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Thursday 20 February 2014

They shoot chessplayers don't they?

Played at Denton Chess Club - 19/02/2014

Stockport Lge Div 2

Denton B           V          Marple C

1 T Hilton        0.5/0.5     G Trueman
2 J Ryan           0.5/0.5    P Kirby
3F Moan             1-0        T Kay
4 D Holt            0.5/0.5     C Baker
5 C Lopez           1-0         T Cowling
6 P Boyd             1-0         J Barlow

                           4.5/1.5

Missing several of our regulars the C teams long unbeaten run finally came to an end at the hands of a buoyant Denton team who needed the points to avoid getting sucked into a relegation dogfight.

I faced Tim Hilton on board 1. The game started 1e4 e6 2d4 d5 3ed:  ( A risky choice on my part as Tim once said that people who play this move should be shot. I do believe it's as good as anything else, after all when White plays e5 , either now or later, I always feel Black has achieved one of his goals) 3...ed: 4Nf3  Bd6 5c4 Nf6 6c5 (Fritz showed me this move some weeks ago. The idea is simply to cramp Black.) 6...Be7 7Nc3 0-0 8Bd3 b6 (Excellent play by Tim, the White pawns must be challenged) 9cb: ab: 10h3 Ba6 110-0 Bd3: 12Qd3:Nbd7 (Here 12...c5 gives good chances of equalising) 13Ne5 (It would have been simpler and a much better practical choice to complete my development with 13Bf4 when White has a nice edge) 13...Bd6  (13...Ne5: is perhaps best as after 14de: Nd7 15Nd5: Ne5: White doesn't really have much)14Nc6 After much thought I decided to invade, it is a good move but is it correct to say a player has made a good move when he doesn't realise why it's a good move? After the game Tim said he feared 14f4 but after 14...c5! it's White rather than Black who doesn't have a good continuation.) 14...Qc8 (Although 14...Qe8 is better I would have been delighted to see Tim play it as after 15Bd2 it's pretty clear that White is on top and the position is easy to play. 15Re1? (I've gone on long enough about my game but I did miss a very nice move here. Can you see it?. If you think logically you should find it, but the answer is available on request.)
After 15Re1? I was always worried about the  now potentially vulnerable Knight on c6 and was rather relieved when we agreed a draw some moves later.

On Board 2 Paul seemed to come out of the opening somewhat worse, with White having a very nice Keres style g4 attack. Not for the first time this season Paul showed his resilience to keep in the game at all and at the end Houdiniesque qualities to somehow emerge with a draw.

On Board 3 Tony came unstuck against an in-form Francis who, the night after beating Stuart Murray (184) with Black, played a very nice long term Knight "sac" for what ultimately became 4 pawns. I struggled desperately to see if there was any way Tony could activate his pieces ...but I don't think there was.Very insstructive play from Francis.

Chris played very solidly on 4 to draw with Black against a higher rated opponent. Dave's 2g3 Anti-Sicilian, which he knows well, never looked like threatening Chris' bastions.

Terry had an interesting game on 5 against a player who I suspect is very under graded. Eventually Terry was forced to concede Bishop and Knight for Rook and I was interested to see if Senor Lopez would try to prove his advantage in an endgame with the match already decided. Unfortunately he did.

On 6 Jeff played very dynamic chess, choosing the Budapest Gambit. Although he seemed to come out of the opening well it was a very difficult middle game to play and he succumbed to a nice Kingside attack.

So 4.5/1.5 was the final score. Many thanks to all who played, particularly those Stakhanovites Tony and Terry who completed three games in three successive evenings for Marple Chess Club.
            

Tuesday 18 February 2014

Triple Match Night - Limit League

As usual we used the opportunity to give experience to Stuart and Joseph so the result was not the main thing.  I continued my good form despite my early attempt to lose the game.

