Disinformator39 - Oxford 4NCL.pdf · Starting top left shows Viktor Korchnoi on 14 December, in action against 20 simultaneously, including our own Mark Hannon in yellow ( right colour

Disinformator 39The Oxford City Chess Club Magazine

December 2009

Disinformator 39 December 2009

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Table of contents

The London Classic, December 2009 2

Editorial 3

Korchnoi Simul – a tale of two GMs – Mark Hannon 4

The Kelly Files and Wedding Belles 5

4 go to Vienna 6

Tables, charts & things … and Legal Beagles 7

Blunderama™ (part I of II) 8-9

The Oxford Leagues in 2009 10-19

Peter Wells … simultaneously 20

The Blues brothers 21

BCF - review of gradings 22

Pop goes the Lawyer 23

Return of the cuckoo 24

news from Wantage 25

Blundermator (Part II of I) 26-27

4NCL updates Tim Dickinson 28

Karlmarxian analysis Karlmarx Rajangam 29

Caption Competition 30

Games 31

Staunton Memorial 41

Last page 42

George Jones R. I. P. The sad news reaches (15 December) of George’s death. In his 80s, and an ever-regular in

my time at the club, George’s life moved from farming (the practical thing) to teaching the

economics of farming (the academic thing) – a move hastened if not enforced by a diagnosis of

diabetes in the 1960s. In later life, he had poor mobility and looked after his infirm wife (who

died in April 2009); often I would see him shopping in Headington, struggling on occasion in

winters. Despite all this, George was a dependable and as-ever-present as his health (and our

transport) allowed. His quickfire style of play intimidate many (including myself) although in

later life this accounted for some Blunderama-style exits. Though he kept to himself at the

chessboard, he was unfailingly polite when approached.

George (2nd left) playing and winning on board 2

against Andrew Robins (Didcot 2) on 9 November (see also page 38)

Cover this time featuring … : centrefold is the tournament hall at the Olympia Conference centre in London, with Michael Adams heading off stage right after nearly giving Magnus Carlsen stage fright. (left features McShane battling to avoid defeat against Ni Hua, and finally succumbing). Starting top left shows Viktor Korchnoi on 14 December, in action against 20 simultaneously, including our own Mark Hannon in yellow (right colour choice there, GM?); some 4NCL end-of-season winner’s strolling as the first team make it to Div 1 in May in Reservoir Dogs style (Mssrs White, Shaw, Smallbone and Ludbrook); and Justin Hadi whipping out Bxh2+ against the GM (well, it works in the Times columns, huh? – although Viktor has rather sneakily delayed castling so this isn’t decisive); some analysis in Yellow Pages mode (“let the fingers do the talking”)

London Chess Classic, December 7 – 15


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Once, when younger and in Ireland, the Pope came a-visiting, and amid scenes of mass excitement played some Mass gigs in various centres throughout the country. Being stubborn at the time, I stayed put and sold some hamburgers to the converted thousands – let them eat shakes, was the attitude. Oddly enough, I became aware almost immediately that I’d missed a major event, and that it wasn’t necessary to have been particularly religious to have attended. Some things you watch – the end of the Berlin Wall, the release of Nelson Mandela – whatever the views from your spectrum – and missing the Pope’s visit was, quite frankly, an error. And going to London seemed, 30 years later to be a necessary (if potentially expensive) form of other pilgrimage. Attending the event in London was a forced, and forcing experience. Watching online was fine, but being there was great. The event ran beautifully – at least for round 6, when I attended. The location was fine, the decoration was even better – for a while there you could almost believe that chess had some connection with a world that includes marketing and promotion – a mainstream event, that is – and things happened in a … tasteful way. The signs at the venue telling us what we could and couldn’t do were polite, and pretty intelligible. People were asked to turn their mobiles off and those whose phones were on “would be asked to leave the auditorium”. Excellent stuff: nowadays I sometimes wonder if the next step will be to dock 150 FIDE rating points, and 3 points on your licence for carrying a camera. In short, in the end, the hype was right, and the tournament played to almost sell-out . Very like the Ashes in 2005, which caught the imagination of those in attendance, and almost quite like the Holy Stone of Clonricherd of Fr Ted fame, which gave Dougal such marvellous sense of serenity (“I got a great buzz off it”). Upwards of one thousand people attended each day at the weekend, split 50:50 between spectators and competitors in the side events that the conference centre amply catered for. (A pity the catering couldn’t cater that well, but no matter: the queuing was pleasant and touch move wasn’t in operation at the stall.) And the chess that day was electric, with fascinating post mortems after Kramnik – Short (1-0) with the Russian showing he’s about 2980 for his computer mousework alone, spattering out variations without (it seemed) any thought with his hands keeping up with his mouth, and Short playing the Ernie Wise to Vladimir’s Eric Morecombe and getting the laughs. The 30 minute knockabout served as the warm-up act to the main post-mortem, the aftermath of the titanic slugfesting that was Carlsen – Adams. Initially a much more cautious affair, as both players sparred for narrative position in near virtual silence (“yes… I’m not sure about f3. PAUSE maybe it is necessary to prepare it in view of Black’s plan. PAUSE) – an entirely different session, which was enlivened by the thoughtful compere-ing of Malcolm Pein which resulted in an absorbing discussion. (Adams, asked why he had chosen 28. … Qxf4 in the diagram – instead of … Bd6 and dxe3 which the commentary room had decided was (and is) winning – it must be, it features in the Times chess quiz – said, simply “I figured Qxf4 won - … I hadn’t anticipated (the strength) of Kf1-e1” as a defensive resource.” Not quite a candidate for Blunderama™, but I suppose the moral here is that when you’re playing someone rated 2800+ one candidate move isn’t enough….

time to reflect in Carlsen – Adams

(½ – ½)

the snapparazzi arrive

the crowd drinks in the wisdom

Carlsen – Adams (B, 28)

Editorial


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Welcome to the 39th step in the Disinformator journals, the magazine which set off on this trek

about 15 years ago without a proofreader, has long since forgotten the difference between a

long sentence and a life sentence, and is now confused as to whether (a) we are reaching the

summit of our ambitions (in which case it’s time to look back with vertigo) or (b) just resting

on the next step of a life sentence (and if so, whether anyone out there can recall any

mitigating circumstances to help in the judicial review).

It’s been a busy year for Oxford chess, and marked by the promotion of Oxford’s first team to

Division 1 of the 4NCL in May, after about 6 years’ effort. The first round of the current season

took place in late October, with Oxford 1 raising a 50% score, while our other teams are

currently in contention for the best placed first-round losers prize. And the second-round

losers prize… which makes it a bit of a shame that there isn’t a prize for either, and that the

4NCL aren’t completely on the ball when it comes to rewarding our frankly dubious turnout and

play in October.

On the personals front, we’ve had one marriage (Aidan / Mel) with Kemal’s in prospect early in

the new year; while Ben is closing on a fatherhood norm to go with any chess norm and the

Disinformator grinding-peppermill opening preps award. Mrs Doyle, who made a fleeting

appearance in Disinformator’s last episode got remarried, so that hopefully clears up the

muddy waters a bit further, and the winner of the Golden Cleric award for 2009 is still up for

grabs.

On the OCA / Oxford City front, news of George Jones’s death reached us only yesterday – a

sad news to report the loss of an old friend and loyal club member. He played his last game

for the club on 9 November, and I remembered thinking he looked a good deal better this year

– having struggled with health problems over the last years of his life. Let us hope that was

the case. We welcome any notes on his life and chess career from those who have known him

over the years – George’s quickfire style and idiosyncratic descriptive script made him a hard

act to decipher…

On the leagues front, the highlights can be found on page 8. The battle for the OCA title has

been thrown wide open with the 3-3 draw that Wantage deservedly achieved against an

underperforming City 1 side that struggled to make it to the club on time without assistance

from the mechanical eye-in-the-sky Tomtom, was shorn of a few regulars, but had plenty of

opportunities to heave over the line – but instead your editor perpetrated some aesthetic and

dubious Blunderama for Disinformator 40, and credit to Wantage for their performance. This

now makes the early New Year clash with Witney, with or without GM assistance in the form of

Peter Wells acting as the pantomime villain in the OCA saga, a must-see occasion. Ho hum –

who will be there to play the dame when the time comes?!

Right, to conclude, some housekeeping and other stuff:

* Kidlington 2010 – see back page, and google for the details…

* The pdf version of the magazine will appear on the Oxford 4NCL site in due course, and

this can be found here: http://oxford4ncl.org/ .

* We also hope to include the games and playthrough facility that Kieran has put there

(“Playformator”) as well as a Pictures section.

So, that’s about it then. Thanks to contributors, however contributed – always welcome.

Sean

92a Church Way

Iffley, Oxford OX4 4EF

Tel: 07811 173268

Email: [email protected] 17 December 2009

London 2009: Viktor Korchnoi simul … our GM-in-residence reports


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Mark: “Amazingly the game I played in the simul vs Korchnoi followed Korchnoi's own game also as black against Geller from Havana 1963 (when I was just born!) till move 11 where Geller won a pretty good attacking game!” Korchnoi,V - Hannon,M [C88] Simultaneous, London , December 14 2009 1.e4 … There goes my preparation .He played d4 on 80% of boards e5 1. … e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6 4.Ba4 Nf6 5.0-0 Be7 6.Re1 b5 7.Bb3 0-0 8.a4 … I knew he was unlikely to allow the Marshall Gambit .

8. … Bb7 9.d3 d6 10.Bd2 … Discourages some lines with Na5 10. … Qd7 11.Nc3 Nd8 12.axb5 … While the Knight blocks the 8th rank 12. … axb5 13.Rxa8 Bxa8 14.d4 exd4 15.Nxd4 c6

Korchnoi stopped and had a good look at the position here 16.Bg5 b4 17.Na4 Qb7? Error – Qc7 is much better, allowing the queen to defend d6

18.Nf5 Ne6 19.Bxe6 … Bxf6 seems clearer . Be6 opens the f file giving Black a chance for counterplay. 19. … fxe6 20.Nxd6 Qa7

Attacking a4 and f2. 21.b3 Bxd6 21... Nd5(!) or Ng4 is superior – with the game continuation the tactics sparkle but fizzle. 22.Qxd6 … Korchnoi said "Very pretty" here but the follow-up of Qxf2+ does not work so Black is busted 22. … h6 23.Qxe6+ Kh7 24.Be3 Qc7 25.Nc5 1-0 note: the printed versions of the magazine had incorrectly quoted 25. Bc5 as the final move.


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The Kelly Files (it’s been quiet on the Kelly front, but where would we be without a regular update?!) Summer Blitz, as reported by Tim Dickinson:

We had a couple of Kelly incidents at our Summer Blitz last night (won by Jochen with 9½ /10):

Case 1: Round 4, Riley v Lai (heard second hand from Heather) Kelly is winning and about to promote a pawn. He has a queen ready but for some reason thinks he has a rook in his hand. Accordingly he dumps the queen on the board upside down, as you would if you were using a rook. Said queen topples over due to the laws of gravity (and bad piece design? No centre of gravity?) and Yi Ming restarts Kelly’s clock, as he should reset the position on his own time. At some point in the ensuing moves Yi Ming’s flag falls but Kelly is still busy trying to mate Yi Ming. Kelly’s flag also falls with no mate on the board, and Yi Ming alertly claims his draw.

Case 2: Round 5, Riley v Matilal, T (witnessed first-hand by the Arbiter) So, it’s game 1 of 2, and Kelly is a piece up with Black. Tamal has a small initiative, but Kelly has the back door firmly shut. There is only one problem: Kelly’s flag is down, Tamal having ~1 minute left. Tamal could claim a win, but is 100% focussed on the position on the board. After a few perfunctory moves, he is obliged to respond to a barrage of checks from Kelly’s roving rook; his king heads up the board to f4, next door to his queen on f5, whereupon Kelly promptly skewers it with Rf3+ (defended by Pe4). “Oh no!” cries Tamal; he pushes the pieces into the middle of the board to signify resignation. Of course, he doesn’t think to check the clock first, just in case. Kelly nods in appreciation, and swiftly picks up the clock to reset it for game 2. Nobody noticed, did they?!

All in all, quite an entertaining evening was had by all, although a little stressful for the Arbiter who had to deal with at least three illegal moves. The last was the most interesting: Stanley v Bowers, game 2 saw Bill set up his pieces at the start with king on d1, queen on e1. During the opening phase, he castled queenside – ie. king to b1, rook to c1. His opponent frowned, then realised what had happened. Arbiter was called over, and I explained (a) it was long past move 3 so they couldn’t restart; (b) 0-0-0 as “played” was illegal – having started with the king on d1, White can’t castle, and therefore (c) Black could claim a win, if he wanted! He duly did, and that was that.

Wedding Bells at the 4NCL ….

There’s been a spate of marriage-related chess activity recently – if by spate we mean two items of news. (This would be a complete spate more than the previous 38 editions have mentioned.) And if you chuck in news that Ben Savage is scheduled to become a father sometime in the Spring that makes it a glut of non-chess events that have a happy sound to them. We’re assuming that Ben did some proper Fritzing of the calendar about 6 months ago to ensure that he’d have ample time to prepare for the next round… similarly warm feelings were mixed with a touch of congrats-but-shame-about-the-timing, as news reaches us that Kemal returns from Germany to be in England for the Saturday of the next round of the 4NCL. Apparently he’s decided to kidnap some key players from the squad to act as wedding guests and/or functionaries… fair enough then.

Meanwhile, Aidan and Mel got married sometime in September, and though invited I couldn’t make it to the Stag session, which was arranged around an anti-French (defence) theme – which given that baiting French Defence addicts is a recurrent theme of the magazine made my non-availability doubly irritating. After paintballing on the Saturday, the party moved to the Richmond one-day tournament, where suitably attired with the I spot that the following game, played at the Richmond one-day tournament and part of the celebrations shows the real spirit of the anti-French (defence) brigade – Black allows White to play the French defence with an extra move, and still gets hockied in 21. Lovely stuff, lads.

Someone should write a quick note to Kamsky about his future choice of openings to let him know about the weaknesses in his current repertoire…

1.e3 g5 2.d4 Nf6

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Smallbone - Healey

Richmond, 13/9/2009 … 0 - 1 (21)

Tournament roundup


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Smallbone,Kieran - Healey,Mike 85th Richmond Rapidplay London ENG (2),13.09.2009 1.e3 g5 2.d4 Nf6 3.h4 gxh4 4.Bd3 d5 5.Rxh4 c5 6.b3 Nc6

7.Bb2 cxd4 8.exd4 e5 9.dxe5 Ne4 10.Nf3 Bb4+ 11.Kf1 Bf5

12.Qe2 Rg8 13.c4 Ng5 14.Bxf5 Nxf3 15.Rf4 Nh2+ 16.Kg1 Qg5

17.Be4 Qxf4 18.cxd5 Ng4 19.g3 Nxf2 20.Bg2 Qxg3 21.Qxf2 Bc5 0–1

Four go to Vienna 1

16 Internationale Wiener Schachmeistersch Vienna http://www.vienna-chess-open.at/ was where it was all at – and here is the off-the-email-cuff report… The post-tournament reflections Kieran Four of us played .

� Kemal scored the most (dur), though Dave made the same score. Matt came along for a weekend of beer. � I fought my little corner against the plane companies and went from Madchester by train. This included a

trip on the Orient Express, which is considerably less glamorous than Hercule Poirot has led me to believe. � Matt fought his little corner for the plane companies and missed his flight back, meaning he had to buy

another ticket. Reason for missing flight: mini-golf. � It was incredibly centrally-Europeany hot. � Beers started at 6% proof, leading to the aforementioned fuzzy memories. � In the final round, I played the worst move I've ever played in response to the worst move my opponent has

ever played. I'd been analysing what to do against ...Bd5 so decided to "transpose". � I've got some photos somewhere. Matt has Vienna videos :s

Kemal My main memories � The spectacular playing hall. Very plush. 2 mins walk from the venue � The international festival of food which just happened to be taking place � Chris' olive oil and balsamic vinegar concoction. Never had it before or since, but very nice. Also: salami. � Feeling very smug that I'd trapped a GM's knight, until he played the 1-move refutation. (I haven't kept my

games I'm afraid, perhaps they're on the website) � Getting mortally wrecked in Grinsing, and the subsequent hangover. � Arguing with the barmaid about how much wine we'd already paid for. � "Das kann nicht sein!" � hearing Brummie accents on the underground cos the Villa were playing there � Aretha Franklin � Dave being sick cos of the stench from the bins (sorry Dave) � PPS I feel I should point out that Villa beat Man U today. � PS Matt, where are the vids!?

Dave � Jagermeister!!! � I did ok in the chess. Until I blundered my queen on move 40. � Oz also threw me into a car. Apparently I deserved it... ;-) � And as for the football, happy early wedding present. *****

Matt Apparently, Matt has the videos – Ed.

