To be fair, the 3 players concerned have since accepted that the DQs were correct under the rules. The results sheet them as DQ rule 6-3. I guess that we will all be a bit more careful about our starting times in future. 😀
It's pretty difficult to challenge a rule so they had no choice but to accept the DQ's, however, common sense should prevail at times, so rather than having hard fast rule sticklers that could damage relations between members and committee's which just build bigger walls, a bit of thought and a quiet word to the side to them all could have helped to breakdown those walls as word spread, it's simple people skills and man-management after all.