4NCL: 6 – 7 December 2008
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FCA SOLUTIONS 1 |
v |
WESSEX 1 |
|||
|
1 |
w |
Reuben, Stewart |
2117 |
½ - ½ |
Lock, Gavin R |
2252 |
|
2 |
b |
Tippleston, Charles |
2177 |
½ - ½ |
Rutter, Nicholas |
2177 |
|
3 |
w |
Almond, Richard |
2138 |
0 - 1 |
Neil, David R |
2165 |
|
4 |
b |
Habershon, Paul |
2120 |
½ - ½ |
Simons, Martin J |
2237 |
|
5 |
w |
Smith, Graham |
2085 |
1 - 0 |
Yeo, Michael J |
2103 |
|
6 |
b |
Majer, Chris E |
2091 |
1 - 0 |
Jenks, Bruce |
2145 |
|
7 |
w |
Weighell, Mark |
2120 |
0 - 1 |
de Coverly, Roger |
2062 |
|
8 |
b |
Gist, Elizabeth (F) |
1720 |
0 - 1 |
Moore, Gillian A (F) |
1976 |
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3½-4½ |
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Things started to go wrong at a relatively early
stage. The Bournemouth contingent, mindful
of the draconian penalties for defaults, arrived at the extraordinary early
time of 1115 and predictably was unable to gain access to their rooms. Martin foolishly encouraged Bruce to join him
in the leisure facilities. Bruce and
exercise are two words not normally found in the same sentence. Swimming races, sauna and steam room meant
that Bruce still looked very pink when most of the rest of us arrived by
1300. Gavin was somewhat later as he had
had to travel by train when his car broke down.
This was a match we were very fortunate to win. My opening was a failure, but instead of
winning a queen for a variety of material I went into a hopeless position where
my extra R+P was no match for 2 rampaging knights. Dave won surprisingly quickly. Gavin bailed out into a perpetual. Roger had
some initiative that he was able to translate into an extra pawn in a double
rook ending. Bruce was still exhibiting
the light-headed effects of his earlier exercise. He blundered the exchange (which he was later
heard to state loudly was an excellent sacrifice), gained some compensation,
missed a winning move and lost.
Gillian’s stonewall had looked promising but was then breached.
Fortunately her opponent chose a tricky move to try and free her pieces that
had a flaw which allowed Gillian to queen a pawn. Martin was never worse and agreed a draw once
he was sure that Nick wasn’t losing.
Rutter-Tippleston looked very similar to two previous encounters - a
Sveshnikov in which Nick sacrificed a pawn for illusory compensation. Unlike the previous 0-1s this time Nick won
his pawn back with enough activity to draw and win the match.
Bruce unwisely decided to rectify his dehydration
with several pints of lager. By the time we set of for the pub at 2000 he was
alternating between incoherent and fortissimo.
My concerns about the absence of pavement were allayed by the discovery
of a cycle track which took us most of the way.
Unfortunately we arrived just after some other tables which meant that
the food was some time in appearing and Bruce got even louder. Still, at £10 a head for a meal and 2 pints
it probably set a record for our evening entertainment! Attempts to lose Bruce on the return journey
failed when everyone else realised that we would have a default on Sunday if
they didn’t shepherd him back to the hotel.
The bar staff at the hotel were eventually unwilling to accept any
further orders from Bruce which at least meant that a body turned up the next
day, if not a mind.
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WESSEX 1 |
v |
KINGS HEAD |
|||
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1 |
w |
Lock,
Gavin R |
2252 |
½ - ½ |
Kwiatkowski,
Feliks J |
2219 |
|
2 |
b |
Simons,
Martin J |
2237 |
0 - 1 |
McMichael,
Richard |
2262 |
|
3 |
w |
Yeo,
Michael J |
2103 |
½ - ½ |
Thomas,
Richard H |
2189 |
|
4 |
b |
Rutter,
Nicholas |
2177 |
½ - ½ |
Ward,
Julian T |
2190 |
|
5 |
w |
Neil,
David R |
2165 |
½ - ½ |
Mackenzie,
Colin |
2112 |
|
6 |
b |
Jenks,
Bruce |
2145 |
0 - 1 |
Forbes,
Cathy (F) |
2098 |
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7 |
w |
de
Coverly, Roger |
2062 |
0 - 1 |
Stevenson,
James A B |
2073 |
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8 |
b |
Moore,
Gillian A (F) |
1976 |
½ - ½ |
Haria,
Ravi |
1794 |
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|
2½-5½ |
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On paper
this match should have been quite close.
In reality there was only one team in it. Our previously invincible board seven set the
tone by resigning after an hour having blundered a piece. After 2 hours, both Gavin and Dave had
decided that they could make no further progress. Nick had some initiative that
evaporated. Bruce had what he described
as an up and down opening. I thought it
was more of a down and down opening.
Having lost the exchange again, he briefly rallied when his opponent
lost a pawn, but his position was so awful that it didn’t matter. Martin won the exchange but at the cost of
allowing a pawn roller that he missed the chance to stop. I had a very promising attack but missed a
win on the last move before the time control.