1 Timmy the Dog wasn’t allowed through owing to restrictions on travel to and from the continent. Shame

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Smallbone (B), to move

Tables and charts and things 2009 (as cut & pasted on 16 Dec 09)


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Black and White to play on, and on,

and on…

Legal Beagles A lot of chess players (and cricketers) tend to get through their games (and lives) without actually learning the rules of the games they play. And a lot of the arbiters (and umpires) we slag off from time to time just happen to be those exceptional players who actually know the rules – or can take the time to find out what they are. What makes things additionally complex is that few people seem to know both what the rules say and how they are to be applied (except, possibly, Tim Dickinson)2. So, this edition we kick off with a you-are-the-armchair arbiter series with this query which was referred to our resident Legal Beagle, Simon King by George Spalding. The problem is stated succinctly below and its resolution appears on page 23.

Problem: “Thanks for the offer to resolve this dispute, the facts of which are quite straightforward to recite. I will not specify who was White and who was Black to leave you as a completely honest broker, which I am sure you would be anyway. 1. The last pawn disappeared from the board, leaving each player with king plus rook alone,

during Black's last 5 minutes 2. The players continued the game, while Black's clock ran down to zero, no draw offers being

made or claimed during this time period 3. Black's clock fell 4. White then claimed a win, on time. 5. Black then claimed a draw, on the grounds that K+R v K+R cannot be won, or was an obvious

draw (Note - I take it that no rook skewer was available at any time during the period leading to a trivial win, as this has not been mentioned. ) Let me know if this is insufficient information for you to make a decision 2 This sort of things happens often in real legal circles, particularly when the law gets reported – as

followers of the trial in Italy of those accused of the murder of Madeleine Kercher may be suspecting.

Disinformator™ goes to pieces … the diagrammatic blunderama


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Burt – Riley (W) Frank Wood Shield, 2009

Sparkes – Moyse (W) Chilterns, Nov 2008

Brooke – Birch (W) Chilterns, Nov 2008

Of all the dumb traps in all of the back bars… OK, here’s an easy one to start us off with. What is obviously the way to go … down … after Will slides out the innocuous 6.Bc4?

This one has a nice Freudian feel to it: After White first plays the innocuous 9.Kh1, it’s Black to play and lose.

With the crowd gathering around, and the gladiatorial loins being girded, it’s once again White to play and lose .

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Holmes - Matilal (W) OCA div 2, Feb 2009

Godfrey – Toll OCA div 2, Mar 2009 (W)

Anna Wang – A. N. Other (B) World u-something Champs, 2009

From Wantage, a case of White to play and not to win .

On move 11, a problem for those of a Holmesian disposition: how did White ever reach this position?

Depending on taste, this could be Black to play and win , or Black to play and lose ,

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Anon – Riley (B)

Oxford tourney 2009 Horton - Hernandez (W)

Benasques, July 2009 Lang - Rajangam (B) OCA div 2, Nov 2009

The pursuit of negative perfection continues with Kelly pointing the way towards the cutting edge. It’s Black to play and lose instantly.

For those of you in search of more subtle pleasures of self-immolation, try this one : White to play and start to lose in one

Here we’re about to take a short break but after 29.Bxd8 it’s Black to play and lose the thread

Disinformator™ goes to pieces … the diagrammatic blunderama


9

1. Burt – Riley (W), Frank Wood Shield, 2009 went 6. Bc4 Nf6? 7. Ne5 … which doesn’t force the win of the pawn (Black can play … Be6) but is part of the Burt Method™ here. Another part of the BM™ is that he’d spent part of the weekend before playing the rejuvenated Kelly in a different variation of the Caro-Kann, before reverting to his usual gambit style on the night.

2. Sparkes – Moyse (W) Chilterns, Nov 2008. Here although the game has a long way to go Nigel lost a pawn after 9 … Ng4? 10. Nxd4 – and whether intended or not, White’s last move allowed that trap tactic to be playable. But that doesn’t seem likely, does it?

3. Brooke – Birch (W) Chilterns, Nov 2008. Any game that starts 1. f4 g5; 2. d3 deserves a fitting end, and here Ian kindly waited until we were all gathered around, before fighting shy of sacrificing his queen (Qxe3) and instead sacrifices his king: 1.Rxd8 Nc2+ 2.Kb1 Na3+ 3.Ka1 Qb1+ 4.Rxb1 Nc2#

4. Holmes - Matilal (W) OCA div 2, Feb 2009. Here, a game with great gusto and joie de vivre sees White amass a regiment of assorted pieces for the queen, and in the position Fritz assesses this as +14 or thereabouts, recommending Rb1. Instead play continued 34. Bf5 and a draw was agreed, and according to George “I think he is winning in the final position, but if I recall correctly, he agreed a draw to secure Wantage 2 the match.” So maybe not so much Blunderama as good team play, although after any move by White Fritz announces a mate, the longest of which seems to be twelve….34. … Qe5 35.Rb8! is cute … b5 36.Rb1 b4 37.Rc8 Ka4 38.Rxc5 K a3 loses the queen without even attacking it.

5. Godfrey – Toll. I have no idea how this position was reached – maybe Dave could let us in on the secret of highly original middle-game starting positions?! – but this is how it ended: 11.Nc3 0–0–0 12.Nh3 Bc5+ 13.Kf3 Rd2 14.Rac1 g5 15.g4 h5 16.Kg2 h xg4 17.Nxg5 Rxf2+ 18.Kg3 Rfxh2 19.Rxh2 Bd6+ 20.Kg2 Rxh2+ 21.Kg1 g3 22.Nce4 Bf4 23.Re1 Rxc2 24.Nf3 Ng4 0–1

6. Anna Wang at the World Championships… : Black to play could win with … Rxe4, but fortunately for the home crowd she decided on the other way which was 1. … Rxc2; 2. Nf6+ with a mate in 5 to follow (although in fact there is a mate in 3). Thanks to Will for this

7. Anon – Riley , as reported by Tim Dickinson in an email I can’t quite locate, Black found the quickest way to end the game: 1. … Kg6?; 2. Kg8 and resigned promptly and with a grace that was noted in the aforementioned lost email. 1-0 Later in the year, Kelly recited a game from memory in the Mitre while drinking orange juice, while his latest language preparation is Portuguese. Is this love, we wonder … ?

8. Horton – Hernandez – is reported on 21 July 2009 on the Streatham & Brixton blog - http://streathambrixtonchess.blogspot.com/ - and asks “can you detect Black’s threat”? One move after playing f4+, Justin forgot about that and play continued 1. h3? Rxe4+ with the fairly inevitable result.

9. Lang – Rajangam – is analysed more fully elsewhere by the winner, and Karlmarx threatened to write the notes from the loser’s seat after 29. … Qxd8? 30.Rxd5 dxc2 31.Rxd8+ Rxd8 when that c-pawn is not really a problem. Join us after the break though…

Banbury (left) – City 1 John Yates - Stephen Morris , Mar 2009 Scenes of the crime – Georg has just played the fatal … Ng4 on his board, while John has adopted the stoic

stance, but John is a half-move away: 13. Bf2 Nf6?; 14. Nxe5

The Oxford Leagues in 2009 … the review to Christmas


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5 October – Cowley chess club

Cowley 1 2½ City 1 3 ½

A good start for the reigning champions, and a mildly deserved

win, with Sean Terry’s more-than-slightly fortunate win being

cancelled by Mike March’s time-affected loss to Dave Robson. To

date, the OCA haven’t been called in to discuss the small matter

away players of leafing through club Informators (right) during

playing time, although (frankly) this magazine takes a stern view.

Two matches in the Cowley club, the other featuring a lot of young

girls beating up a crowd of old men – though I can’t find the formal

match score of the latter match on the website.

The Apocrapha

on open show in Cowley

Following a summer which, if it was noteworthy for anything of a chess nature was usually something that could be found on the internet – the British Championship at Plymouth, and Richard Palliser’s storming performances there spring to mind – City’s first team defence of their OCA title started at Cowley on 5 October. The pre-season gossip was that Witney had secured the services of Peter Wells GM for their top board on their return to Division 1, and a largely imaginary tussle (we suspected) was taking place over securing the services of Duane Rowe – the Jamaican board 1 – with City being a little too disorganised to organise a proper bid, and Cowley having to act with the heroic restraint of the patient broker. Notwithstanding the occasional appearance of Jamaica’s top man at the Donnington Arms, my experience from the cricket arena is that many Jamaicans live their life on Kingston time, with a Dublinesque sense of punctuality. And so for the first match, while Cowley weren’t able to unfurl this particular team-selection TN, they did have a newcomer on board 1. So, arriving with about 5 minutes before the default would have been claimed to square up against Marcus Clifford on board 5, the Board 1 clash between Matt Rose and Jason McAteer was already approaching the middle game, and by about move 16 Matt had a slight pull in a dour Modern Defence where nothing interesting was going to happen quickly. Our full-team complement was achieved with a few minutes to spare when Jon Manley took his place on board 2 against Ray Starkie , with resident magazine GM Hannon taking on Will Burt in what turned into a tactical slugfest which will probably adorn the pages of the Cowley magazine in due course before ending in a draw. Lower boards featured the usual suspects for the most part, although many of us will not have seen Clifford Marcus for 15 years. As there was another match in progress in the room (Cowley 2 – Cowley Workers) the crowd had to squeeze in by the wall, but none of the lower boards (right) seemed to complain. Board 3 was where the first tactical boil was reached, with Will and Mark discussing the finer points of the Albin countergambit, and agreeing a draw a few moves after the pawn was retrieved by black. And with Clifford Marcus taking some time to work out how best to deal with 1. h3, there was time to take in the other boards, and Board 1 was the pick of them.

The crowd are transfixed by Robson – March …



11

Faith, Hope, but not much Charity…

Cowley working against the workers

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Rose - McAteer

and this is the long-n-dour manoeuvring position mentioned earlier in the report, where I spent some time wondering whether e2 or e3 was the right square for the attacked rook, while wondering at the patience of chess players in positions like this: no obvious attack, few weaknesses in the enemy defence, and every prospect of an long period of calculated defence. Then Matt played: 17.Rh5 The crowd cheered a little at this (in fairness) candidate move, although not one you expect to see on board one, so early in the season. (That said, most of the crowd were penned in by board 6 so order was quickly restored.) The plan is simple and consists in hacking through to mate on the king-side, with the help of some accurate calculation of course. 17...gxh5 This needs to be played if it's sound, as otherwise ... Nf6; 18. Qh6+ Kh8; 19. Re5 allows the white queen to invade. 18.Qg5+ Kh8 19.Qh6

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The critical position; at the time I thought Ng5 was trivially winning but subsequent analysis at the Prince of Wales, to where 50% of the crowd went afterwards (the rest went to the cheap pub in Cowley, presumably leaving at the crossroads wondering at inability of 10 chessplayers to agree a post-match watering hole) shows that although the h7 pawn falls, there's no need to take it (allowing mate), and it's not easy to finangle the queen in to a mating position. 19...f5? This loses the queen and with it the game. Matt was a bit miffed at missing the defensive power of ... Nf8! which threatens Qxd4 or Qd6, both of which hold. A variation by Fritz is ... 19...Nf8 20.Bxh7 Qd6 21.Bg6+ Kg8 22.Bxf7+ Kxf7 23.Qxh5+ Kg8 24.Qxe8 when 24...Qg6 trades off queens leaving a B for 3 pawns ending. Instead White marches on to victory. 20.Ng5 Nf6 21.Nf7+ Kg8 22.Nxd8 Rxd8 23.Bc4+ Nd5 24.Re1 Rd6 25.Qg5+ Rg6 26.Bxd5+ cxd5 27.Qxe7 1–0

With Jon Manley winning on board 2, this left us needing a point from the last three boards – which prospect receded with Jon D’Souza Eva’s win on board 4, and Mike’s loss on time on bottom board. In our game Marcus found himself a pawn up in the ending but faltered under time pressure, blundered the pawn back and the game quickly became untenable – so the match went to the visitors.



12

31 October – MCS

Oxford u-190 WIN BUCKS

If anything happened between 5-31 October, the whole of

Oxfordshire chess is keeping quiet about it – maybe the details are

to be found in a time capsule disguised as an advent calendar? In

any event as I relaxed by the poolside, the 4NCL proceedings were

renewed on 23-24 October, but to conclude October we resumed

battle in the annual Ian Brooke crusade to conquer, subdue and

subjugate the otherwise good folks of Hants, Berks, Bucks and

other outlying districts of the south-east. Will’s birthday was

recognised in a liquid throat-polishing exercise at the A&G.

The order of play

GM attention for the troublesome birthday child as Marcus steams through another French Defence

(careful, son)

Maria Wang – winning all the way, til the final move

And an entertaining afternoon’s play it turned out to be, with Kelly Riley returning to active service duty in the role of resident GM kibitzer and first substitute in the event of one of the elderly taking a bullet in the trench warfare that is the Chilterns League. A strong Cowley contingent took over the top four boards – Mssrs McKenna, Burt, Nixon and d’Souza Eva – with Will on board 2 following his hike up the ratings to the largely deserved but heady heights of 189 BCF. (A report on the shenaniga… re-structuring of the BCF grades to take grade inflation into account is elsewhere.) And they were needed as, facing them in the jousting lists, with all their silverware polished and in position, were Mssrs Smith, Bonavent, de Coverley and James – and not a single knight parfait amongst them willing to split the point and share a early cup of tea. And in the end I think we won, fairly comfortably. My notes of the evening were slightly diluted by the beers Will and I had at the A&G, which once the restraining influence of Mike March had left declared open throat season for ageing middle-aged drinkers. On the top boards, a cautious draw on board 1 was mirrored by the D’Sousa-Eva – James effort on board 4, but with some mutually shared violence on the intervening boards: Will’s smart win features in the games section, while Rod Nixon got de-Coverley-ed after some stubborn resistance. I managed to win a game after my opponent made too easily with his king’s position, and played my first style move of the season (right) – clearly a bishop here with a mind of his own, and intent on a bit of Sci Fi, though its intention (to induce a weakness or win a pawn) might have been tested as a simply 18. Be2 would force its retreat, as the bishop gets trapped on b2). On the board adjoining mine, Maria Wang was winning comfortably on the queen-side which forced some hacking play on the other by Dave Turner, and she showed considerable calmness and careful selection in deciding which of the offered material to nab. Until, a few moves after the time control she missed a trivial threat … trivial, but mating.

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Hawkins – Terry 17 … Bc1



13

2 November – home at the club

City 1 4 Didcot 1 2

A quiet night at the club, and a match where the

visitors played well to get results on three boards,

but not enough to secure a point.

Dave Scott returned to active service duty after a year away during which time he’s become a father – well done that man and woman. The season's fashion choices in the white-player Sicilian seems to be between the Morra and 2. c3 - and if this turns out to represent the seasonal trend, it's going to be a long winter for the annotators. Still, we live and hope - and wait to see what happens next .. … and here Black's play seems to have segued the opening back to a French defence of sorts, and he heads for the White king with:

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Alcock - Scott

16...Nxe5 17.dxe5 Qa4+ 18.Ke1 Nc4 Diagram

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White can continue to look to exploit his extra piece with Bd2 or Qd4, but preferred the early shake of the hands after:

19.bxa5 Qxa5+ 20.Kd1 Qa4+ ½–½ On top board Matt faced the same variation and preferred to keep the position open with the extra pawn. Here, and continuing the play-style-moves-along-the-h file motif that has characterised his season to date (his 4NCL victory in October is well worth a play-through) he continues

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12...Nxg3 13.hxg3 g4 14.Nh2 h5 15.Nf1 h4! 16.Qxg4 Ne5 which opens the h-file and spells danger, which duly resulted in a win which features in full at the back.

On the lower boards the points were shared after our stand-in player (John Luke) lost quickly while I added to the Blunderama™ archives before resorting to a McShane, discussed further on page 24 but summarises as countless waiting moves while waiting for a thought to crystallise, only collecting the point 30 moves later than perhaps necessary. An odd feature of the bottom boards was that John didn’t take down moves at all (“I’m only making up numbers”) while my opponent stopped taking moves down as soon as I reached about 5 minutes left.

With Matt Brown winning after yet another openings blunder, the win was secured.



14


City 2 4½ Bicester 1 1½

City 3 3 Didcot 2 3 With the first team taking a night off, the tide of outright blunders slowed to a trickle, leaving a lot more intricate play to savour from the 2s and 3s. Drama for City 3 as time-trouble induces a last-minute error from Phil V, to concede a draw.