1.  Neil Dainty         1 - 0  Mike Palmer
2.  Peter Kelly          0 - 1  Tony Flynn
3.  Stuart Anderson  0 - 1  Mike Garvin
4.  Joseph Anderson 0 - 1  Ashley Weinberg


(10) PALMER,Mike (113) - DAINTY,Neil (93) [A48]
SDCL, 17.02.2014


[Dainty,Neil]
1.d4 Nf6 2.Nf3 g6 3.Bf4 d6 4.e3 Bg7 5.Bd3 0–0
6.Nbd2 Nbd7 7.c3 c5 8.0–0 b6 9.Re1 Bb7 10.Qc2 a6 to prevent Bb5
11.e4 Rc8 12.d5 e5 completely forgetting that this was defending d6. I should have played cxd4 and then Rc8
13.dxe6 fxe6 14.Bxd6 Re8 15.e5 Nh5 16.Be4 Bxe4 I did consider Ba8 when taking back with my rook would have freed my R and Q
17.Nxe4 Bh6 This is agony;I can't play like this!
18.Rad1 Rc6 19.g3 Bf8 I can at least get rid of the bishop
20.Qd3 Bxd6 21.Nxd6 Rf8 22.Nh4 At last a way out for my queen. A knight will attack it but I must find some counterplay
22...Qg5 23.Nf3 we both missed Ne4 with the Nd7 loose!
23...Qg4 24.Nd2 I am now off the rook and Mike is visibly rattled. I have 20 minutes to his 30
24...Nf4 25.Qe4 Nh3+ I spent a lot of time on this as I can see that Kg2 leaves me with Rxf2 but not a lot else
26.Kh1?? the pressure is getting to him
26...Nxf2+ after two more moves I now have 8 minutes to his 14
27.Kg1 Nxe4 28.N2xe4 Nxe5 4 against 10
29.Nd2 Rxd6 30.Rf1 Rxf1+ 31.Kxf1 a right time scramble now. Not sure of the remaining moves but with only one minute each I mated him having swopped some more pieces
31...Qh3+ 32.Ke1 Rxd2 33.Rxd2 Nf3+ 34.Kd1 Nxd2 35.Kxd2 Qxh2+ 36.Kc1 Qg1+ 37.Kc2 a5 38.Kd2 Qf2+ 39.Kc1 a4 40.Kb1 0–1



 


Triple Match Night - A&B Team Results

Last night we had 3 matches at the club.  Here are the match cards for the A & B team matches


Marple A v East Cheshire (Charnley Cup)

 


Marple A East Cheshire
1 Alex Longson 1 0 P Ramsey
2 John Bentley 0.5 0.5 J Reed
3 Alan Walton 0.5 0.5 D Newell
4 Nigel Livesey 0.5 0.5 K Holton
5 Sean Hewitt 0 1 P Bamford
6 Andy Jenkins 1 0 K Flaherty
3.5 2.5

 

Marple B v Holmes Chapel

 


Marple B Holmes Chapel
1 Andrew Horton 1 0 P Bennett
2 Sarah Hegarty 1 0 J Turner
3 Glenn Trueman 0.5 0.5 A Raeburn
4 Paul Kirby 0 1 B Scattergood
5 Tony Kay 0 1 I Bates
6 Terry Cowling 1 0 C Gay
3.5 2.5


With a few players missing (Daniel, Michael, Ioannis, Jamie) I decided to take a risk and balance the sides so we would have a chance of winning both matches - this of course meant increasing the risk that the A Team would suffer an upset and drop out of the cup.

Both matches were very dramatic and went down to the last game.  In the A Team match Andy won a nice game early on to put us in a nice position, but unfortunately Sean's kingside attack came to nothing and his opponent won an exchange before finishing the game with a nice queen sac.

A couple of draws followed which left just me and John playing with the scores tied at 2-2.  John had sacked an exchange for a pawn and some dark square play in a Benko.  It looked a bit murky to me and his opponent wasn't making any obvious errors.  Getting low on time John allowed a repetition.

So I was last to finish and I needed to win or else we would lose the match on bottom board elimination.  Despite a some slightly dubious early middlegame play I'd managed to steer the game to a highly favourable endgame for me - and with an advantage on the clock I was highly confident of converting which I was able to do. 

The B Team match was even more dramatic.  By the time I had finished the scores were tied at 2.5 -  2.5 with just Andy's game remaining.  He was on the wrong side of a 3v2 rook endgame (all pawns on the kingside) and both players were down to a minute playing on their 10 second increments.  Pat decided to go for broke and gave back his extra pawn to try and activate his king and promote his h-pawn.  What he had underestimated was that Andy's e-pawn was now the more dangerous.  The game simplified into rook + f-pawn (Andy) v rook.  The position was a theoretical draw but it became clear that Pat was unaware of the correct drawing methods (Philidor's 3rd rank defence being the simplest) and Andy managed to bring home to victory in fine style!