Gillian was facing an English representative in the World Youth
Championships under 10 section. Her
attempts at activity backfired into a lost K&P ending that still looked lost
when they agreed a draw.
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WESSEX 2 |
v |
BARBICAN 4NCL YOUTH |
|||
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1 |
w |
Buchkremer,
Felix |
2081 |
0 - 1 |
Coleman,
David |
2209 |
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2 |
b |
Marsh,
Roger |
2088 |
0 - 1 |
Ynojosa,
Felix J |
2145 |
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3 |
w |
Gregory,
Keith D |
2067 |
0 - 1 |
Sen,
Subin |
2073 |
|
4 |
b |
Pleasants,
Allan J |
2100 |
0 - 1 |
Bhatia,
Kanwal K (F) |
2065 |
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5 |
w |
Clark,
Ian C |
2106 |
1 - 0 |
O'Toole,
George E |
2054 |
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6 |
b |
Taylor-Bowd,
Phil |
2025 |
1 - 0 |
Wells,
Daniel |
2012 |
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7 |
w |
Tunks,
Dominic |
1945 |
1 - 0 |
Cumming,
Rhys |
1894 |
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8 |
b |
Thilaganathan,
Jessica (F) |
1891 |
½ - ½ |
Ynojosa,
Angelica M |
1725 |
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3½-4½ |
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Yet another agonizing defeat. The game-plan of winning the bottom four boards and scraping a draw somewhere in the top four so very nearly came off.
We welcomed Felix, a friend of Phil’s, who had flown over from Germany just for the weekend. Little did he know what was in store. Allan ran out of expletives to describe the awfulness of his game. He was quite relieved to get beyond move 20. Ian’s game was a traditional mess. It would be nice to think he had it all under control but I suspect he was also relieved when the dust had cleared. Phil looked as though he was playing his younger brother. He engineered a knight ending with a couple of extra pawns. Dominic won a pawn and withstood a fair amount of pressure to keep his 100% record. Jessica won a pawn in a knight ending but in a position where her king couldn’t gain entry. Roger offered a draw on move 15 as he thought his opponent “looked pissed off” (!) Later he thought his position had improved enough to try and win but his optimism predictably backfired. Keith entered the time-scramble with a promising position but by the time he lost on time it was looking a lot worse. This left it 3½-3½ and all down to Felix. He had a slightly worse ending that then began to look a lot worse until he managed to swap off into a drawn R+P ending. The rest of us left for dinner in high spirits expecting to have gained our first point. Unfortunately, after six hours play, Felix thought that he had to stay active which lost, when passive defence would have drawn.
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ANGLIAN AVENGERS |
v |
WESSEX 2 |
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1 |
w |
Munson,
Shaun D |
2168 |
1 - 0 |
Clark,
Ian C |
2106 |
|
2 |
b |
Talsma,
Paul A |
2237 |
1 - 0 |
Pleasants,
Allan J |
2100 |
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3 |
w |
Gregory,
Stephen J |
2187 |
1 - 0 |
Buchkremer,
Felix |
2081 |
|
4 |
b |
Bucknell,
Malcolm |
2175 |
0 - 1 |
Taylor-Bowd,
Phil |
2025 |
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5 |
w |
Spence,
David |
2214 |
1 - 0 |
Gregory,
Keith D |
2067 |
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6 |
b |
Gray,
Mark S |
2125 |
½ - ½ |
Marsh,
Roger |
2088 |
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7 |
w |
Boulton,
William (J) |
1990 |
½ - ½ |
Tunks,
Dominic |
1945 |
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8 |
b |
Wallis,
Ian |
1951 |
1 - 0 |
Thilaganathan,
Jessica (F) |
1891 |
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6 - 2 |
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I had hoped that we might have had chances in this match, but being out-rated on all boards, this was probably unrealistic.
Phil’s opponent was certainly unaware that Phil’s e-mail address includes c7c6. Phil therefore completed an excellent weekend by demolishing his favourite defence. Felix was showing the after-effects of his superhuman efforts on the previous day. Jessica had come well prepared until move 8 when she produced a howler after which she was struggling. Allan was very depressed by his fourth loss in a row from a reasonable position. Ian’s time-scramble developed into a farce. Digital clocks showing one second left of course mean that the time remaining is somewhere between zero and one second. At one stage both clocks were showing one second left. Unfortunately, Ian was on move and failed to press his clock in time. The arbiter stated that Ian hadn’t made enough moves, but a reconstruction then convinced her that he had. Fifteen minutes and several moves later another arbiter decreed that Ian had in fact lost on time while making his 40th move. I only hope that this isn’t used as yet another argument in favour of increments! This left Dominic trying to preserve his 100% record in a R+P ending that veered between being won and drawn over the course of 20 moves and two hours. Dominic made the last mistake so it was drawn.
Relegation is not yet a certainty, but is disappointingly probable,
Last modified: December 8, 2008
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