My take is very different, Manfred. While I think none of these images would ever win any awards, these images have an impact on me and I my eyes have no hesitation whatsoever immediately knowing what to focus on. I'm not mentioning this to disagree with you; instead I'm mentioning this so Erik understands that there are opposing points of view.
Robert Capa's quote that you mentioned applies to photos that aren't good enough. It doesn't apply to these photos in my mind because, indeed, they are good enough because they are close enough. As an example, your close crop leaves out important information:
- How many people are playing with this person?
- What are the approximate age, sex and whatever of the people playing with this person?
- Who is this person looking at?
- What else is on the game table?
- The list goes on and on.
That's not to say that your composition wouldn't be good; indeed, it would be good. However, if you want to show the impact of five people playing a board game, it doesn't make any sense to me to display a photo of only one of them.