These two wins were hard fought and mean that the A-Team have a cup final to look forward and the B Team now have 9 points and are very close to being mathematically certain of avoiding relegation.

Thanks all for playing.

Alex

Friday 14 February 2014

East Cheshire C vs Marple D 12/02/14

1.         D.Taylor            0.5 - 0.5            A. Kay

2.         W.Tait               1 - 0                 J.A.Jenkins

3          M.Heywood      0.5 - 0.5            C.Baker

4.         K.Hodgson       0 - 1                 T.Cowling

5.         R.Beswick         0.5 - 0.5            T.Thomas

 Total                             2.5 - 2.5

 Thank you to Terry for standing in as captain and Chris for providing transport on such a stormy night. Some of you have provided summaries of their games, as follows.

On board 1, Tony had white against David Taylor. "I opened with my favourite Bird's and David responded with an aggressive line bringing his major pieces to pressurise the c file. David had castled short so I countered with a kingside threat by my Queen and centrally placed knight. I sacrificed a rook to establish what I thought was a winning combination but my opponent managed to engineer a draw by repetition. Early finish!"
Andy on board 2, "I played Bill Tait again with the Black pieces. As usual, it was a close game but Bill got some activity and a dangerous passed pawn on the b file. I was about to win the pawn when Bill attacked my unimportant g7 pawn with his bishop; so I just snapped Bill's passed b pawn off with my bishop. Bill took my rook off!! Because I was fixated on the passed pawn, I failed to notice that Bill's bishop move attacked my g7 pawn and my rook. It was game over."

Chris on board 3, "I had white in a very closed positional English - the first pawns were exchanged on move 18. After a series of exchanges I was a pawn down but the bishop pair and much more active pieces meant I could get the pawn back to reach an ending with two bishops versus bishop and knight with 5 pawns each. Although my position was undoubtedly better, I accepted a draw offer as it seemed unlikely we could reach a satisfactory conclusion with well under 10 minutes each left."

A win by Terry and a draw from Trefor, meant the match was drawn.  Thanks to all for your efforts.

 

Wednesday 12 February 2014

A routine draw

Heres the scorecard from Mondays C team match -

Stockport Lge. Div 2. 10/02/14 

Marple C                                          E Cheshire A
1 S  Hegarty (189)      0.5-0.5          J Reed       (164)
2N Livesey  (161)       0.5-0.5          P Ramsey  (172)
3G Trueman (161)       0.5-0.5         S Tranter    (169)
4P Kirby        (151)         1-0            T Rickards  (151)
5 T Kay         (132)        0.5-0.5        D Newell     (144)
6C Baker      (130)        0-1              D  Broadbent (138)

                                       3-3

Unfortunately I haven't got the time to write a full match report here but I would like to thank everyone for playing and for performing so well against very strong opposition. Although this match included four draws the earliest one was not agreed until 10.15!.

TEAM CHANGES AT STOCKPORT

For our second game in two nights the E team had three forced changes. Missing from Monday, stalwarts Trefor and Tony returned to the line-up, which was just as well as we only had five players available.
We were unable to replicate our success at Macc the night before:

1. John Kelly      (132)      0 - 1    Chris Baker      (126)
2. David Preen     (130)      0.5     Trefor Thomas (111)
3. Peter King         (127)   1 - 0    Tony Doust      (107)
4. Ian Anderson    (111)     0.5      Neil Dainty     (93)
5. Anthony Prime (103)    1 - 0  P Kelly             (87

          STOCKPORT C    3 - 2     MARPLE E

As you can see we were outgraded on the boards were we lost.     I didn't see much of the other games.  Peter lost a piece early on and held on to be last to finish.  Chris was first to finish, perhaps he'd like to add a comment.  My own game was even most of the time, but I missed a chance to win a piece with a tactic (OK a simple tactic) I'd been waiting to play.

Once again I'll impose my game on you just in case someone can help me!

