A good week for us. 3 matches, 3 wins. The A team top of division 1, the C team up to second and the E team still unbeaten. Oh to be alive in such an age.
First up the E team who steamrollered South Bristol C. We did outgrade them but we made it count. An early and straightforward win for Joe followed by a clear and sensible win on debut for Jacob. He recognised his advantage and simplified into a completely won ending. Captain Strickland made it 3-0 with a comfortable victory over Vicky and finally Joaquim, having graced us with his majesty for only the third time this season, wrapped it up. Very good. Score card here.
Then on Wednesday we took two teams to Downend and won both matches. Not something that has happened that often. An A team report may follow [is now below!] so I won’t steal any thunder but without giving away any spoilers both matches finished 3.5-2.5 but were achieved in very different ways. Scorecards here and here.
The C team raced into a winning match position by 9:15. On board 1 Nigel had been unable to stop Ian engineering a 14 move draw to put the first mark on the scorecard. However James took us ahead with a pleasing win on board 3; Dave had got himself into a dreadful positional bind and white found a series of elegant moves to restrain, paralyse then deliver a lovely coup de grace. James was rightfully pleased with how it went. Judd won shortly afterwards. The game was relatively even for a while but Greg got caught out and dropped a piece and the game was won shortly afterwards. On board 2 Nigel had given up a pawn for activity against Pete but he didn’t really find any and black was able to exchange down and create a pair of connected passed pawns with the pressure leading to a blunder and the match was won.
Downend battled on and scored a couple of consolation wins on boards 5 and 6. Duncan’s 100% start to his Horfield career came to an end against rapidly improving junior Carolus when he missed a tactic to lose rook for queen and his better position was then very much worse. Then Joe kept his driver waiting until 10:30 by battling to the end. Firstly he got in trouble, then he equalised, then he won a piece, then he traded queens (but only by messing up his pawn structure allowing), then t’other Joe was able to mop up some pawns, then it was tense for a bit, and then it was over as t’other Joe’s connected rooks were too strong. Pity but a good match win.
Anyhow it was a good evening. Happiness, not in another place but this place, not for another hour, but this hour.
Thanks Walt. Let us relish it.
How the A team did it (thanks Phil)
We faced a much weaker version of Downend A than in our recent previous encounter, so this time we were favourites rather than underdogs, but taking nothing for granted.
Peter gave up his queen for 2 bishops and a pawn, which looked all according to plan as he was playing quickly and had a promising position. Nigel defused the attack by giving up the exchange. Now with no control of the dark squares Peter’s progress was stymied and a draw soon followed.
Around 10pm 3 more draws followed. Tom’s game always looked to be heading that way. Matias had been pressing for a long time, entering a knight ending a pawn up but in the end ran out of pawns. And last and least, my game stuck within a valuation of +/-0.2 and although Lichess credited us both with 99% accuracy, this proved not to be a good measure of anything in particular, especially excitement.
Pete had been putting Derek under some pressure in a queen and rook ending which netted up a pawn, but this was ultimately inconsequential with all the pawns on the kingside, so we had another draw.
Now we returned to a familiar theme of relying on the final game to win us the match. By this stage it was looking good. James had earlier elected to open the kingside rather than locking up the pawns, but Steve’s pieces were better placed to take advantage of the space. James gave up a pawn to try and speed up his development but to little avail. Steve then gave up the exchange for a couple of pawns and then gained complete control of the centre. The final position was quite a picture, featuring Steve’s king on e5 in the midst of an army of pawns hurtling towards the 8th rank.
Horfield & Redland Chess Club 