as planned. We strongly feel that it is much more likely to proceed as some form of dance competition if they do not have the added pressure of the financial conditions of a European Championship.

We value yours thoughts and suggestions on what happens next and we invite all of our members to share these with us in writing to board@essda.eu. We feel it important for us to continue to work with both the EGLSF and Team Roma to help deliver a dance competition for 2019, however this will not be a competition that is either sanctioned or overseen by ESSDA within any form of partnership or official agreement. We also feel it important that the EGLSF support Host Cities in future applications to fully understand the implications when bidding for a Eurogames when wanting to hold a European Championships in partnership with ESSDA. 

We will share as soon as we are made aware, of any details regarding their plans for dance in Eurogames 2019. We still want there to be a competition for everyone to enjoy!

Your faithfully,

ESSDA Board