Top boards : Lee, Rajangam, Hayward

Matt Rose and myself arrived for these matches, but too late to make any sense of the top boards of the City 2s, where Simon Lazarus was extracting a signature from Tony Lee, and Karlmarx Rajangam was forced to extract chessboard blood from Marcus Harvey, who takes some convincing that a resignation is sometimes better than til-the-death resistance. (Can’t blame him.) The main drama came from the middle boards, for which places the visitors had provided a father-n-son brace of Becketts, and drama ensued. First, on board 3, let’s look at Beckett, Daniel – Hayward , and as we join proceedings, Fritz hasn't quite reached for the black cap to help him pronounce the sentence on White, but it's getting close and humid for Daniel about here. With Black to play we get to :

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23...Bf6 Black hopes to embarrass the Rc1, although ... c4 or ... Qd4+ are alternatives that might have led to more simple play at this time limit. 24.Ne3 Bg5 25.c3! R4b7 26.Qf2 Rd7 27.Ng4 Qg7? 28.f4! Bh6 Diagram

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and White has now reached a position where the assessment is +1.00 or thereabouts − but will he be able to re−adjust his thinking frame? 29.Nxh6+?

Alas not - ... Ne5 was worth a twirl and quite embarrassing given Black’s earlier dominance. 29...Qxh6 30.Qxc5?? and here Rd1 was necessary 30...Rd2 31.Qxc6 Qxf4 32.Qc5 Qg3 0–1 Yates - Richard Beckett is an absorbing play in about 3 Acts, with John pushing all game for an advantage (see games), Richard agreeing a draw in what looks like a won position (see Blunderama) with this Act 2 sandwiched in between. Here, after White has been probing for about 10 moves, Black retreats a Knight to aid the defence, and: 29.Re1

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29...Nc6 threatening the first shot on target in quite a while, so John chooses to block a threat with a pin. 30.Rc3 Rxd4 ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. It takes a practiced eye to see what John really thought − which probably would amount to what Jochen Wittmann would have said right now ....

No room for mention of Peter McLeod’s excellent win on board 3 to secure the draw for his team: see games section.



15

16 November – FW Shield: home at the club

City 1 3½ Cowley Workers 1½

City 2 6 Oxford 4 0

City 3 0 Cowley 1 6 With the full house testing out all the Fire & Safety

regulations, Oxford 2 & 3 get the results that were

expected, while Oxford 1 return to the Blunderama

board for more entertainment…

Drama in the back room … Yes, as we end the first decade of the 3rd millennium, one which has stubbornly failed to live up to its naughty lifestyle and so hopefully lost the soubriquet the media tried to give it, the firsts are looking to see it out in Blunderful style. In a close match against Banbury, the first to go west on the Blunderama train was Georgs Vikanis, who found himself in difficulties against the in-house GM and already in the diagram position he's having a few problems defending the f-pawn after an uncertain brand of Dutch defence.

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Hannon GM - Vikanis 11...Ng4 which falls foul of ... 12.d6 Bxg2; 13.dxe7 Qxe7 when it's really time to get off the train and wait for his team mates, but then again it’s a long wait at 7.50pm, so … 14.Kxg2 c5 15.Nf3 Nc7 16.Bf4 Ne8 17.Qd5+ after which the rook goes for a walk. 1–0

Meanwhile I was building up quite a head of steam although in the cool light of day it turns out to be a metaphor of a different nature involving steam that comes to mind. Once again I've played 1. h3 and reached a vaguely playable position, although as Matt Brown worked out, the queen-side fianchetto adopted by my opponent isn’t perhaps its sternest test. Anyway, looking at this position below I'm fairly sure that I've got a bit of initiative here. The only problem in the diagram position is that the natural Nb5 loses the e-pawn and the question is whether this is worth it. I think on balance it is...

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Terry - Martin

before deciding on balance that it might be better to “prepare” it... and playing 8.Bd3 cxd4 - d'oh. Rather trivially I'm losing a pawn, and 15 ignominious later, the game.

The jury however have decided to keep the most sparkling champagne until the end − where Mike in the diagram pops the cork and out flows ...

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Manley (Nathan) – March 10...Nge7? 11.Bxb5! ah - all mayhem breaks lose if the white knight gets to b5, so Mike grovels with... 11...Ng6 12.Bxc6+ Bxc6 13.Bg3 after which he's still in a pickle. 0–1 to his credit Mike gradually works his way back into the game before missing the winning continuation with 2 minutes left, not accepting a draw with 15 seconds left, and losing about 45 seconds later.



16

21 November – Chilterns @ Wellington Coll

Oxford LOSE to Berkshire (8-12 ish)

After an initially bright start, our bright sparks were

extinguished in the friendly fire of negative tactics.

Plenty of interest though in the woods near Sandhurst

A late substitution in Wager - Harvey

The moment has passed in Ballard - King , while (right) Majid concentrates in his game against Neil Staples , with

Wellington looking away from the scene of Sparkes - Moyse

Our Glorious Leader™: an unusual beginning matched up with an

inglorious end…

With the 20 boards being generously distributed into two rooms of Wellington College, it was harder than normal to keep an eye on proceedings, although the top nine boards would have appreciated the spatial advantage they quickly demonstrated over the remaining 11 boards. The magazine editorial staff found a pleasant table from which to note the passing of the day, and the provision of biscuits and sandwiches was an additional positive which allowed us decide it had been worthwhile getting out of bed that morning.

First to feature was an odd error by Nigel Moyse on board 4, noted elsewhere, and while Lucy was putting the final touches on a draw offer, coffee was being doled out in the backroom. Nick Hepworth was taken out by a passing stray bullet on board 10 or so; Rod Nixon was languidly trading Siclian theory in the centre of the room with a younger opponent, while Neil Staples was subjecting Majid (who plays for Berks) to the cold-water torture that is the double fianchetto with lots of one-square pawn moves thrown in. My own game was going languidly. In short, something had to give: it was too quiet out there. Ian was providing the outer room with its fun, with this opening sorties being well worth the diagram:

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with the continuation 2...gxf4 3.Bxf4 d6 4.c3 Bg7 5.e4 Nf6 6.Be2 Nbd7 7.Bf3 c6 8.Nd2 Rg8 9.Nb3 Qc7 10.Ne2 Nf8 11.Ned4 c5 12.Nf5 , but my own game was reaching the point where it needed some analytic attention so I missed the next 20 moves. (And no doubt Ian missed a few of them also…) And around about here, Simon King appears bearing a point of order: “I have just checked my opponent and he has responded by castling queenside. Is this legal?” – somewhat reminiscent of Korchnoi’s query in the 1970s about castling long over a b1/8 square that is covered by opposition guns. Having got three people to agree that this wasn’t a legal option, the

Brooke - Ballard



17

matter was resolved at the table. Here’s the position, in case the chess police want to take it further…

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10...0−0−0 (N)

On the top boards we seemed to be holding our own, although this impression – partly created by not factoring in this year’s BCF grade inflation, which makes me think that people are suddenly stronger than before – wasn’t to last for long.

My own ending was pleasing, although trust Fritz to spoil it all in the real analysis:

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Henderson - Terry (W)

I'd reached this ending courtesy a style move earlier (Kh6 - g6, rather than capturing on g5), and felt fairly smug about this. White is threatening to push the a-pawn and protect it with Ra6 if necessary. This seemed good enough for my opponent and play continued... 35.Ra8 Kh5 36.Rxa7 Kxh4 37.g6 Kg5 38.Ra8 Kxg6 39.Rd8 Kf5 40.Kf2 Ke4 41.Re8+ Kd3 42.Rg8 Kxc4 43.Rxg7 Kxd5 0–1

So far, so good, and this set up a few pints in the Donnington Arms later with Simon and Will. But feed this to Fritz later, and the giant German grub isn’t in the least bit impressed, he thinks the position is equals-ish. 35.Kf2 a5 and in this line 36.Kf3 a4 37.Kg4 a3 38.h5+ Kf7 39.g6+ Ke7 40.h6! Diagram

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White has the better of the draw by perpetual check. Another dark day for the human grey cells... but interesting to see how quickly those pawns race to promote… But the wins were ultimately too few and far between to threaten a result on the day. Near the end we needed 2.5 / 3 to get something but ended up getting null points… with this ending on board 5 the most interesting. Rod had previously been doing well enough, but his sacrifice of the exchange to get his pawns moving (though looking convincing) ended up as being only worth a draw, with best play. Which didn’t quite happen.

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Nixon - Holland (W) 43.Rxe5 fxe5 44.Ba4 Kh5 45.d7 Rg8+ 46.Kh1 Rgg2 47.d8Q Rh2+ 48.Kg1 Rdg2+ 49.Kf1 e2+ 50.Ke1 Rg1+ 51.Kd2 e1Q+ 52.Kd3 Qe2+ 53.Kc3 Rh3+ 0-1



18


City 1 3½ Univ 1 2½

City 4 2 Witney 3 4

City 1 continue their winning ways in a match that was

close and where the draw was on the cards until Matt

Brown squeezed a win in a Sicilian ending. City 4

continued their ways in the opposite direction, this loss

being the 3rd home 2-4 loss.

peace on board 6, battle on the rest Arriving on time, but 20 or so minutes later than the scheduled start, might soon mean that the game is conceded (if you believe FIDE) - but here this lack of punctuality aided team selection as a squad of 6 + 1 had assembled, which left me in the roving reporter’s role. Both teams seemed reasonably strong – City having a top-boards superiority in rating - while the appearance of East European surnames in the team sheet almost made this one-night affair into a category XIV event: their Pozimski was balancing out our Ljubic.

While Matt on board 1 had already written himself onto the year-end Blunderama board by this stage, and was getting into hotter water than he had anticipated against Mike Healey, on board 6 things had reached an unusual climax: 17...d5

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March - Lai

and with White to move, he seems comfortably a pawn to the good, subject to any Burt-like kingside outrages involving Ng4, B or Rxf5 and so on. Play continued: 18.Ne6 Rf7 if [18...Bxe6 19.fxe6 white may be losing the e6 pawn but Black has difficulties defending b7, d5, etc. After say 19...b6 20.h3 Rae8 it's an interesting balance between developed pieces, knights against bishops, and pawn islands against each other... But it was clear that neither side had a clear evaluation of the position] 19.Ng5? Here Fritz suggests Nc7 which more or less forces Black to sacrifice the exchange 19...Rf8 20.Ne6 ½–½ Matt was still under visual pressure when Jon Manley’s clear plus began to emerge.

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Manley – Pozimski Black seems to have got the worst of out the Sicilian here, with a sluggish and slightly backward pawn centre, and while those c-pawns may look part of a bulky centre, these appearances are subject to change. Meanwhile, White's last move (Na4) has converted Black's Bd4 into the object of tactical assault: 14.e5! dxe5 15.c3 e4 16.dxe4 Bg7 and with the pawns now isolated, Jon took his time to win round up the c-pawns, followed by perhaps a little more care than was needed to win about 40 moves later.

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Scott − Schaper



19

This was the game of the Great Thinks, where having got to this position fairly rapidly, each side then took about 40 minutes on their next move: 14...Rab8 15.Nd2 b5 16.Qc2

Dave beats a tactical retreat and while this seems sensible (taking the pawn when it reaches b5 seems quite risky), Black does now have the option of Nb4 and Bf5 which creates some pressure. By now though the game was almost in its blitz phase, with less than 15 mins each for the rest of the game, and a draw was announced about 20 moves later... 16...c4 17.Nde4 Nxe4 18.Nxe4 Rxe4 19.Qxe4 Bf5 20.Qf3 Re8 21.0-0 Nb4 22.Rfd1 Be4 23.Qg3 Nxd5 24.Bf3 Bxf3 25.Qxf3 Nb4 26.a4 Nd3 27.axb5 Nxb2 &c.

Probably the best game of the night was on board 3, where Ivan gradually turned the screw on Graham’s closed Sicilian, stopping en route to allow this graphic picture of Total Chess to emerge on his third rank:

which with the addition of some neat tactics soon became a winning +3 advantage – with the added

bonus for the spectators of some mutual time trouble to see us through to the end of play.

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Morris - Ljubic

Unfortunately for the home side, this allowed Graham show how adept he is at flashing out moves in a hopeless position, and in this case converting the proverbial pig’s ear of a position into a … well, more sweetly smelling pig’s ear. 28...fxe4 29.Bxe4 e5 30.Bd5+ Kg7 31.Rxe5 Bc8 32.Rae1 Rg4 33.Re7+ Kf6 34.Rf7+ 1-0 All of which left the scores tied with just Yu − Brown to finish, and Matt duly converted this ending:

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Yu - Brown

33.Rxd5 Bxd5 34.f4 Ke7 35.Kd2 Ke6 36.Ke3 Kf5 37.Ne5 f6 38.gxf6 gxf6 etc 1–0 , leaving the great debate (the one I remember, that is) in the Vicky Arms later that night the question of whether you’d prefer to defend this ending as White with a pair of rooks on the board, or without.

Personally I’m all for keeping hold of the rooks: pawn endings such as the one that featured in McShane - Howell (London, 2009) as early as move 24 are fine for GMs, but for the lesser mortals they are simply an invitation to flip a coin to decide the result. From the other match, no detail that sticks in the memory. Did the optimistic Tamal reject a draw when he could have taken one? Wins for Martin Jones (2) and Paul Wood (6) couldn’t cancel out the losses on boards 3-5 – you can see John Rowlinson’s head a-thinking right… And with this, it’s time to head out with the Bandaid number … “so this is Christmas…”

Peter Wells … simultaneously


20

Tamal … last man standing (sitting)

As probably mentioned earlier in the mag, Witney CC – at one time in the 1990s the top end engine of Oxfordshire chess – are, after a brief break during which they’ve broken up, re-formed and re-freshed themselves as many times as a 1970s rock band… but this time around they’ve made it to Division 1 and, with the help of Peter Wells, hope to topple the stranglehold which those absolute baddies at Oxford City chess club had on the Division 1 league.

(If that sounded a bit like Alan announcing the winner of King of the Sheep competition in Fr Ted – apologies)

Anyway, one of the compensations for the chess implications raised by that last paragraph is that Witney are back, have a base of youth playing chess, and arranged a two-night evening with Peter Wells. On the second night (7 Dec) he gave a lecture featuring some of his better games, and, perhaps against his ideal wishes – a review of the opening phases of Palliser – Wells from the last UK championship. Two weeks earlier, he had soundly thrashed most of the 23 people who had come in search of glory. His final score (+20, =2, -1) was achieved in about 3 enjoyable hours and about 2 cups of coffee – supplied by a chess mum and widow (Mrs Truran?), with beer in the excellent Strickland Arms in Ducklington.

Dave Hackett (win), Derek Edwards and Anco van Velsen (draws) who went home with some points in the bag, and we expect any day now for the game scores to appear in some form on the OCA site. (Or: send them to me, Mike.)

Meantime, here’s Tamal’s game with Peter, which starts off a little later than the others as Tamal arrived after Peter had completed 10 or so full rounds. The first move ten moves are part of the book that Tamal sent me on the Barcza Larsen, and were played in Bohm – Johansen (Amsterdam 1983, 1-0, 24). After Black varies with 10. Nb6 (… b6 had been the preferred choice previously), play takes an unusual turn with Black’s rook wandering out to a5, and when on move 17 Black loses a piece, it seems all up – but the GM misses a trick (19. g4?, when instead of which Fritz suggests the not immediately noticeable 19. Qb1! And if 19… Qxc3 Re3 traps the queen.) and ends up almost immediately handing back not only material, but position.

Faced with a dodgy position after 20 … Rxd5! Peter sacrifices his queen for bits and though he’s still losing on the board, Tamal has a technical conversion issue and with the number of opponents dwindling, and consequently a lot less time to think things through. With a possible draw on the cards, 39. Kf3 Qc3+, Tamal blunders into the one-move mate that was lurking around waiting for an accident to happen. A shame!