(8) ANDERSON,Ian (111) - DAINTY,Neil (93) [A26]
SDCL div3 Stockport, 11.02.2014


[Dainty,Neil]
1.c4 Nf6 2.Nc3 d6 3.e4 e5 4.g3 g6 5.Bg2 Bg7
6.Nge2 0–0 7.h3 Be6 8.d3 Nc6 9.0–0 Ne8
10.f4 f5 11.Kh2 h5 12.h4 Nf6 13.Bh3 Qd7
14.Ng1 a6 15.Rb1 Ne7 16.b3
            the Nc3 is now loose and I am looking to play exf4 then fxg4 winning the piece ¤
16...c6 17.Nf3 Nh7 opportunity missed! I wanted to prevent Ng5 when there was no need.
My exf4 was on:
 [17...exf4 18.Bxf4 Ng4+ 19.Bxg4 (19.Kh1 Bxc3) 19...fxg4 20.Na4 (20.Ng5 Bxc3) 20...gxf3 21.Nb6 Qd8 22.Nxa8 Bg4 23.Qc1 Qxa8]
18.Ne2 fxe4 19.Bxe6+ Qxe6 20.dxe4 Nf6
 21.Ng5 Ng4+ 22.Kg2 Qd7 23.Qd2 Rad8
 24.Ba3 Nf6 25.fxe5 dxe5 26.Qxd7 Rxd7
 27.Rbd1 Rfd8 28.Rxd7 Rxd7 29.Bxe7 Rxe7
30.Rd1 Bh6 31.Nc3 Bxg5 32.hxg5 Nh7
 33.Rd6 Kf7 34.Na4 Nxg5 35.Nc3 Re6 36.Rd7+ Re7 Diagram


XABCDEFGHY
8-+-+-+-+(
7+p+Rtrk+-'
6p+p+-+p+&
5+-+-zp-snp%
4-+P+P+-+$
3+PsN-+-zP-#
2P+-+-+K+"
1+-+-+-+-!
xabcdefghy
 
I can see no way through. Draw agreed. ½–½



 


Tuesday 11 February 2014

SECOND WIN FOR E TEAM

We travelled to Macclesfield with the only five players available.  A mixed bunch, grade-wise, and probably in other ways too!

Andy led us in fine style winning early on and rewarding himself at the bar.  He told me he won a pawn early on with a trick and his opponent blundered a second pawn so it was all over.  I could see Barrie was two pieces down to David Mallinson and it was no surprise when we lost this one.  Asked for a report he gave his predicted reply "I came second".

My game was next to finish and I won when a mistake allowed me a very nice check with the Queen giving a forced mate (see below).  So 2-1 up with two games still in play.  On Board 2 Jeff was playing Macc captain Richard Murphy.  Jeff is in fine form and when I started watching both players had two knights and five pawns.  Neither made any mistakes and a draw was agreed, but only after Richard had taken a look at the other game where Peter was up against Tom Robson.

Tom's grade has gone from 90 twelve months ago, to 119 in the new listing, so Richard may have been confident that Tom could win and draw the match.  If so he was in for a shock.  Peter was a piece up (2R,N,B+6 v 2R,B+6) and had no intention of being outplayed.  He forked Bishop and Rook with his Bishop forcing the exchange.  Tom then carelessly allowed him to force the Rooks off and Peter then used his experience to fork two pawns with his Knight.  Tom resigned seeing his one remaining pawn could not stop the three bearing down on him.  It might sound straightforward but it was very well executed.

1.  M Brough (134)      0 - 1   A Jenkins (127)
2. R Murphy (120)       0.5     J Barlow (104)
3.  B Woodhall (111)  0 - 1   N Dainty (91)
4. T Robson (119)       0 - 1   P Kelly (87)
5.  D Mallinson (108)  1 - 0   B Edwards (77)

          Macclesfield B  2 -3 Marple E
 
 
 DAINTY,Neil (91) - WOODHALL,Brian (111) [B52]
SDCL div3, 10.02.2014


[Dainty,Neil]
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.Bb5+ Bd7 4.Bxd7+ Nxd7 5.c3 Ngf6
I am trying to follow something Glenn showed me.  My plan is c3, d4, e5.  It took a while to happen, although I think it helped.
 6.d3 e6 7.0–0 Be7 8.Bf4 I thought this was a great move; Fritz is not impressed
.....0–0 9.Nbd2 Rc8 10.h3 preventing Ng5 and maybe a new home for my bishop
....h6 11.Nh2 my bishop won't like it here as e5 is coming anyway
....e5 12.Be3 Nh7 13.f4 exf4 14.Bxf4 Ne5 15.Ndf3 Bf6 16.d4 Ng6 17.Be3 Re8 18.Qd3 b6 19.Ng4 Be7 20.e5 dxe5 21.Ngxe5 Nxe5 22.Nxe5 f6 [22...Bf6 23.Ng4 cxd4 24.Nxf6+ Nxf6 25.Bxd4] 23.Qc4+ Kh8 Diagram


