Three matches, one win and two tight losses. Not necessarily the match we would have liked to have won. Anyhow. Details on the A team’s top of the table clash against Clifton B first:
A team vs Clifton B (thanks Phil)
Our opponents put out their full team for the first time this season for this crucial match which gave them an average 50-point advantage per board.
Unfortunately, I got us off to the worst possible start. Zack played Ng4 with the threat Bd4+ picking up the exchange. It felt right to counter-strike with e5 (later confirmed to give me a decent advantage) but I couldn’t find the right follow-up, so settled for defending with my time running low. Black’s queen entered the fray on h4 which was not as bad as it looked, but I quickly moved the wrong pawn in front of my king after which Bd4+ would require me to give up a whole rook to avoid mate on the h file.
Some light relief was provided from the junior match in the same room: “Do you want a draw?” was presumably declined as the next question was “Do you want to play all night?”.
Peter got us on the scoreboard with a draw. At this stage it looked to be an uphill task to get something from the match. Derek and Tom looked to be better but Matias and Steve worse.
Over the next period Matias gave up the exchange for a pawn and some play. His knight was holding together his exposed queenside but looking vulnerable to a counter-exchange sacrifice. Chris arguably had some compensation for a pawn with 2 bishops and open lines but Tom bravely turned down the draw. Derek infiltrated with his rooks down the a-file and had a good grip on the position. Steve was struggling to equalise against Colin’s enduring edge owing to better placed pieces.
So to the endgame. Derek forced Mike’s queen so far back that he was able to trap it with a knight, which resulted in Derek coming out a piece up and a resignation soon followed. Oli did indeed give back the exchange leaving Matias’s king horribly exposed and picked up a bishop around the same time. Matias battled on, hoping for a miracle that didn’t come. Tom had rook and knight v rook and bishop with an extra pawn, or 2 if you counted the doomed one on f2 which could be taken at any time by white’s king on f1, and the bishop on g2 meant that it was in no danger of queening. Chris had an active rook on the queenside getting behind Tom’s pawns, which looked to be good enough for the draw whilst Tom was doing strange manoeuvres with his knight. Suddenly it all became clear: Tom defended the f2 pawn from the side with his rook and got his knight to d1 with the simple threat of Ne3 mate, to which there was no defence. We had now amassed 2 great wins against higher-rated opponents, but would it all be in vain? Steve toughed it out in a knight ending a pawn down for quite some time before calling it a day: At a glance it looked like he might play on but the resignation was hardly premature given the unstoppable outside passed pawn that was about to be created, and Colin’s unrelenting accuracy.
48 hours later the emotions aren’t quite so raw, but it’s still agonising to have got so close. Heigh-ho, we did have the reverse result in our previous meeting, and we live to fight another day
C team vs North Bristol A
Alan was immediately under the pump against Richard and his responses made his position look more and more awkward, it seemed only a matter of time before one of the under-stress parts snapped but the snapped kept being delayed. James had set up a rope-a-dope position against Nigel who was looking to work out how he could progress his space advantage into something tangible but patience was the key. On board 3 Pete had probably the better position against Patrick into the middlegame but any advantage was small. James had taken control of the centre, Jason possibly had opportunities to undermine, but it favoured white. On 5 Judd looked better against Advik but only after a piece of ‘calculation’ which would of blundered a piece if white had spotted it. Finally on 6 Joe, road testing a new opening, had better pawns than Michael but not much else to write home about.
So the bottom two boards finished first. Judd played a good endgame, he created threats with connected a and b pawns that Advik couldn’t deal with and although black was short-ish on time there was no point white playing on. Shortly afterwards Joe’s better pawns turned out to be decisive in a R+P ending. He created a passer and that was that. 2-0 became 3-0 soon afterwards as James won material out of some interesting complexity in the centre of the board and that was that. Pete had missed a simply tactic to win material and once he let queens come off the board it looked very drawn. Patrick mindful of the match situation played on for a bit but there was nothing in it and a draw was agreed and the match won just leaving the top two boards.
Alan had managed to hang in and reached an ending a pawn down but after Richard missed chances to win a drawn position was reached. Alan just needed to play Kb8. Bizarrely his hand (does it offend thee?) refused to do his brain’s bidding and paced the king on c8 instead resulting in a loss. A mouse slip in real life. Finally Nigel managed to turn his game around in the last couple of minutes to take the full point.
A solid win. Combined with South Bristol and Bath C drawing means we sit in second on points difference ahead of those two.
F team away to South Bristol E
Three draws. Ash and Ryan drew relatively early (Ash after initially turning down an offer) and then on board 3 Siobhan came unstuck against a young ‘un. Two pawns up but she missed a threat on her rook and the game floated away. Martin on board 4 entered an endgame a rook up but wasn’t able to convert the advantage because his king didn’t have enough cover and Alessandro was able to create a perpetual checking pattern with his queen. A draw and a narrow defeat.
Horfield & Redland Chess Club 