“and this is how to play at Redcar… “

The 1.5 / 2 part of the shop: Dave & Anco

Wells,Peter - Matilal,Tamal [A43 ] Simul @ Witney, 23.11.2009

1.e4 e6 2.d4 c5 3.d5 exd5 4.exd5 d6 5.ºb5+ âd7 6.âf3 ºe7 7.0-0 âgf6 8.¼e1 a6 9.ºf1 0-0 10.a4 âb6

11.âc3 ºg4 12.h3 ºh5 13.ºf4 ¼c8 14.ºd3 c4 15.ºf5 ¼c5 16.ºe3 ¼a5 17.ºxb6 Qxb6 18.¼xe7 Qxb2 19.g4 Qxc3 20.gxh5 ¼xd5

21.¼e3 ¼xd1+ 22.¼xd1 Qa5 23.âd4 g6 24.hxg6 hxg6 25.¼g3 âh5 26.¼g4 ¾h7 27.¼g5 ¾h6 28.h4 Qd8 29.ºe4 âf6 30.ºxb7 Qb6

31.ºf3 ¼d8 32.a5 Qb2 33.¾g2 d5 34.¾g3 Qc3 35.¾f4 âh5+ 36.ºxh5 gxh5 37.âf5+ ¾h7 38.¼dg1 Qd2+ 39.¾f3 ¾h8 40.¼xh5+ 1-0

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17 (W)

The Blues brothers …


21

-------------------- Re: Chess Varsity 14th March Greetings from sunny Scotland! I'm off to Cancun to morrow for two weeks to party my ass off with drunk American chicks. ☺ But I hope you will thoroughly enjoy this altogether more cerebral form of entertainmen t. PS: You can't let the Tabs win, no matter what thei r inflated ratings say. -------------------- And so it came to pass – Ed. �� + +�+�+� ��+�� +�+�+� �+�+��"�+� !�+�+�+�+# $+)+�+*+"% &"�"��+Q�""+' (+�+�+�-.�/ 0123456789

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Bicknell – Pinter (25, B) Tyomkyn – Healey (24, B) Chen – Robertson (23, W) White to worm his way into things Find the sexy continuation Watch out, this one is a street fight

For reasons I’ve not bothered analysing til now I’ve never made it to the Pell Mell club in the middle of London for the annual 8-a-side chug-a-lug drinkathon with a touch of chess on the side, and held this year on a Saturday in mid-March, and perhaps the starting point is the fact that it’s only recently that the rules have been relaxed so as to let foreigners (ie, non-Univ players) attend. A second feature might be what prevents me from playing golf at anything other than public courses: the dress code, while the clinching feature is that while many know that I’m not a morning person, I’m an even worse mid-afternoon drinker, so that friendly invitations to spectate have usually been declined. However, the appearance of the above message on Facebook has, however, made me re-consider my future plans – if only to find out whether the parties in Cancun were in fact ass-worthy and whether there were any implications for that writer’s future opening repertoire – assuming I ever remember their name. In the meantime, the under-rated Oxonians beat the over-flated Tabs and four games stood out (3 here, 1 in games) and the lot in Playformator™.

Bicknell,Carl - Pinter,G (2355) [B22] 127th Varsity Match London ENG (1), 14.03.2009 1.e4 c5 2.c3 âf6 3.e5 âd5 4.ºc4 âb6 5.ºb3 g6 6.d4 cxd4

7.cxd4 ºg7 8.âf3 0-0 9.h3 d6 10.Qe2 âc6 11.0-0 âa5 12.ºc2 ºe6

13.¼d1 ¼c8 14.âa3 âac4 15.âxc4 ºxc4 16.ºd3 ºxd3 17.¼xd3 âd5 18.¼b3 ¼c7

19.ºd2 Qd7 20.¼c1 ¼xc1+ 21.ºxc1 ¼c8 22.ºd2 b6 23.âg5 dxe5 24.dxe5 Qf5

25.âf3 Qb1+ 26.¾h2 Qxa2 27.¼a3 Qxb2 28.¼xa7 ¼d8 29.e6 f5

30.Qc4 ºe5+ 31.g3 b5 32.Qc6 âf6 33.¼xe7 âe4 34.¼e8+ 1-0

Tyomkyn,M (2055) - Healey,M (2016) [A25] 127th Varsity Match London ENG (1), 14.03.2009 1.c4 e5 2.g3 âf6 3.ºg2 âc6 4.âc3 ºc5 5.e3 Qe7 6.âge2 e4 7.d4 exd3 8.Qxd3 âe5

9.Qc2 âxc4 10.0-0 âe5 11.âb5 d6 12.b4 ºb6 13.a4 a6 14.âbd4 0-0 15.ºb2 c6

16.¼fd1 d5 17.b5 axb5 18.axb5 ºg4 19.bxc6 ºxd4 20.¼xa8 ¼xa8 21.cxb7 Qxb7 22.ºxd4 âf3+

23.¾h1 âe4 24.âg1 Qb3 25.¼c1 âe1 26.ºxe4 âxc2 27.ºxc2 Qc4 28.ºxh7+ ¾xh7 29.¼xc4 dxc4

30.¾g2 ¼a3 31.f3 ¼a2+ 32.¾f1 ºd7 33.âe2 ºc6 34.e4 f5 35.exf5 ºxf3 36.âf4 ¼xh2

37.âe6 ºg4 38.âxg7 ¾g8 39.f6 ¾f7 40.¾e1 ¼e2+ 41.¾f1 ¼c2 42.¾e1 c3 43.ºe5 ¼e2+ 0-1

Chen Ti - Robertson,Stuart [D14] 127th Varsity Match London ENG (1), 14.03.2009 1.d4 d5 2.c4 c6 3.âc3 âf6 4.cxd5 cxd5 5.ºf4 âc6 6.âf3 ºf5 7.e3 e6 8.ºb5 âd7

9.0-0 ¼c8 10.âe2 h6 11.¼c1 g5 12.ºe5 f6 13.ºg3 ºe7 14.ºd3 ºg4 15.ºg6+ ¾f8 16.âc3 ¾g7

17.ºb1 f5 18.h3 ºh5 19.âb5 âf6 20.Qa4 a6 21.âc3 ºxf3 22.gxf3 âh5 23.Qd1 ºd6

24.ºe5+ âf6 25.f4 gxf4 26.exf4 ¾f7 27.¾h1 ¼g8 28.¼g1 Qe7 29.¼g3 ¼cf8 30.Qf3 ¼xg3

31.fxg3 ¼g8 32.¼g1 ¾e8 33.¼e1 ¾d7 34.âa4 ºxe5 35.dxe5 Qb4 36.Qe3 âh5 37.âc5+ ¾e7

38.âd3 Qe4+ 39.¾h2 âd4 40.Qxe4 fxe4 41.¼c1 exd3 42.ºxd3 ¼xg3 43.ºh7 âf3+ 44.¾h1 âxf4 0-1

BCF – the review of the gradings review - email from Simon King


22

Dear all As many of you may know, the ECF has undertaken a c omplete revision of player gradings, to correct distortions that have accumula ted over recent decades. The mathematics underlying both these distortions and t he formula for correcting them is quite complex, and can be found on the ECF website. Basically, it means that the grades for lower grade d players are increased (the lower the grade, the greater the increase) while th ose for the top players remain pretty much unchanged. I set out the new grades below. You can find them y ourself by clicking on the reference code preceding the player's name on ECF c lub listings.

Player Old Grade

New Grade

Old Rapid

New Rapid

Wei Sin Tan 209 209 Matt Rose 208 202 191 201 Jon Manley 198 197 194 201 Gerhard Heide 186 193 Graham Chapman 166 177 Sean Terry 163 175 Tony Lee 163 175 Phil Vainker 156 166 Matt Brown 154 165 Mike March 152 164 Bernard Rawlings 135 155 Simon King 134 153 127 153 Matt Leigh 134 147 Karl Biswas 133 151 Dave Godfrey 133 149 John Yates 130 155 122 150 George Jones 128 146 Peter McLeod 119 145 Ian Brooke 116 143 82 115 Lucy Smith 116 137 122 157 Adrian Riley 112 138 96 130 Tim King 110 129 Zaid Marham 109 133 Tony Heslop 98 128 107 138 John Rowlinson 97 128 Martin Jones 92 124 Tamal Matilal 84 114 72 113 Mark Creasey 83 117 Agustin Rodriguez 61 92

Club members may view these changes with mixed feel ings. John Rowlinson, for instance, who has announced that he will stop playi ng chess when his age going up meets his grade going down, now faces the disagr eeable target of 128. Whereas I, on the other hand, seem to have achieved a lifet ime goal of breaking the 150 barrier, at least for the few summer weeks until th e new ratings come out, without having had to win more than two games this season! IMPORTANT NOTE: these are NOT next season's grades, they are the revised grades for the season just ended, to which players' result s will be applied in the usual way to generate next season's grades. These s hould appear some time in July or August, and I will notify you when they app ear.

Pop goes the lawyer… Simon King adjudicates


23

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Black and White to play on, and on,

and on…

(contd from page 7)

Dear George Thanks for this. The Laws of Chess seem to me to provide the unambiguous answer, that Black loses on time. My reasoning is as follows.

1. Article 5.1 lists two conditions under which a game is won or lost (a) checkmate (b) resignation. This is clearly not exhaustive, as it does not mention expiry of time limit on the clock, which is dealt with in Article 6

2. Article 5.2 lists five conditions (also not stated to be exhaustive)

under which the game is drawn (a) stalemate (b) 'dead position', meaning impossibility of checkmate by any series of legal moves (c) agreement of players (d) threefold repetition of position (e) the 50-move rule.#

3. Article 6.10 states as follows: "Except where Article 5.1 or one of the Articles 5.2 (a), (b) or (c) apply, if

a player does not complete the prescribed number of moves in the allotted time, the game is lost by the player. However the game is drawn, if the position is such that the opponent cannot checkmate the player's king by any possible series of legal moves, even with the most unskilled counterplay" (my underlining).

4. To my mind, the underlined phrase is decisive against Black in this dispute. It makes clear that a

"dead position" (e.g. K+N v K) is not the same as "dead even position" such as K+R v K+R, because of the condition of unlimited ineptitude. There are countless ways in which is would be possible to lose a K+R v K+R endgame. Black's contention that such an endgame "cannot be won" is simply false, given the condition of unlimited ineptitude imposed by Article 6.10.

I therefore conclude that Black loses on time. Best wishes Simon

0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0- Postscript. Our staff at HQ thought we’d encourage another post-publication email from Tim Dickinson so to ensure this eventuality we sent a follow-up query: That seems clear enough all right - though if one of the players were extremely young (say) and there were circumstances suggesting undue influence so as to make it hard to make a draw offer, this might need a re-think? Well, the Laws of Chess are 'common law' in content, and seem to be silent about the 'equity law' side of things, relating to age, experience etc, which materially affect the "balance of negotiating power", important though this may be to a truly just outcome. The matter is only touched upon in the Preface, which includes this passage on how the Laws should be applied: "The Laws assume that arbiters have the necessary competence, sound judgement and absolute objectivity. Too detailed a rule might deprive te arbiter of his freedom of judgement and thus prevent him from finding the solution to a problem dictated by fairness, logic and special factors". My feeling is, however, that the Laws are designed to define a player's rights, and that when these are clearly expressed, as they are in Art.6.10, then an arbiter should not be allowed to derogate from them according to private notions of fair play etc. What the Preface is aiming at is to explain why the rules are not over-precise, rather than provide a discretionary basis for ignoring them when they are precise. As for the 'extreme youth' problem, I think that a sensitive education into realities is probably preferable to a protective defence against them.

I suspect it might be a good idea to encapsulate this dispute into a practice note, for inclusion in the next mag. Some readers might benefit: Kelly, for instance, frequently asserts "this is a drawn game" with great emphasis (oblivious of the fact that he is just about to convert it into a lost one), as if the fact of equality was a sufficient basis for claiming a draw.

Return of the cuckoo… - in disguise


24

Reading the Times coverage a few days back I found this game spread-eagled over the content with the nod of approval from RD Keene to the effect that this marathon was an object illustration of how to squeeze a win from a small advantage. That wasn’t quite the idea I had, when online – stop wasting time and do something, were the thoughts emanating from mag HQ.

On reflection, this might be a little unfair. It’s clear the contestants were in fact re-enacting, from moves 25-70, a character from the Fr Ted series: Chris, the unhappy sheep, who looks exactly the same every time you look at her, but you convince yourself something must be different…. But if you can make it through the 163 moves without checking your pulse… … there’s a job for you on a different magazine.

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25...Nf4 26.Rd2 g6 27.Bg3 Nh5 28.Bh2 Ng7 29.Bg3 Nh5 30.Bh2 Ng7 31.Re1 Rb8 32.Rdd1 Rba8 33.Rd2 Rb8 34.Ra1 Rba8 35.Rc1

35...Rb8 36.Bg3 Nh5 37.Bh2 Ng7 38.Rg1 Rh8 39.Rf1 Rh7 40.Rd3 Rh8 41.Rdd1 Ne6 42.Rh1 Ng7 43.Rhe1 Rha8 44.Bg1 Ne6 45.Rd2

35...Rb8 36.Bg3 Nh5 37.Bh2 Ng7 38.Rg1 Rh8 39.Rf1 Rh7 40.Rd3 Rh8 41.Rdd1 Ne6 42.Rh1 Ng7 43.Rhe1 Rha8 44.Bg1 Ne6 45.Rd2

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55...Kf7 56.Rd5 Bf8 57.Rdd1 Bg7 58.Rh1 Raa8 59.Rh2 Ra6 60.Rdh1 Raa8 61.h4 gxh4 62.Rxh4 Rxh4 63.Rxh4 Ra7 64.Rh1 Ra8 65.Bf2

65...Nf8 66.Be1 Ra7 67.Bd2 Ne6 68.Bc1 Ra8 69.Bd2 Rd8 70.Bc1 Re8 71.Rh4 Ra8 72.Kd3 Ra6 73.g3 Nf8 74.f4 Nd7 75.Rh2

65...Nf8 66.Be1 Ra7 67.Bd2 Ne6 68.Bc1 Ra8 69.Bd2 Rd8 70.Bc1 Re8 71.Rh4 Ra8 72.Kd3 Ra6 73.g3 Nf8 74.f4 Nd7 75.Rh2

McShane,L - Short,N [C45] London (1), 08.12.2009 1.e4 e5

2.âf3 âc6

3.d4 exd4

4.âxd4 ºc5

5.âxc6 Qf6

6.Qf3 bxc6

7.âc3 d6

8.Qg3 Qg6

9.ºd3 a5

10.ºd2 âf6

11.f3 ºa6

12.âe2 âd7

13.ºxa6 ¼xa6

14.Qxg6 hxg6

15.âf4 ºd4

16.âd3 c5

17.c3 ºf6

18.0-0-0 a4

19.¾c2 g5

20.h3 ºe7

21.âf2 âf8

22.âg4 âe6

23.âe3 f6

24.âc4 ¾f7

25.ºe1 âf4

26.¼d2 g6

27.ºg3 âh5

28.ºh2 âg7

29.ºg3 âh5

30.ºh2 âg7

31.¼e1 ¼b8

32.¼dd1 ¼ba8

33.¼d2 ¼b8

34.¼a1 ¼ba8

35.¼c1 ¼b8

36.ºg3 âh5

37.ºh2 âg7

38.¼g1 ¼h8

39.¼f1 ¼h7

40.¼d3 ¼h8

41.¼dd1 âe6

42.¼h1 âg7

43.¼he1 ¼ha8

44.ºg1 âe6

45.¼d2 ¼h8

46.ºe3 ºf8

47.¼h1 ºg7

48.¼d5 ¾e7

49.¼h2 ¼aa8

50.¼h1 ¼a6

51.¼d2 ¼aa8

52.¼e1 ¼a6

53.ºf2 ¼aa8

54.ºg3 ¼a6

55.âe3 ¾f7

56.¼d5 ºf8

57.¼dd1 ºg7

58.¼h1 ¼aa8

59.¼h2 ¼a6

60.¼dh1 ¼aa8

61.h4 gxh4

62.¼xh4 ¼xh4

63.¼xh4 ¼a7

64.¼h1 ¼a8

65.ºf2 âf8

66.ºe1 ¼a7

67.ºd2 âe6

68.ºc1 ¼a8

69.ºd2 ¼d8

70.ºc1 ¼e8

71.¼h4 ¼a8

72.¾d3 ¼a6

73.g3 âf8

74.f4 âd7

75.¼h2 ¼a7

76.ºd2 ¼b7

77.ºe1 ºf8

78.g4 ¾g7

79.ºg3 c6

80.f5 g5

81.¼d2 âb6

82.¾e2 ¼d7

83.b3 d5

84.c4 axb3

85.axb3 dxe4

86.¼xd7+ âxd7

87.ºc7 ¾f7

88.âd1 ¾e8

89.âc3 ºe7

90.âxe4 ºd8

91.âd6+ ¾e7

92.âc8+ ¾e8

93.âd6+ ¾e7

94.âc8+ ¾e8

95.ºg3 âb6

96.âd6+ ¾f8

97.âb7 ¾e8

98.âxc5 ºe7

99.âe4 ¾d8

100.ºe1 âd7

101.ºc3 c5

102.ºb2 ¾e8

103.¾f2 ¾d8

104.¾g2 ¾e8

105.¾h3 ¾f7

106.¾g3 ¾e8

107.ºc3 ¾d8

108.¾h3 ¾c7

109.ºb2 ¾c6

110.âc3 âb6

111.¾g3 ºd8

112.¾f3 ºe7

113.¾e3 ºd8

114.¾d3 ºe7

115.¾e4 ºd8

116.âd5 âd7

117.ºc3 ¾d6

118.ºe1 ¾c6

119.ºg3 âf8

120.¾d3 âd7

121.¾c2 âf8

122.ºe1 âd7

123.ºg3 âf8

124.¾b2 âd7

125.¾a3 ºa5

126.âe7+ ¾b6

127.ºd6 ¾a6

128.âd5 ºd8

129.ºg3 ºa5

130.¾a4 ºd2

131.ºc7 ºc1

132.ºd8 ºb2

133.b4 ºd4

134.b5+ ¾b7

135.¾b3 ºe5

136.¾c2 ºd4

137.¾b3 ºe5

138.ºe7 ºd4

139.ºd6 ºf2

140.¾c2 ¾a7

141.¾d3 ¾b7

142.¾e4 ºd4

143.ºe7 ºe5

144.âe3 ºf4

145.âg2 ºg3

146.¾d5 ºf2

147.¾e6 âe5

148.ºxf6 âxc4

149.ºxg5 âa3

150.f6 ºd4

151.f7 ºg7

152.ºf6 ºf8

153.ºe7 ºg7

154.ºxc5 âxb5

155.f8½âc7+

156.¾f7 ºxf8

157.ºxf8 ¾c6

158.âf4 ¾d7

159.g5 âb5

160.g6 âd4

161.g7 âf5

162.g8½âh6+

163.ºxh6 1-0

News from Wantage…


25

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George Spalding’s annual reports from the wilds of Wantage are a feature of the Disinformator year, when a mixture of stats, commentary, anecdote and games lands hits the email box and gets filed away for future use. By the time this note appears the games have long been played, but this year’s crop of brevities are nice and hot, some sprightly play and some sharp finishing from positions not suggesting the danger signs: � Piggott – Trewhela sees White break through in 23 moves after an

innocuous 12 moves. After 12. Qe2 Qb7 does protect the pawn but doesn’t quite prevent the avalanche…

� In Morris – Marlow , which Fritz sees as basically equal, Black has

the two bishops and perhaps because of this White hides in the corner with 20. Kh1. Mate lands on his desk a mere 5 moves later.