XABCDEFGHY
8-+rwqr+-mk(
7zp-+-vl-zpn'
6-zp-+-zp-zp&
5+-zp-sN-+-%
4-+QzP-+-+$
3+-zP-vL-+P#
2PzP-+-+P+"
1tR-+-+RmK-!
xabcdefghy
 
and Brian resigned 1–0



 


Wednesday 5 February 2014

Chorlton V Marple B Stockport League Div.1 04/02/2014

Played at Chorlton Chess Club-

Chorlton        V   Marple B  Stockport League Division 1 04/02/14 

1P Olbison (162)        0-1            S Hegarty  (189) 
2R Doney (182)         1-0            P Kirby      (151)
3C Vassiliou (170)      0.5-0.5     G Trueman (161)
4D Owen     (159)       1-0            T Kay         (132)
5A Sainsbury (155)    0.5-0.5       C Baker    (130)
6A Beresford (155)    1-0             A Jenkins  (125)

                                   4-2

Player unavailability meant we were always going to be "up against it" and as I suspected we were outgraded on five of the six boards.

 I saw very little of Andy and Tonys games so I can't really comment, but their opponents were both strong players.

My own game was an object lesson of how not to play against the Sicilian. I had played this line against Chris Vassiliou  in 1996 but it was rather naive to think his conduct of the opening would not improve over eighteen years!. I exchanged on c6 hoping that Qd6 would cause problems but Blacks control of the b file was the most important feature of the position. GM Rowson advises maintaining a constant dialogue with your pieces but after I played b3 my white squared Bishop wouldn't talk to me at all. With no way of creating play I was reduced to preventing any of Chris' potential  pawn breaks (a4,d5,f5,g5) being terminal and in this limited sense was  succesful.

G Trueman V C Vassiliou  1e4c5 2Nf3 e6 3c4 b6 4d4 cd: 5Nd4: Bb7 6f3 Bc5 7Be3 Nc6 8Nc6: Bc6: 9Bc5: bc: 10Nc3 Ne7 11Be2 Ng6 12Qd2 0-0 130-0 Rb8 14Rfd1  Qb6 15Rab1 Rfd8 16Qc2 a6 17Bf1 Qc7 18Qf2 Qa5 19Qc2 Rb7 20b3 Qa3 21Rbc1 h6 22Nb1 Qb4 23Nc3 Ne7 24Rd2 Rdb8 25Rcd1 Qb6 26Qd3 Qc7 27Qc2  0.5/0.5

Board 5 was a triumph for heroic defence against a higher graded opponent. Chris (B) refused to panic despite facing massive pressure down the f file and when his opponent erred secured a draw by pepetual check with 43 seconds left on his clock!

On board 2 Paul showed Houdiniesque qualities to survive a difficult opening and for one brief moment appeared to be winning. However its extremely difficult to play accurately when you have only 90 seconds left and in a flurry of moves it was all over and Ron had triumphed.

Sarahs game was a fascinating struggle in a Classical French. Although Phil was a late replacement he is a very talented tactician and Sarah had to show  all her ability to subdue her opponent. One amusing feature of the game was that Phil castled Kingside at 10.38pm , which must be the latest ever castling in the Stockport Chess League?

So  a 4-2 defeat in the end. Sarah has asked me to thank everyone for playing, particularly those who were significantly outgraded.

Marple V Stockport A Manchester League 28/01/14 Match Scorecard

Played at Stockport Chess Club last week -

Stockport A   V   Marple Manchester League 28/01/14

1 A Smith (206)              0-1               D Fernandez (230)
2A Reeve (200)              0.5- 0.5         A Longson      (227)
3P Cawley (189)             0-1                M Fernandez(187)
4P Siddall  (185)             1-0               S Hegarty      (189)
5S Murray (180)             0-1               I Lentzos       (193)
6M Taylor  (172)            0.5-0.5          G Trueman   (161)
7M Crowther(151)          0-1               P Kirby          (151)

                                         2-5