i start my post with the knowledge, that i´m a german user, so maybe i´m biased, but:
in my opinion it´s a real pity, that even the officials here have the opinion, that a highly unsportsmanlike action is even rewarded with a bonus and every user, that has an ethos and doesn´t use a "fact" (again, the rules of the game say a forfeit or walkover is awarded with a *, and to me it wasn´t known before that a walkover is not awarded with a * in national team games and i guess a lot of people didn´t know that till this week, i still think this is just a bug if something isn´t executed like the rules say) which is just unsportsmanlike get punished.
In every sport a behaviour like this would be regarded as an offense to the spirit of the game and would be punished in a real hard way. In my opinion there is no difference between a forfeit here and the same procedure which took place during the olympics in london in the badminton contest. If there isn´t any rule in the bb rules, that a behavior that is highly unsportsmanlike and against the spirit of a sports competition (meaning like the olympic oath) then i suggest to implement something like this as soon as possible.
If a behavior like a forfeit is regarded as a good managment (as B.B.King said in a previous post) then something is totally wrong in this game. I don´t know if both teams played a tie but i guess it´s most likely here, and if it´s the case, then there definetely was a deal before between england and hong kong, that england would forfeit the game (why would hong kong play a tie in a game they simply had to win to reach the next round?). Does this sound to anyone like a good thing? There is a big difference in having a deal to tie a game or to not even play a game.
I understand the opinion to say we can´t change the rules in a season. But this is no change of a rule in midseason. I quote the rules:
"
Standings
"I don't want to shoot my mouth in my foot, but those are games we can win."
The Standings is the go-to page for your current division. Here, you can see the relative rankings of each team in the division. We advise you to check the standings page after every game to keep track of your opponents. Teams that are still in the National Tournament will have a small trophy icon next to their name.
When the 22 league games are concluded, the four top-ranked teams in each conference will make it to the playoff round. The playoff schedule is displayed on the standings page; if the regular season has not finished yet, the playoff schedule is predicted according to the current standings. As the season progresses, certain players will perform magnificently on the court. The standings page keeps a list of the league leaders in average points-per-game, rebounds-per-game, and assists-per-game. Clicking on any player will take you to that player's historical box score statistics, broken down by game and by season totals.
Ties in the standings are broken first by number of forfeits (indicated by a * next to the number of losses a team has), followed by point differential, then points scored.
At the end of a season, a most valuable player (MVP) will be selected from all of the players in the division. The results and summary of this selection process will be accessible for all previous seasons. The overall league leaders and the MVP will be given a trophy on the players page. Using the drop-down menu near the top of the page, you can view the final standings for the current division from previous seasons.".
So the rules say there must be a *for a forfeit, why aren´t the rules executed then? Because a "well known fact" (by the way, how do you know that, because two people said it here?And how should another manager know this fact, when he can read in the rules that a forfeit will result in a * ? ) prevents you from executing your own rules? Sorry, there is no logic in that.
This is just fixing the execution of a rule, which was´nt ex