� Marlow – Bush may be a two-parter: is the pawn on b2 poisoned?

If not, why not? � Piggott – Slater is a standard grand Prix attack, and when Black

fails to answer, it’s about mate in 8 from there on in.

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Piggott – Slater (B, 9) Roley Piggott being watched by John Place playing Sean Terry (Mar 09)

Marlow – Bush (B, 17)

Piggott,R - Trewhela,P [C78] OCA 2008, 13.11.2008 1.e4 e5 2.âf3 âc6 3.ºb5 a6 4.ºa4 âf6 5.0-0 b5 6.ºb3 d6 7.d4 exd4 8.a4 ºg4 9.axb5 axb5 10.¼xa8 Qxa8 11.Qd3 ºxf3 12.Qxf3 âe5 13.Qe2 Qb7 14.f4 âed7 15.e5 âe4 16.e6 âdc5 17.exf7+ ¾d8 18.âd2 âxb3 19.âxe4 âxc1 20.¼xc1 ºe7 21.âg5 ºxg5 22.¼e1 Qc6 23.fxg5 Qd7 24.Qf3 1-0

Morris,Stephen - Marlow,Mike [E98] Wantage cl ch, 02.12.2008 1.d4 âf6 2.c4 g6 3.âc3 ºg7 4.e4 d6 5.âf3 0-0 6.ºe2 e5 7.0-0 âc6 8.d5 âe7 9.âe1 âe8 10.f4 exf4 11.ºxf4 f5 12.ºg5 âf6 13.ºd3 fxe4 14.ºxf6 ¼xf6 15.¼xf6 ºxf6 16.ºxe4 âf5 17.âf3 Qe7 18.Qd3 Qg7 19.¼d1 ºd7 20.¾h1 Qh6 21.¼e1 ¼e8 22.Qd2 âg3+ 23.¾g1 Qxd2 24.âxd2 ºd4+ 0-1

Marlow,Mike - Bush,Martin [C11] Wantage cl ch, 19.02.2009 1e4 e6 2.âc3 d5 3.âf3 âf6 4.e5 âfd7 5.d4 c5 6.dxc5 ºxc5 7.ºd3 âc6 8.Qe2 a6 9.0-0 âd4 10.âxd4 ºxd4 11.ºf4 g5 12.ºg3 h5 13.h3 g4 14.h4 ºc5 15.Qe1 ºe7 16.f4 Qb6+ 17.ºf2 Qxb2 18.a3 ºc5 19.âa4 ºxf2+ 20.Qxf2 1-0

Piggott,Roley - Slater,George [B07] OCA 2008, 09.02.2009 1.e4 d6 2.f4 âf6 3.âc3 g6 4.âf3 ºg7 5.ºc4 0-0 6.0-0 c5 7.d3 âc6 8.Qe1 a6 9.f5 âd7 10.fxg6 hxg6 11.âg5 ºf6 12.Qh4 ºxg5 13.ºxg5 Qe8 14.âd5 âde5 15.âf6+ exf6 16.ºxf6 1-0

Blundermator™ 2009 – the post ad madness


26

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Lang - Rajangam (B) OCA div 2, Nov 2009

Brown – Jacobs (B) OCA 1, Nov 2009

King - Ashford (W) OCA, 2008

Welcome back to the Formula 1 equivalent of the pits, and here we’re just in time for a bit of chess dis-purity: White to play and lose

Here, it’s Black to play and develop a little too casually for Fritz’s tastes (although Kelly might well disagree) with … Bg7

Here, it’s time to admire the sheer artistry of this composed ending: White to play and self-mate in 5 (OK, so it starts Rxe6, Raf8)

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Healey - Rose (B) OCA div 1, Dec 2009

Yates - Beckett OCA div 2, Nov 2009 (W)

Jakovenko - Grischuk World Championship 2009 (B)

After 8 … b6, which part of the crowd started cheering – Univ or City?

Life in the old dog yet as play continues: 42.Rf6? Qc5? 43.Kh2 Qxe5+ 44.Rg3+ ½–½ ? Psychoanalysis to follow.

Learn (what) from the Grandmasters. 61...Rd4 62.Rg3+ Kf1 63.Ke3 Rd5 64.Bf2 1–0

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Jobava - Grischuk (W) World Cup, 29 Nov 09

Max Meessen - Smallbone– Vienna (2009)

Cox – Healey Uxbridge (2009)

More instructional video (“I see … ”) from the GM world: 13.Qxb7 Nc5 14.Qc6 Rc8

15.Qb5 Rb8 16.Qc6 Rb6 0–1

Should Black , to play, keep his bishop – and if so, how!?

So it’s white to play and decide the fate of the game…

Blundermator™ © 2009 … post ad madness…


27

Part 2 answers… Lang - Rajangam (B), OCA div 2, Nov 2009. And here White went on a 0-1 crash course with 32.Nd4 Rxd4 33.cxd4 Bxd4+. Ho hum, at least this was a free lesson. Brown – Jacobs (B) OCA 1, Nov 2009. … Bg7 was met with Bxf7 + King - Ashford (W), OCA, 2008. Another donation from the Wantage yearbook this one shows all the lines being cleared in impressive fashion by Simon King – the only marginal drawback here is that the idea is to open the lines to the opponent’s king. 26.Rxe6 Raf8 27.hxg6+ Rxg6 28.Nf5 Ng4 29.Rxg6 Qh2# 0-1 ahhh Healey - Rose (B), OCA div 1, Dec 2009. … b6 was indeed a blunder, and could have been punished quite severely by 9. e5! when the following variation, though indicative, isn’t that far off the mark: 9.e5 dxe5 10.Bf3 e4 11.Nxe4 Nd5 12.Qxd5 Qxd5 13.Nf6+ Bxf6 14.Bxd5 Yates – Beckett, OCA div 2, Nov 2009 (W) – another of the classic rescues of a position by John – as the countdown clock counts down, the game concludes 42.Rf6 Qc5 [instead 42...Qe1+ 43.Kh2 Qxe5+ 44.Rg3+ Kh5 45.Rf7 is minus 4.91] 43.Kh2 [43.Rxb3 Qxe5 44.Rb4+ Kh5 45.g4+ Kh4 46.Rh6# is about plus 5.94 – the mating line quoted here isn’t necessarily forced] 43...Qxe5+ 44.Rg3+ and with the pendulum now swept again in the direction of a minus 5.50, a draw is agreed and we went back to the studio for a BBC weather storm warning ½–½ In Meessen – Smallbone , played at the Vienna Rathaus in August this year – and, not unlike Fr Beeching (“God, I love saying Mass”) – we can’t help thinking there’s an impressive ring to the sound of that particular tournament (16 Internationale Wiener Scachmeistersch). How posh to be writing about it into the magazine … Kieran took the view that the bishop was essential to his future plans – or maybe the bishop was one of those prelates that like Sci Fi ?! – as play continued: 24...Bb5 (sic) 25.c4 (sic) Nxe5 26.dxe5 Qxc4 27.Qxc4 Bxc4 28.Bxe4 ½–½. Whether and when the contestants will be charged with bringing the tournament into disrepute is as yet unclear. Healey - Cox features Mike in action against the eventual tournament winner and IM, John Cox, and after slugging it this far, he provides part of the reason his opponent eventually won the tournament. He writes: 40.Kc2?? My time was now sinking away as I fretted over seeing ghost mates after 40.Kd4, the winning move. Thinking the IM had foreseen all of this during his earlier thinking I conceded the material and hoped my rooks would still win me the game. Neither of us seemed interested in a draw at this point. [¹40.Kd4 Qf2+ 41.Kc3 Qe3+ 42.Qd3 Qe5+ 43.Kb3+-] 40...Rf2+-+ 41.Qd2 Rxd2+ 42.Kxd2 Qxg5+. Unfortunately white is lost. 0-1, 55

Footnote . The reader may notice that I have managed to find 18 game positions without managing to include one of my own, and wonder why this is. I have two theories to explain their absence: 1. What with the advance of that large unwieldy clock called Old

Father Time, I find I’m playing a brand of chess where nothing much happens until the point after which something interesting can in fact happen. Indeed I often whether the noise coming from Fritz in the later phases of one of these games isn’t in fact that sound of a gentle German snore.

2. This is not to say that I don’t blunder, just that the sort of

blunders I make register more of a sigh, than a shudder – think asthma attack rather than Krakatoa – on the Fritz analysis machine. Just so the reader gets the drift, here’s a model illustration from last January, where, with a Fritz advantage of +1.5 the puzzle is “Black to continue playing and lose in about 45 moves, dribblingly.

Next year I’ll be writing a lot more on Buckaroo …

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Ti Chen – Terry

(B)

4NCL updates … (are available on the team’s site)


28

An alert Tim Dickinson writes in … from your web report3 ... “... in a game not yet appearing on the site.” My cue, I think. They haven’t yet put up the late finishers from D1 round 2 – presumably the inputter left early. I dropped a pawn early for the second day running, and this time spent some 5 hours trying unsuccessfully to get it back:

Lewis,Andrew - Dickinson,Tim [D37]

3 http://oxford4ncl.org/articles/51.htm

1.c4 If you’ve looked at the Atticus photos, you can see that I was in centre of shot (photographer: Claire Summerscale) waiting for his first move, but the captioner focussed for some reason(?!) on Sophie. Humph. I knew he’d open 1. c4 as he’s always done, but I still wasted a good five minutes deciding how to reply. Memo to self: get a decent anti-English, and soon! 1...e6 2.Nc3 d5 3.d4 Nf6 4.Nf3 Be7 5.Bf4 0–0 6.e3 c5 7.dxc5 Bxc5 8.Qc2 Nc6 9.a3 Diagram

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9...a5? Idiot. It took me 13 moves on Saturday to chuck a pawn, only nine moves on Sunday. This looked so natural ... but ... 10.Rd1! Ouch. The d5 pawn is gone already (funny how I lost a pawn on the same square both days), and in the ensuing moves I even almost lose a piece. I think 14. e4 might have seen me offload queen & pawn for rook & bishop – nowhere near enough compo. 10...Re8 11.cxd5 exd5 12.Nxd5 Nxd5 13.Qxc5 Be6 14.Bc4 Nce7 15.Bb5 Qc8 16.Qxc8 Rexc8 17.Be5 f6 18.Bd4 a4 Diagram

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He plays the rest of the game in very controlled fashion: I don’t get a sniff of a chance, and he doesn’t chuck the pawn back like Ellen did on Saturday!19.0–0 Ra5 20.Be2 Nc6 21.Rc1 Nde7 22.Bb6 Raa8 23.e4 Na5 24.Rxc8+ Nxc8 25.Bxa5 Rxa5 26.Nd4 Bf7

27.Rc1 Nd6 28.f3 Ra8 (again!) 29.Kf2 Re8 30.Nb5 Nc8 31.Rc7 b6 Diagram

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I was on the verge of resigning around here. It looked awful – the queenside is virtually indefensible and my pieces are sooo unco-ordinated – but we might have needed a miracle draw to win the match, so I soldiered on. 32.Rb7 f5 33.Nc3 fxe4 34.Nxe4 Bd5 35.Rb8 Bc6 I entertained hopes of a win here. Maybe he’d let me walk the king to c7 and trap the rook? Nah, no such luck. 36.Ba6 Nd6 37.Rxe8+ Nxe8 38.Ke3 Kf7 39.Ng5+ Kg6 40.Ne6 Kf6 The match had clarified by now. Aidan had reached his winning ending, after mutual piece-drops, and we were 3.5-2.5 ahead. I didn’t therefore need to draw this ... so long as Aidan won his game. To my relief, he did – by move ~43 in our game. I’ll admit I took my eye off the ball after that, I am sure pushing g5/h5 wasn’t a good idea. I would have paid rather more attention if we had desperately needed the draw. 41.Nd4 Bd7 42.Bb5 (almost winning the a4 pawn) 42...Ke7 43.Kd3 Nc7 44.Bxd7 Kxd7 45.Kc4 g5 46.g3 h5 47.Nb5 Na6 48.Nc3 Kc6 (hanging on to a4 but losing the whole kingside) 49.Ne4 g4 50.fxg4 hxg4 51.Nf6 Nc5 52.Nxg4 b5+ 53.Kd4 Nb3+ 54.Ke5 Nc1 (no, I’ve no idea where the knight is going either) 55.Nf2 OK, here I thought it was game over, everyone else from both teams had long since gone home. Resign now. Then I thought, no, why not try one last punt? 55...b4?! This is absolute tosh, and he can do just about anything he wants here. For some reason he went in the tank for a full ten minutes or more! Maybe I had him worried? Nah ... he kept full control ... 56.g4 bxa3 57.bxa3 Kd7 58.Ne4 Ke7 59.Nc5 Nb3 60.Nxa4 Nd2 61.Nb6 Nf3+ 62.Kf4 Nxh2 63.Nd5+ Kd6 64.Ne3 Humph. My poor knight is stuck, will have to sac itself for g4, and he will definitely play Nc2 to defend his last pawn from the back – or, if he’s feeling flamboyant, Nf1–d2-b1. Some 30 moves and at least two hours overdue, I resigned. 1–0

Bonsoir

Karlmarxian analysis … Karlmarx Rajangam writes…


29

Lang,Heather − Rajangam,Karlmarx [B26] OCA2 2009 − cowley, 26.10.2009

1.e4 c5 2.Nc3 d6 3.g3 g6 4.Bg2 Bg7 5.d3 Nc6 6.Be3 Nf6 7.f4? This over ambitious move gives black the initiative 7...Ng4 8.Bd2 Bd4 9.Nh3 h5 Diagram

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Preparing for 10... e6,11...Be3 and 12...Nd4 10.Qc1! a6 11.Ne2 Qb6 12.c3 Bg7 13.Ng5 f6 Preparing for 14... e5 −/+. White is in trouble with lack of piece co−ordination as well with nearly 30 mins more on clock compared to black, at this stage 14.Nf3 e5 15.h3 Nh6 16.Nh4 Ne7 Defending g6 as well preparing for d5 break 17.0-0 Be6 18.Be3 Qc7 Diagram

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With possible attack on g3 pawn later, although 18... Qc6 looks better to me 19.Qd2 It is clear white is preparing for either d4 or b4. So... 19...0-0-0 20.b4 c4 21.d4 d5 22.fxe5 fxe5 23.Qc2 dxe4 24.Qxe4 Bd5 25.Qc2 Nhf5 26.Bg5 Diagram

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26...exd4 I think this gives black a decisive advantage 27.Nxf5 Nxf5 28.Rxf5 Bold move trying to complicate thing. But white also got into time trouble at this stage, had just about 3 mins left on clock, while I enjoyed about 25 mins 28...d3 I think nothing can stop that pawn from queening soon 29.Bxd8 Qxd8 Diagram

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A miscalculation from my side. I know taking that bishop with rook is clearly winning for black, eg: 29... Rd8 30.Q~ ef4 31.Nf4 Bg2 32.Kg2 Qe5 33.Rc1 Bh6 etc. But taking into white's time pressure and a miscalculation that exchanging queen gives the win sooner, I played the text provoking... 30.Rxd5 dxc2 31.Rxd8+ Rxd8 =. White cannot hold the extra piece and has to give it up soon] 32.Nd4?? Time pressure blunder. What I originally (mis)calculated was something like this: 32.Kf2? Bh6! 33.Ke1 (33.Be5 Rd1 34. Nc1 Bc1 −/+) Bd2+ 34.K~ Rf8+ 35.Kg1 Be3+ etc. But I completely missed 32.Rc1!, when I played 29... Qd8. But still, there are some interesting possibilities exist here, like 32.Rc1! Rd2 (32...Rd1+? 33.Kf2 Rc1 34.Nc1 Bh6 35.Be5 Bc1 36.Bc2 (36.Bg6? Be3+!) g4 leads to draw) 33.Kf2 Bh6 34.Be5 Re2+ 35.Ke2 Bc1 36.Bc2 (36.Bg6? Bb2!) g4= 32...Rxd4 33.cxd4 Bxd4+ 0-1

Caption competition … the usual rules


30

In a pub after beating Wantage to retain the Div 1 title

Spotted at the Staunton in Simpsons in August …

So, we’ve just won Div 2 and a cool few quidlets…

4NCL May, and the editor reflects on past glories

Games …. Disinformator™ 39


31

Burt,Will - Nixon,Rod [B72] Oxford Quickplay, 08.11.2009 And where better to start than with this monster of a Dragon from the small-but-perfectly-vicious Open section of the OU quickplay at Lincoln, and featuring Will as the Dragon slayer and the recently-returned-to-chess Rod Nixon, one time 1970s dragon master on the 1970s Leinster circuit. Each side misses a way to win before Rod misses a drawing+ combination just before the arrival of Will’s second knight on f5 causes a permanent dampening of the dragon’s fire. I’d tell you more, but it’s Christmas. But Matt’s article in the Oxford Times tells all. 1.e4 c5 2.âf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.âxd4 âf6 5.âc3 g6 6.ºe2 ºg7 7.ºe3 0-0

8.Qd2 a6 9.f3 âc6 10.âb3 Qc7 11.ºh6 âe5 12.h4 ºe6 13.h5 âxh5

14.ºxg7 ¾xg7 15.g4 âf6 16.Qh6+ ¾g8 17.0-0-0 ¼fc8 18.âd4 Qa5 19.âf5 ºxf5

20.âd5 ºxe4 21.âxe7+ ¾h8 22.fxe4 âc4 23.âf5 gxf5 24.Qxf6+ ¾g8 25.¼xh7 1-0

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#13 (W)

Burt,Will - Riley,Kelly [B15] FW shield, 16.11.2009 The alert reader will have noticed the earlier appearance of this game in Blunderama ™, and its inclusion after a subsequent loss of a piece is only to admire the technique with which Will’s two bishops mate the opposite king – the sort of activity that Fr Ted’s bishops seem to be engaging in quite regularly – so no doubt he picked up a few tips from them en passant … - then again, it’s helpful when trying to mate with two bishops to have a Knight and an armful of extra pawns in the background 1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.âc3 dxe4 4.f3 exf3 5.âxf3 ºg4 6.ºc4 âf6 7.âe5 Qc8 8.ºxf7+ ¾d8 9.Qd2 âbd7 10.ºb3 âxe5 11.dxe5+ âd7 12.e6 Qc7

13.0-0 Qd6 14.Qxd6 exd6 15.exd7 ¾xd7 16.¼f7+ ¾c8 17.ºg5 ºh5 18.ºe6+ ¾b8 19.¼d7 a6 20.ºe3 c5 21.b4 ºe8 22.¼d8+ ¾a7 23.¼xa8+ ¾xa8 24.âd5 ºc6

25.¼b1 ¾a7 26.c4 b6 27.¼f1 ºe8 28.a4 g6 29.a5 bxa5 30.bxc5 dxc5 31.¼xf8 ¼xf8 32.ºxc5+ ¾b7 33.ºxf8 a4 34.h4 ¾c6 35.g4 ¾b7 36.g5 ºc6

37.ºa3 ¾b8 38.¾f2 ¾b7 39.¾e3 ºe8 40.¾d4 a5 41.¾c5 ºc6 42.¾d6 ºe8 43.âe7 ¾b6 44.ºc5+ ¾b7 45.ºd5+ ¾a6 46.¾c7 a3 47.ºb7# 1-0

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#27 (B)

Burt,Will - Norman,Ken [C33] Chilterns - Berks, 21.11.2009 And this, to conclude the initial excursion in the Burt Files, is a loss on top board from the match played in Wellington College against the blokes from Berks – and featuring quite a messy collection of pieces on the king-side in the diagram position. When Black turns down the opportunity to pick up a piece on move 17, the resulting ending is slightly in favour of White (who misses 23. Nb5) but the scales are reversed when Will’s exchange sacrifice is met with the charge of the two rooks, which mop up efficiently and with tactical precision. 1.e4 e5 2.f4 exf4 3.ºc4 âe7 4.âc3 âg6 5.d4 d6 6.âf3 ºe6 7.d5 ºg4 8.0-0 ºe7 9.ºd2 0-0 10.ºe2 ºxf3 11.¼xf3 ºf6

12.¼h3 âd7 13.ºg4 âde5 14.ºf5 h6 15.Qh5 ºg5 16.¼f1 âh4 17.ºxf4 âxf5 18.exf5 ºxf4 19.¼xf4 Qg5 20.Qxg5 hxg5 21.¼b4 b6 22.âe4 f6

23.¼c3 ¼ac8 24.âg3 ¼fe8 25.¼e4 ¾f7 26.âe2 g6 27.¼a4 a5 28.fxg6+ ¾xg6 29.âd4 âd7 30.¼ac4 âc5 31.âe6 b5 32.¼xc5 dxc5

33.¼xc5 c6 34.âd4 cxd5 35.¼xb5 ¼c4 36.¼xd5 ¼e1+ 37.¾f2 ¼d1 38.¾e3 ¼xc2 39.¼xa5 ¼xb2 40.h4 ¼xg2 41.hxg5 ¼xg5 42.¼a8 ¼e5+ 0-1

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#17 (W)



32

Ljubic,Ivan - Truran,Mike [A81 ] OCA 2 - Witney, 05.03.2009 Editors are supposed to know something about which they write – although in fairness would we be in the midst of our 39th step if that were truly the case? - but parts of this game simply baffle me. For instance, we get to move 9 of a Dutch, and both sides have done the Bishop-to-gee-2 / 7 manoeuvre, and White seems to have a bind on the centre, a solid pawn on d5 and a weakness on e6 which will take a toll. Next thing you know White has whipped out 10. c5 without reaching for the cyanide (which in Fr Ted is usually to be found just beside the valium) and three moves later his centre has gone phut. Not saying that it’s wrong, simply a bit … odd. Then again, so’s the Dutch. 1.d4 f5 2.g3 âf6 3.ºg2 g6 4.âh3 d6 5.d5 âbd7 6.0-0 ºg7 7.c4 0-0 8.Qc2 âe5

9.âf4 c6 10.c5 cxd5 11.âxd5 âxd5 12.ºxd5+ e6 13.ºg2 Qc7 14.ºe3 âg4 15.ºf4 Qxc5 16.âc3 ºd4

17.e3 ºf6 18.h3 âe5 19.e4 fxe4 20.Qxe4 d5 21.Qe2 âc6 22.¼ac1 Qe7 23.âb5 Qf7 24.¼fd1 ¾h8

25.âc7 ¼b8 26.âb5 e5 27.ºxd5 Qg7 28.ºe3 âd4 29.âxd4 exd4 30.ºf4 ºxh3 31.ºxb8 ¼xb8 DRAW

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#22 (B)

Hackett,Dave - Terry,Sean [B05] OCA 2 - Witney, 05.03.2009 The publication of Dave’s win against Peter Wells in the simul came, he tells us, as a bit of a surprise to his girlfriend who doesn’t do chess – I suppose if she did we’d call her a Hackette - and perhaps some solid evidence that his Monday nights were spent actually doing something that could be tangibly evidenced. I suppose here’s some more evidence to put on the pile, and the diagram position saw me expecting a draw after … Ng5, (although kicking myself for the lack of technique in a slightly better position earlier), but Dave takes the wrong view and heads to a N+P ending. 1.e4 âf6 2.e5 âd5 3.d4 d6 4.âf3 ºg4 5.ºe2 g6 6.0-0 ºg7 7.exd6 exd6 8.ºb5+ c6 9.¼e1+ ºe6 10.c4 âc7 11.d5 cxb5 12.dxe6 fxe6 13.cxb5 0-0 14.âc3 d5 15.ºe3 âd7

16.¼c1 b6 17.âd4 âe5 18.âce2 âc4 19.b3 âxe3 20.fxe3 e5 21.âc6 Qd7 22.âc3 ¼f7 23.¼f1 ¼af8 24.¼xf7 ¼xf7 25.a4 ºh6 26.âxe5 ºxe3+ 27.¾h1 Qf5 28.âxf7 ºxc1 29.âd6 Qe5 30.Qxc1 Qxd6

31.âe2 Qe5 32.âg1 âe6 33.âf3 Qe4 34.Qc8+ ¾g7 35.Qb8 âg5 36.Qe5+ Qxe5 37.âxe5 d4 38.¾g1 âe4 39.b4 âc3 40.¾f1 ¾f6 41.âc6 âxa4 42.âxd4 âc3 43.¾e1 ¾e5 44.âc6+ ¾d5 45.âxa7 ¾c4

46.¾d2 ¾xb4 47.âc8 âd5 48.¾d3 ¾xb5 49.¾d4 âf6 50.h3 âh5 51.âd6+ ¾a6 52.¾c4 âf4 53.âe8 âxg2 54.¾b4 g5 55.âf6 âf4 56.âxh7 âxh3 57.âf6 âf2 58.¾c4 g4 59.âh5 âe4 60.âf4 g3 0-1

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#35 (B)

Rose,Matt - Bicknell,Carl [B22] OCA 1 - univ 1, 02.03.2009 Matt ended his 2009 much the same way as he started it – winning games – and a 11 ½ / 12 score was enough to pick up the OCA equivalent of the Golden Cleric award for the season. This game ends a lot quicker than seemed likely after a Sicilian c3 with h3, g4 and h4 by move 11 seemed to suggest – maybe castling early by Black was a bit committal – although as is always the case Fritz shows that the position is not as hopeless as the game continuation might suggest. (After 17. Nxg5 it comes up with Nxd4) 1.e4 c5 2.c3 g6 3.d4 cxd4 4.cxd4 d5 5.e5 ºg7

6.âc3 âc6 7.h3 âh6 8.g4 0-0 9.ºg2 e6 10.ºe3 ¾h8

11.h4 âg8 12.f4 f6 13.âf3 fxe5 14.fxe5 h6 15.Qd2 ºd7

16.h5 g5 17.âxg5 hxg5 18.h6 ºxe5 19.dxe5 âxe5 20.ºd4 1-0

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#16 (W)



33

Morris,Graham - Brown,Matt [B90 ] OCA 1 - univ 1, 02.03.2009 From the same match as the previous game, featuring two of Oxford’s notorious time-wasters, both players having FM norms in the art of giving good Zeitnot to the assembled spectators, with this being no exception. Here Matt initiates some mayhem on the board in the diagram position, but when Graham re-sacrifices the exchange back without too much thought the pendulum goes tick-tock against Black and White steps nimbly into the accumulated Black weaknesses to force resignation a few moves before mate. 1.e4 c5 2.âf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.âxd4 âf6 5.âc3 a6 6.ºe3 e5 7.âb3 ºe6 8.f3 ºe7 9.Qd2 0-0 10.0-0-0 a5 11.ºb5 âc6 12.g4 âe8

13.¾b1 âc7 14.ºb6 Qb8 15.Qf2 ¼c8 16.a3 âxb5 17.âxb5 a4 18.âc1 ºc4 19.âc3 ¼a6 20.h4 ¼xb6 21.Qxb6 âd4 22.¼xd4 exd4 23.â3e2 ¼c5 24.âd3 ¼b5

25.Qxd4 d5 26.exd5 ºxd5 27.Qe3 Qc7 28.âc3 Qxc3 29.Qxe7 Qc8 30.¼e1 g6 31.Qe8+ Qxe8 32.¼xe8+ ¾g7 33.f4 ºf3 34.âe5 ºd5 35.g5 ºe6 36.¼e7 ¼d5

37.¾c1 ¼d4 38.¼xb7 ¼xf4 39.¼b4 ¼f1+ 40.¾d2 ¼f2+ 41.¾c3 ¼e2 42.âg4 ºf5 43.âf6 ºxc2 44.¾d4 ¼h2 45.¼b8 ¼d2+ 46.¾e3 ¼d3+ 47.¾e2 1-0

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#20 (B)

Riley,Kelly - Ashford,Martin [B17 ] OCA 2 - wantage, 02.03.2009 The Kelly files are never complete. During the year we decided to grant Kelly a testimonial season, and then the guys from Wantage gave him two: As it happens we played City 3 in the league last night and Kelly was on good form and defeated Martin Ashford with a decent technical ending (I even found myself going up to Kelly and saying how well he did – credit where credit due). No fireworks from him during the game this time, just plenty of self-assured nodding before and after every move.” Gordon Brown

A recent example was the City 3 match versus us recently. He ended up in a minor piece ending, a pawn up, and I was impressed at how he brought it home against our Martin Ashford. Perhaps this is not the most exciting game, but I think it shows Kelly in good form in the minor piece ending, and this should be recognised

George Spalding

1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.âc3 dxe4 4.âxe4 âd7 5.ºc4 âgf6 6.âxf6+ âxf6 7.h3 ºf5 8.c3 e6 9.âf3 Qc7 10.ºd3 ºxd3 11.Qxd3 ¼d8 12.Qc2 c5 13.dxc5 ºxc5 14.ºg5 0-0 15.0-0 ¼d7 16.ºxf6 gxf6 17.¼ad1 ¼fd8

18.¼xd7 Qxd7 19.Qe4 Qd5 20.Qxd5 ¼xd5 21.¼e1 ¾g7 22.g3 ¼d3 23.¾g2 ¾f8 24.¼e2 ¾e7 25.¼d2 ¼xd2 26.âxd2 f5 27.f3 e5 28.g4 fxg4 29.hxg4 ¾e6 30.âe4 ºe3 31.c4 b6 32.âg3 ºd4 33.b3 ºe3 34.âf5 ºf4

35.âg7+ ¾d6 36.b4 ºd2 37.âf5+ ¾e6 38.b5 ºf4 39.¾f1 e4 40.¾e2 exf3+ 41.¾xf3 ¾e5 42.âe7 ºd2 43.âc6+ ¾d6 44.¾e2 ºf4 45.âxa7 ¾c5 46.¾d3 ºg5 47.âc6 ºf6 48.âb8 ºd8 49.a3 ¾d6 50.¾e4 ¾c5 51.¾d3 ¾d6

52.âc6 ºf6 53.a4 ¾c5 54.a5 bxa5 55.âxa5 ºe5 56.âb3+ ¾b6 57.¾e4 f6 58.¾d5 ºc3 59.âc5 ¾c7 60.âe6+ ¾b6 61.âf8 h6 62.âg6 ¾c7 63.âe7 ºd2 64.c5 ºe3 65.âf5 ºf4 66.b6+ ¾b7 67.âd6+ ºxd6 68.¾xd6 1-0

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#31 (W)



34

Rose,Matt - Robertson,Stuart J [B22] OCA 1 2008, 31.03.2009 Isn’t there some sort of phone help for Sicilian 2. c3 players, the chess-playing equivalent of the Priest Chat-back line in Fr Ted, which might help them out of the habits of a lifetime? The answer is, “probably not”, and certainly not since David Howell since picked off a draw against Magnus Carlson in the London tournament. Ho hum – unlike Mrs Doyle, some of us don’t like the misery. Here though, Stuart seems to mix plans from different openings (… a5 doesn’t seem right here) and his multiple moving knights blunder material as early as move 15 – leaving Matt to play some careful move before the posh 23. Rc6 to finish. If you’ve been disturbed by any of the annotations in this game, please call the BBC which is bound to have a handy helpline. 1.e4 c5 2.c3 âf6 3.e5 âd5 4.d4 cxd4 5.âf3 e6 6.cxd4 d6

7.ºc4 âc6 8.0-0 ºe7 9.Qe2 âb6 10.ºb3 a5 11.âc3 âb4 12.a3 â4d5

13.ºxd5 exd5 14.exd6 Qxd6 15.âb5 Qd8 16.ºf4 âc4 17.âc7+ ¾f8 18.âxa8 ºd6

19.ºxd6+ âxd6 20.Qe5 b6 21.¼ac1 f6 22.Qxd5 ºb7 23.¼c6 1-0

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#10 (B)

Paxton-Doggett,Paul - Chapman,Graham [A26] OCA 1 2008, 31.03.2009 Apart from board 1, the other games in the title tingled the nerves. On board 2, our resident GM (Hannon) had to contend with an endgame without material advantage but with greater mobility, a churn-n-gurn win resulted. Then there was the Yates great escape (which for some odd reason didn’t make it to Blunderama™), while here we have a real match-of-two halves on board 4, where White starts off with a strong-looking sacrifice to lay bare the Black king (see diagram) but Graham turns things around over the course of the next 10 moves and his more nimble minor pieces triumph over the rook. 1.c4 e5 2.g3 g6 3.ºg2 ºg7 4.âc3 âc6 5.d3 d6 6.âf3 âf6 7.ºg5 h6 8.ºd2 0-0 9.Qc1 ¾h7

10.h4 ¼e8 11.âe4 âxe4 12.dxe4 f5 13.h5 g5 14.ºxg5 hxg5 15.âxg5+ ¾g8 16.exf5 ºxf5 17.ºd5+ ¾f8

18.h6 ºf6 19.âf7 Qd7 20.h7 ¾e7 21.h8½¼xh8 22.âxh8 ¼xh8 23.¼xh8 ºxh8 24.e4 ºe6 25.Qh6 ºf6

26.g4 âd4 27.Qh7+ ¾d8 28.Qh6 Qe7 29.ºxe6 Qxe6 30.¾d2 ¾d7 31.¾d3 Qxg4 32.Qe3 ºg5 33.f3 Qg2 0-1

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#13 (B)

Terry,Sean - Piggott,Roley [E10] OCA 1 2008, 31.03.2009 Making a guest appearance for the ones, I thought I was just about getting to grips with the position when I uncorked e4 in the diagram position (about 23 moves later than my knowledge of opening theory warranted, but no matter). This seems to win a rook and a knight, but Black has enough counterplay to force a draw. Sometimes you can get to enjoy the thrill of nearly losing. 1.d4 âf6 2.c4 e6 3.e3 c5 4.âf3 g6 5.âc3 ºg7 6.ºe2 0-0 7.h4 d6 8.âd2 e5 9.d5 ºd7

10.g4 a6 11.g5 âe8 12.âde4 f5 13.gxf6 ºxf6 14.h5 ºh4 15.hxg6 hxg6 16.¾d2 ºf5 17.Qg1 ¾g7

18.ºg4 b5 19.ºxf5 ¼xf5 20.Qg4 ºxf2 21.¼h2 b4 22.âe2 âf6 23.âxf6 Qxf6 24.e4 ¼g5 25.Qc8 ¼h5

26.¼xh5 gxh5 27.Qb7+ ¾g6 28.Qxa8 Qf3 29.Qxb8 ºe3+ 30.¾c2 Qxe2+ 31.ºd2 Qxc4+ 32.¾d1 Qf1+ 33.¾c2 Qc4+ DRAW

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#24 (W)



35

Morris,Stephen - Yates,John [E73] OCA 1 2008, 31.03.2009 I’ve always had a blanket fear of reaching the sort of position depicted in the diagram: one pawn light, two roaring central pawns glowering at you, and not much position for any pieces, but here John hardly even managed a sigh before settling into that what’s-the-problem stoical stance that he has made his trademark over the years. Club members would have known better than to gloat, but Stephen here allows the door to open in a bit-by-drip fashion, and when the final blunder comes, the retribution is swift – and quite pretty, really. 1.d4 âf6 2.c4 g6 3.âc3 ºg7 4.e4 d6 5.ºe2 âc6 6.ºe3 e5 7.d5 âe7 8.¼c1 ºd7 9.f4 âfg8 10.âf3 f5

11.fxe5 dxe5 12.0-0 f4 13.ºf2 âf6 14.âxe5 0-0 15.ºd4 g5 16.h3 âg6 17.âxg6 hxg6 18.e5 âh7 19.ºg4 ºxg4 20.hxg4 ¼e8

21.¼e1 âf8 22.¼e4 b6 23.e6 Qe7 24.ºxg7 Qxg7 25.Qf3 âh7 26.¼ce1 ¼ad8 27.a4 Qe7 28.b3 ¾g7 29.âe2 Qc5+ 30.¾f1 âf6

31.¼e5 ¼h8 32.âc3 Qd4 33.¼xg5 Qd2 34.âe2 ¼h1+ 35.âg1 ¼xg1+ 36.¾xg1 Qxe1+ 37.Qf1 Qe3+ 38.Qf2 Qxf2+ 39.¾xf2 âe4+ 0-1

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#23 (W)

Burt,Will - Bonavent,Phil [B99] Chilterns - bucks, 30.10.2009 Will’s next birthday saw him force resignation a move later than his actual year count in MCS against Bucks, and we managed to struggle into the Angel & Greyhound for some post mortem refreshment. In the opening Black resists the temptation to win the Nf5 with … g6 on move 13 – worth a bit of analysis – and by the diagram position things seemed to have settled a bit. Will’s choice here – a positional pawn sacrifice – demonstrates how we can all graduate from the ‘have-em-and-blunder’ school of pawn pushers if we’re not careful, and some delicate heavy piece manoeuvring ensues, only broken by a blunder just after the time control which settles things quickly. 1.e4 c5 2.âf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.âxd4 âf6 5.âc3 a6 6.ºg5 e6 7.f4 ºe7 8.Qf3 Qc7 9.0-0-0 âbd7 10.ºd3 h6 11.Qh3 âb6

12.¼he1 e5 13.âf5 ºxf5 14.exf5 0-0-0 15.ºxf6 ºxf6 16.ºe4 exf4 17.¼d3 ¼he8 18.¼ed1 ¾b8 19.Qf3 ¼d7 20.¾b1 Qc5 21.a3 ºe5 22.âd5 ¼c8

23.¼b3 âxd5 24.¼xd5 Qa7 25.f6 g6 26.Qh3 ¼cc7 27.Qxh6 Qg1+ 28.¾a2 ºxf6 29.Qxf4 ºe5 30.Qd2 Qc5 31.ºf3 ºxh2 32.¼dd3 ºe5 33.ºd5 f5

34.c4 ¼h7 35.Qg5 ¾a7 36.Qxg6 f4 37.Qg8 ¼cg7 38.Qf8 Qg1 39.¼h3 Qd4 40.¼xh7 ¼xh7 41.Qc8 b5 42.Qa8+ ¾b6 43.Qb8+ ¾a5 44.¼xb5+ 1-0

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#23 (W)

Butland,Nick - March,Mike [A00] Chilterns - bucks, 30.10.2009 What is the answer to 1. b4? Was Mike’s question after the game and “not 1. … a5 seemed to be the answer, notwithstanding whatever was said in the MCOs of the 1970s. As it is, Black has to endure a position which would have had Petrosian and maybe even Tal not so much turning in their respective graves but also wrinkling up his face as if to say “can Black survive?”. Well, as it happens – and in much the same way as Fischer did against Gligorich – he did. 1.b4 a5 2.b5 d5 3.e3 ºf5 4.âf3 âf6 5.c4 e6 6.âc3 dxc4 7.ºxc4 ºd3 8.ºxd3 Qxd3 9.Qe2 Qxe2+ 10.¾xe2 âbd7

11.d3 a4 12.ºd2 âb6 13.¼ab1 ºd6 14.e4 e5 15.ºe3 âfd7 16.¼hc1 0-0 17.âd2 ¼fe8 18.g3 ºf8 19.f4 exf4

20.gxf4 ºc5 21.d4 ºf8 22.¾f3 g6 23.e5 f5 24.h4 c6 25.h5 ¼ac8 26.bxc6 bxc6 27.hxg6 hxg6 28.¼g1 ¾f7

29.¼g2 âd5 30.âxa4 ¼a8 31.¼b7 ¼xa4 32.¼xd7+ ¼e7 33.¼xe7+ ºxe7 34.âf1 ¼a3 35.¼b2 c5 36.dxc5 ºxc5 37.¼b3 âxe3 DRAW

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#23 (B)



36

Gough,Nick - Rose,Matt [B21] OCA 1 - didcot, 03.11.2009 Nick makes the error here of playing the Morra, not because it’s all that bad, but because he got a reasonably good position against Matt in the corresponding fixture at the end of the 2008 season. In the meantime, Matt had done some preparation and he despatches his opponent with a good deal of style, though in the diagram position Nick showed some resourcefulness in staving off the immediate loss of the bishop (in one) and his king (in two). But all the tactics had been set like clockwork…. 1.e4 c5 2.d4 cxd4 3.c3 dxc3 4.âxc3 âc6 5.âf3 d6 6.ºc4 a6 7.0-0 âf6 8.ºg5 e6 9.Qe2 h6

10.ºh4 g5 11.ºg3 âh5 12.¼fd1 âxg3 13.hxg3 g4 14.âh2 h5 15.âf1 h4 16.Qxg4 âe5 17.Qe2 hxg3 18.âxg3 Qh4

19.Qc2 âxc4 20.Qa4+ b5 21.âxb5 ºd7 22.âc7+ ¾d8 23.Qxc4 ¼c8 24.¼ac1 Qh2+ 25.¾f1 ºb5 26.âxb5 ¼xc4 27.¼xc4 axb5

28.¼b4 ¼g8 29.¼d3 Qh6 30.¾g1 Qc1+ 31.âf1 ¼g5 32.¼c3 Qd1 33.a4 ¼c5 34.axb5 ¼xc3 35.bxc3 ¾c7 0-1

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#19 (W)

Sheridan,Martin - Terry,Sean [E10] OCA 1 - didcot, 03.11.2009 Here’s another long game which might compete for the local-level equivalent of the McShane – Short longevity award, although here Black manages to prolong things into an endgame by virtue of some Blunderama™ which doesn’t make it to the limelight for the lack of any dramatic element mellifluence – put more simply, this one is the one with the boring edges, but you could watch out for it from the diagram onwards. 1.d4 âf6 2.âf3 c5 3.d5 e6 4.c4 b5 5.âc3 b4 6.âb1 ºb7 7.dxe6 fxe6 8.e3 ºe7 9.b3 0-0 10.âbd2 d5 11.ºb2 âbd7 12.ºd3 âe4 13.ºxe4 dxe4 14.âe5 ºf6 15.âxd7 Qxd7

16.ºxf6 ¼xf6 17.Qe2 e5 18.¼d1 ¼d8 19.âf1 ¼d6 20.¼xd6 Qxd6 21.âg3 Qd3 22.0-0 Qxe2 23.âxe2 ¼d2 24.âc1 ºc8 25.h3 a5 26.¾h2 ¾f7 27.¾g3 ¾e6 28.¾h4 ºb7 29.¾g5 ºc6 30.¾h4 h6

31.¾g4 ¾f6 32.¾h4 ¾g6 33.¾g4 ºe8 34.¾h4 ¾f5 35.¾g3 g5 36.¾h2 h5 37.g3 a4 38.¾g2 ¾e6 39.¾h2 ¾d6 40.¾g2 ¾c7 41.¾h2 ¼c2 42.¾g2 ¾c6 43.¾h2 ºf7 44.¾g1 ºxc4 45.bxc4 ¼xc4

46.¼d1 ¼c2 47.¾f1 c4 48.¾e1 b3 49.axb3 cxb3 50.âxb3 axb3 51.¼d2 ¼c1+ 52.¾e2 ¾c5 53.¼b2 ¾c4 54.¼d2 ¼c2 55.¼xc2+ bxc2 56.¾d2 ¾b3 57.¾c1 ¾c3 58.g4 hxg4 59.hxg4 ¾d3 0-1

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#17 (W)

Rose,Matt - Jackson,Gary [B22] FWS 2009 - banbury And speaking of oversights, you might want to look at events in this game, where after 15. h4 it might seem to players of the Black pieces that Dougal might have been right (“well Ted, there’s nothing we can do now, we might as well just give up and go home”) – but perhaps had Black adopted the steely jaw, that look of defiance that characterised Fr Jack … things might have been different. Editorial note: the miss here is a bit too subtle for Blunderama™ - do try harder, guys… 1.e4 c5 2.c3 âf6 3.e5 âd5 4.d4 cxd4 5.âf3 âc6 6.cxd4 e6 7.ºc4 âb6 8.ºb3 d5 9.0-0 ºe7

10.âc3 ºd7 11.âe1 ¼c8 12.Qg4 g6 13.âf3 âa5 14.ºc2 âbc4 15.h4 h5 16.Qf4 b5 17.ºd3 b4 18.âe2 b3

19.âg5 ºxg5 20.hxg5 bxa2 21.¼xa2 âb3 22.¼xa7 âxc1 23.¼xc1 âxb2 24.¼xc8 Qxc8 25.ºb5 0-0 26.¼xd7 Qb8 27.âc3 Qc8

28.Qc1 âd3 29.Qd2 âb4 30.âa4 âc2 31.âc5 âa3 32.ºa6 Qc6 33.Qd3 âc4 34.ºxc4 dxc4 35.Qxc4 ¼a8 1-0

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#15 (W)



37

Hawkins,Kevin - Terry,Sean [B03] Chilterns - bucks, 30.11.2009 An enjoyable game (for me, admittedly) from the Chilterns match against Bucks, and featuring a move (17… Bh1–c1) which picks up the style marks while baffling white into losing a bit more time, though in fairness, and as Jon d’Souza Eva pointed out, “If you can play that move, you must be winning”. Oddly enough, there are plenty of opportunities to lose from here on in – I considered 20...Qf5 21.Nc4 exd4 - but after White’s confusing the Alekhine with the King’s Gambit, with his king misplaced on f1 he was always on the back foot. By the time we reached the diagram his “getting a bit crowded over here” (on the kingside) more or less summarises his plight. And those bishops aren’t going anywhere – they’re here to fumigate the king-side. 1.e4 âf6 2.e5 âd5 3.d4 d6 4.f4 dxe5 5.fxe5 ºf5 6.ºb5+ c6 7.ºa4 e6 8.c3 Qh4+

9.¾f1 f6 10.âf3 Qh5 11.Qe1 âd7 12.ºd1 0-0-0 13.a4 ºg4 14.exf6 gxf6 15.ºe3 âxe3+

16.Qxe3 ºh6 17.Qe1 ºc1 18.b3 e5 19.ºe2 ºe3 20.âbd2 âb6 21.âe4 Qf5 22.âg3 Qf4

23.h3 h5 24.hxg4 hxg4 25.¼xh8 ¼xh8 26.ºd1 gxf3 27.ºxf3 e4 28.Qe2 Qxg3 29.Qxe3 ¼h1+ 0-1

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#23 (B)

King,Simon - Ballard,Vic [C42] Chiltern - berks, 21.11.2009 Here’s the full text of the game that so nearly went 10. Re1+ 0-0-0 for the record; actually it’s got its interesting bits for the modern reader too. White squeezes out an extra pawn from the diagram position to find that though his pawn is two squares from queening on d6, the win isn’t trivial – and in the tradition of Saturday afternoon middle-aged play a draw is agreed. Fritz sees the win fairly immediately and, having seen it, you can’t help wondering if you’d see it yourself … 1.e4 e5 2.âf3 âf6 3.âxe5 Qe7 4.d4 d6 5.âf3 Qxe4+ 6.ºe2 ºf5 7.c4 Qc2 8.0-0 Qxd1 9.ºxd1 âbd7 10.¼e1+ ºe7 11.âc3 a6 12.ºg5 ¾d8

13.ºa4 h6 14.ºh4 g5 15.ºg3 ºe6 16.d5 ºf5 17.b4 âh5 18.¼ad1 âxg3 19.hxg3 ºf6 20.âe4 ºxe4 21.¼xe4 âb6 22.ºb3 ¼e8 23.¼xe8+ ¾xe8 24.c5 âc8

25.âd4 ºxd4 26.¼xd4 a5 27.¼e4+ ¾f8 28.f4 âe7 29.fxg5 hxg5 30.cxd6 cxd6 31.¼g4 f6 32.¼e4 ¾f7 33.¼e6 ¼a6 34.bxa5 ¼xa5 35.¼xd6 ¼b5 36.¼d8 ¾g6

37.d6 âc6 38.¼e8 ¼b4 39.d7 ¼d4 40.ºe6 ¼d6 41.g4 ¾h7 42.¾f2 ¾g7 43.¾e3 ¾h6 44.g3 ¾g7 45.ºf5 ¾f7 46.¼h8 ¾g7 47.¼e8 DRAW

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#35 (W)

Wells,Peter - Terry,Sean [B03] Simul @ Witney, 23.11.2009 Anyone who missed Peter’s fine lecture a week ago should be encouraged to attend future such events. He talks through stuff at a pace that’s both entertaining and digestible for all. Next time I might ask him about how to deal with Catholic Guilt while playing stronger players. Here, we reach an entertaining position where Black’s position may fairly be described 9before any analysis) as somewhat flaky, and coincidentally the last time Black is the right side of speed limit that counts as the judgement of Fritz. Looking at it now, there’s only one move to play, and it’s obvious – unless of course you feel tied to the idea that it’s a sin to break any of the opening rules (“though must not double your pawns in front of where your king happens to be”) … … and, of course, if it is, I’ll have to see you all on day release from Hell. 1.e4 âf6 2.e5 âd5 3.d4 d6 4.c4 âb6 5.exd6 exd6 6.âc3 âc6 7.ºe3 ºf5 8.âf3 ºe7 9.ºe2 ºf6

10.h3 h6 11.Qd2 g5 12.d5 âe5 13.âxe5 ºxe5 14.h4 ¼g8 15.hxg5 hxg5 16.¼h5 ºf6 17.0-0-0 âd7 18.¼dh1 a6

19.ºd3 ºxd3 20.Qxd3 ºe7 21.¼h8 ¼xh8 22.¼xh8+ âf8 23.Qh7 ºf6 24.¼g8 ºxc3 25.bxc3 Qf6 26.Qg7 Qxg7 27.¼xg7 f6

28.¼xc7 âd7 29.c5 dxc5 30.¼xb7 0-0-0 31.¼a7 âe5 32.¼xa6 ¼xd5 33.¼xf6 c4 34.¾c2 ¼a5 35.¼f5 1-0

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#14 (B)



38

Three entertaining games from the club on 9 November ...

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Beckett D- Hayward (W, 21) Yates - Beckett R (W, 16) Richards - McLeod (B, 11)

White goes to ground… After 16. Qd4 Bc5 what next…?! The fun starts after 11. f5 Bxg3+

Beckett,Daniel - Hayward,Philip [B72] OCA 2 - bicester, 09.11.2009 1.e4 c5 2.âf3 âc6 3.d4 cxd4 4.âxd4 âf6 5.âc3 g6 6.ºc4 ºg7

7.ºe3 d6 8.h3 0-0 9.0-0 a6 10.ºd5 Qc7 11.Qd2 ¼e8 12.âxc6 bxc6

13.ºb3 a5 14.a4 ºa6 15.¼fc1 ¼ab8 16.¼ab1 âd7 17.âd1 âc5

18.ºxc5 dxc5 19.âe3 ¼b7 20.ºa2 ¼eb8 21.b3 Qe5 22.âd1 ¼b4

23.f3 ºf6 24.âe3 ºg5 25.c3 ¼4b7 26.Qf2 ¼d7 27.âg4 Qg7

28.f4 ºh6 29.âxh6+ Qxh6 30.Qxc5 ¼d2 31.Qxc6 Qxf4 32.Qc5 Qg3 0-1

* Yates,John - Beckett,Richard [B22] OCA 2 - bicester, 09.11.2009 1.e4 c5 2.c3 âf6 3.e5 âd5 4.d4 cxd4 5.cxd4 âc6 6.âf3 e6

7.ºc4 âb6 8.ºb3 d6 9.0-0 ºd7 10.âc3 a6 11.¼e1 dxe5 12.dxe5 âa5

13.ºe3 ¼c8 14.¼"c1 âxb3 15.axb3 ºb4 16.Qd4 ºc5 17.Qg4 ºxe3 18.¼xe3 0-0

19.¼d3 Qe7 20.¼cd1 ºc6 21.âd4 ºd5 22.âe4 ºxe4 23.Qxe4 âd5

24.Qg4 ¼fd8 25.h4 g6 26.h5 âb4 27.¼h3 ¼d5 28.hxg6 fxg6

29.¼e1 âc6 30.¼c3 ¼xd4 31.Qxd4 âxd4 32.¼xc8+ ¾g7 DRAW

* Richards,John - McLeod,Peter [B18] OCA 3 - didcot 2, 09.11.2009 1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.âc3 dxe4 4.âxe4 ºf5 5.âg3 ºg6 6.f4 e6

7.âf3 âd7 8.Qe2 ºd6 9.âe5 âe7 10.âxg6 âxg6 11.f5 ºxg3+ 12.hxg3 Qa5+

13.c3 âgf8 14.¼h5 âf6 15.¼g5 h6 16.¼xg7 Qxf5 17.Qf3 Qxf3 18.gxf3 âg6

19.g4 ¾f8 20.¼xg6 fxg6 21.ºf4 ¾e7 22.ºd3 g5 23.ºe5 h5 24.gxh5 ¼xh5

25.0-0-0 ¼f8 26.¾d2 a5 27.ºc2 âd5 28.¼g1 âf4 29.ºd1 ¼c8 30.¼g4 âd5

31.¾d3 c5 32.f4 ¼h3+ 33.¾d2 ¼h2+ 34.ºe2 âxf4 35.ºxf4 gxf4 36.¼xf4 cxd4 &c0-1



39

Rose,Matt - ,Jason McAteer [B06] OCA 1 - Cowley , 05.10.2009 1.e4 g6 2.d4 ºg7 3.âc3 d6 4.ºe3 c6 5.h3 âf6 6.âf3 d5 7.ºd3 dxe4

8.âxe4 âxe4 9.ºxe4 âd7 10.Qd2 âf6 11.ºd3 0-0 12.0-0 a5 13.¼fe1 ¼e8 14.ºh6 a4

15.ºxg7 ¾xg7 16.¼e5 âd7 17.¼h5 gxh5 18.Qg5+ ¾h8 19.Qh6 f520.âg5 âf6 21.âf7+ ¾g8

22.âxd8 ¼xd8 23.ºc4+ âd5 24.¼e1 ¼d6 25.Qg5+ ¼g6 26.ºxd5+ cxd5 27.Qxe7 1-0

Zong Zi Jing (2410) - Kangur,Alv (2231) [B78 ] 127th Varsity Match London ENG (1), 14.03.2009 An interesting exchange of views with material imbalances… 1.e4 c5 2.âf3 âc6 3.d4 cxd4 4.âxd4 g6 5.âc3 ºg7 6.ºe3 âf6 7.ºc4 0-0 8.ºb3 d6 9.f3 ºd7 10.Qd2 ¼c8 11.0-0-0 âe5 12.h4 h5 13.ºg5 ¼c5 14.g4 hxg4

15.h5 âxh5 16.âd5 ¼xd5 17.ºxd5 Qb6 18.ºb3 a5 19.f4 a4 20.fxe5 dxe5 21.âe2 ºb5 22.c4 axb3 23.cxb5 bxa2 24.¾c2 Qxb5 25.âc3 Qc5 26.Qe3 Qc6 27.ºxe7 ¼c8 28.¼d8+ ¾h7

29.¼xc8 Qxc8 30.¼a1 g3 31.Qf3 Qh3 32.¼h1 Qe6 33.ºc5 ºh6 34.¼a1 f5 35.exf5 Qxf5+ 36.Qxf5 gxf5 37.âxa2 ¾g6 38.âc3 ¾g5 39.¾d3 ¾g4 40.¾e2 âf4+ 41.¾f1 g2+

42.¾f2 âd3+ 43.¾xg2 âxc5 44.¼a5 ºe3 45.¼b5 f4 46.b4 f3+ 47.¾f1 âb3 48.âb1 e4 49.¼xb7 ºd4 50.¼e7 e3 51.b5 ¾f4 52.¾e1 âc5 53.âa3 âe4 54.¼f7+ ¾g3

55.âc2 ºc3+ 56.¾f1 âd2+ 57.¾e1 âe4+ 58.¾f1 e2+ 59.¾g1 âg5 60.¼f5 âh3+ 61.¾h1 f2 62.¼xf2 âxf2+ 63.¾g1 ºa5 64.b6 ºxb6 65.âe1 ºa5 66.âc2 âg4 67.¾h1 ¾f2 0-1

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#25 (W)

Matthewson,Edward - Denton,John [E15] Eighth Oxford University Major, 17.05.2009 A game which on the face of it is lost by Black who – perhaps to deaden the White initiative - over-values the loss of the exchange in the position (#17) where he decides to sacrifice it, and hopes his better placed minor pieces will compensate. The rest of the game sees White mop up and win. I rather liked the eclectic travel path of the White queen, first a tour on the white squares: Qd1-c2-f5-h3-f1-d3-d5-a8-e4 followed by a finesse on the black squares Qe4-e5-c7-f4 just to ensure that the R V B ending would be trivial. A fine and classy performance by the dame – if she were on Fr Ted, she’d be the Fr Romeo Sensini (who only drank the very finest altar wine) 1.d4 âf6 2.c4 e6 3.âf3 b6 4.g3 ºa6 5.Qc2 ºb7 6.ºg2 c5 7.0-0 d5 8.¼d1 âbd7 9.âc3 ºe7 10.cxd5 exd5 11.ºf4 0-0 12.¼ac1 a6

13.âe5 ¼c8 14.Qf5 g6 15.Qh3 cxd4 16.âxd7 dxc3 17.âxf8 cxb2 18.¼b1 Qxf8 19.ºh6 Qe8 20.¼xb2 ¼c6 21.ºf3 ºa3 22.¼b3 ºc5 23.e3 ¼e6 24.Qf1 Qe7

25.Qd3 a5 26.ºg5 Qd7 27.ºxf6 ¼xf6 28.ºxd5 ºxd5 29.Qxd5 ¼d6 30.Qa8+ ¾g7 31.¼xd6 Qxd6 32.Qe4 Qd1+ 33.¾g2 h5 34.¼d3 Qg4 35.Qe5+ f6 36.Qc7+ ¾h6

37.Qf4+ Qxf4 38.gxf4 ¾g7 39.¼d7+ ¾f8 40.¾f3 f5 41.¾e2 h4 42.h3 ºe7 43.¼b7 ºc5 44.¾d3 ºb4 45.¼xb6 ºe1 46.¾e2 ºc3 47.¼xg6 1-0

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#14 (W)



40

Burt,Will (2050) - Harvey,Marcus (1905) [C00] Eighth Oxford University Major (1), 16.05.2009 A game which instructs on many levels – the first of which is Will’s capacity, when he puts his mind to it, to leak pawns the way he can drink beer; secondly the careful way the youngster calculates and reaps what Will seems to have thrown away. By the diagram position, a near clear 5 pawns adrift with Black still controlling all the key points, it’s another bad Saturday morning at the office for the White pieces, you feel. Then, as each piece exchange reduces the tactical tension within the position, you check to see that Black still retains a serene poise, to go with a surplus three pawns and the good wishes of Fritz, who confers +4.53 on the player. But alas for those looking for the happy ending, and the comfort of an easy life, one marginal slip and the Burtwolf is at the door, demanding a half-point…. 1.e4 e6 2.âf3 d5 3.e5 c5 4.b4 cxb4 5.d4 âc6 6.ºd3 f6 7.exf6 âxf6 8.ºg5 ºe7 9.h4 0-0 10.âbd2 Qc7

11.Qe2 ¼e8 12.âb3 ºd8 13.âe5 âxd4 14.Qe3 Qc3+ 15.Qd2 âxc2+ 16.ºxc2 Qxe5+ 17.¾f1 âe4 18.Qe2 ºxg5 19.hxg5 Qxg5 20.¾g1 âf6

21.f4 Qxf4 22.¼f1 Qg5 23.âd4 âe4 24.âf3 Qe7 25.g3 ºd7 26.âe5 ¼f8 27.¼f4 ¼xf4 28.gxf4 ºe8 29.ºxe4 dxe4 30.Qxe4 Qc5+

31.¾h2 ºc6 32.âxc6 Qxc6 33.Qxb4 ¼c8 34.¼g1 Qf3 35.¼xg7+ ¾xg7 36.Qe7+ ¾g6 37.Qxe6+ ¾g7 38.Qe7+ ¾g8 39.Qe6+ ¾f8 40.Qf6+ DRAW

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#27 (W)

Duane Rowe –the true story revealed at last (contd from page 10)

Editorial comments: “…should have signed up for City …” “… he could have been Pope …” “ … he would have played below Gary Kasparov but maybe above Ian Brooke …” “… he’s not late, he’s just slightly delayed…”

The Staunton Memorial Tournament 2009


41

An excellent tournament, all right – held in this splendid room in Simpsons… (photos from 13 August 2009) … and yet … can anyone actually see the play-through boards at the back of the room? the crowd is in the foreground of the above photo, while if you don’t have a seat you get to see this:

Though in fairness it is quite easy to get to the top of the queue … but if you aren’t a Peregrine Falcon and used to eyeing its prey from the top of a craggy mountain, the boards look somewhat like this:

(that’s Jan Timman on the left) which some might say defeats their purpose. Still, it was good to see Nigel Short turn up and crush (was it?) van Werle, while carrying what was rumoured to be a bit of a hangover:

an excellent win indeed as we demonstrated here:

while seeing Viktor from about 10 feet was worth the journey to the Strand

and of course my friends will be impressed to find I play in the same league as:

The Staunton Memorial Tournament 2009


42

Tal - Stean [B96] Hastings, 1973 Of course, we can see what you’re asking here: Why feature a game from 1973 in full multi-colours featuring a mating trek by the world’s most famous attacking legend of the 1990s on the back page of a magazine which has no other cover, thus creating the impression that the rest of the magazine is just completely chokka with similar material? Point conceded. The other reason comes from the running email & chatter about whether our comment about the variation in Burt – Goodfellow (Disinformator 38) “if it’s good enough for Tal, it’s good enough for a Kidlington u-170 round 5 experiment” was accurate. Discussions with our professional advisors (Legal Seagull, Wednesday, possibly Thursday evenings) suggests that perhaps he didn’t ever play it, but if he could play like this (below) then he must certainly have thought about playing that. 1.e4 c5 2.âf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.âxd4 âf6 5.âc3 a6 6.ºg5 e6 7.f4 âbd7 8.Qf3 Qc7 9.0-0-0 b5

10.ºxb5 axb5 11.âdxb5 Qb8 12.e5 ºb7 13.Qe2 dxe5 14.Qc4 ºc5 15.ºxf6 gxf6 16.¼xd7 ºe3+ 17.¾b1 ¾xd7 18.¼d1+ ºd4

19.fxe5 fxe5 20.âxd4 exd4 21.Qxd4+ ¾e7 22.Qc5+ ¾f6 23.¼f1+ ¾g6 24.Qe7 f5 25.Qxe6+ ¾g7 26.Qe7+ ¾g6

27.h4 ¼a5 28.h5+ ¾xh5 29.Qf7+ ¾h4 30.Qf6+ ¾g3 31.Qg5+ ¾h2 32.Qh4+ ¾xg2 33.¼f2+ ¾g1 34.âe2# 1-0

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#17 (W)

Dickinson,Tim - Eckersley-Waites,Tom [D02] OCA 1 2008, 2008 Jon d'S-E notes "only one game in my database" after 3. ... c5, without what the result was. Nor does he say if it was actually this one! I thought this was worth a look at rapid chess, as the ODCL is. 7. Nxf7 - another move that I spotted and thought "yes, that's worth a bash". A five-minute analysis suggested I might get the piece back, and his king is going to look stupid. It was worth it just for the look of consternation on his face! However, the attack, such as it is, is slow to arrive and defused by the return of the piece. 26 … g5. So this was an awkward move. I'd been hoping to pressure g7 but it ain't there any more; 27. hxg6+ Bxg6 would tidy his kingside up nicely. And he now threatens ... Bf4+ to boot. What to do? I spotted a chance and thought it might even be winning. Annoyingly he had a defence - just:

27. Nb5! gxh4! 28. Nxd6+ Ke6 29. Nxc8 Rxc8 and now “I can't win the bishop because the h-pawn is too fast, so the game subsides ignominiously” Ho hum. Note to self: book up on 3. Ne5 and fine-tune 7. Nxf7 for next 4NCL. Notes by Tim Dickinson

1.d4 âf6 2.âf3 d5 3.âe5 c5 4.e3 Qc7 5.âd2 ºf5 6.c3 âfd7 7.âxf7 ¾xf7 8.Qf3 ¾g6

9.g4 ºc2 10.h4 âf6 11.h5+ ¾f7 12.g5 âbd7 13.gxf6 âxf6 14.e4 cxd4 15.exd5 Qe5+ (ouch) 16.Qe2 Qxe2+

17.ºxe2 dxc3 18.âf3 âxd5 19.ºc4 e6 20.âd4 cxb2 21.ºxb2 ¼c8 22.ºxd5 exd5 23.a3 ºd6 24.¼h4 ¼c4

25.¾d2 ¼hc8 26.¼c1 g5 27.âb5! gxh4! 28.âxd6+ ¾e6 29.âxc8 ¼xc8 30.¼e1+ ºe4 31.ºd4 ¾f5 32.f3 ºxf3 0-1

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#7 (B)

Kidlington 2010

6 & 7 February

Exeter Hall

Documents

Disinformator39 - Oxford 4NCL.pdf · Starting top left shows Viktor Korchnoi on 14 December, in action against 20 simultaneously, including our own Mark Hannon in yellow ( right colour