'Yesterday's result was not quite the one we were looking for if we were to have any chance of overhauling Ringwood B. We drew 2-2, so are potentially 2 points behind Ringwood. We need to win our last 2 matches and Ringwood to lose a match. Unfortunately, Toby Miller was obliged to cancel at the last minute because he and his family have gastric 'flu. We wish them an early recovery from this rather nasty virus.

I rang nearly everybody in the club from a list in my possession and even someone who I found is no longer in the club! That was Nikolai Cherskov whose mother, Tatiana Marples, I know from U3A table tennis! In the end, Chris Roberts was available and kindly offered to play. My mood was not helped by finding that Simon Patterson, whom I couldn't reach, was at the Wimborne club last night.

As to the actual play, Paul Wood continued in fine form and edged out his opponent in a pawn ending where each player had 5 pawns but one of his opponent's was isolated. Well done, Paul, for once again saving our reputation! Chris, in her first outing for the A team was by no means outclassed, although slowly ground down by her opponent. Interestingly, she told me that post-match analysis revealed that she missed 2 opportunities to checkmate her opponent! That left a rather tired Martin, who was assisting us straight from work and my game where, as black, I again obtained a poor opening. In my defence, my opponent's QP opening play was so insipid that he obtained a 'Cambridge Springs defence' in reverse, with a move in hand. My white squared bishop was in open play on the kingside and not available to support the defence of my queenside and my opponent played the standard moves of Qa4, Bb5 and Ne5 all raining down on my pinned knight at c6 supported by my queen and my b pawn. Somehow, I got out of it only at the cost of a pawn (and loss of time) and then rapidly outplayed my opponent. Basically he had come for a draw and kept offering it to me.

In a situation where I was rather short of time, still a pawn down and hoped Martin might win, I eventually accepted the offer. Martin was fatigued and his opponent played exceptionally well, so that even the exchange down he was in a position to force a repetition of moves with dangerous back rank and seventh rank threats. So 2-2 was really all we could manage in the circumstances.

After dropping my two passengers off, I remembered that I needed some milk so just made it to the Co-op at Lilliput three minutes before it closed at 11pm before delivering the record cards to Chris A at his house!'

Phillip
[Submitted by crsta]

Poole D achieved a good win against Poole C last night, winning 2.5/1.5. Stephen Chappell and Vincent Platt, on boards 1 and 2, beat Chris Ambrose and Don Hewson, respectively. Ken Parkin, on board 3, was beaten by John Howe and Chris Roberts, on board 4, drew with David Lockwood. The next D team match (vs Southbourne E) is at home on Thursday 15 March.
[Submitted by crsta]

Away to Ringwood B, Poole A team just missed the win that would have allowed us to overtake Ringwood at the top of the table. We had the full team
out and Paul Wood, in a rich vein of form, quickly got on top of his opponent and scored a win. Toby Miller was hard pressed as black by Ringwood's captain, Peter Donaldson so we needed a win and a draw out of the other two games to prevail. On top board Martin Macachek saw that I was two pawns up against my opponent and assumed I would win so took the draw offered to him. Unfortunately, I was only temporarily two pawns up having to return one of the pawns and my only advantage at adjournment was a passed pawn on the a file with my rook in front of it. I returned to Ringwood to continue the game but my small advantage proved insufficient to win so the match was drawn 2-2. Ringwood B will continue to fight hard for promotion because it appears that Ringwood A is likely to be relegated from the first division.

At home to New Milton A, I continue to be puzzled by the Chessnuts for two reasons. First, they are doing reasonably well in the league but have twice played woefully against us. Secondly, last night two of their players were ungraded but I am sure they must play enough games to earn a grade. Admittedly Mike Bond on top board is a worthy opponent and he played a tough game against Toby Miller In the Queen's Indian Defence until the latter outsmarted him in a very complicated late middle game where Mike's king became exposed to an attack from Toby's pieces. Well done Toby since Mike is now graded at 152.
Before that occurred, Paul Wood continued his winning ways with a neat performance as black against New Milton's captain, Bill Page. Paul plays the French Defence very well and knows how to apply pressure down the c file given half a chance. He doubled his rooks on the c file and had two bishops against Bill's two knights. Bill was under huge pressure because his pieces were tied up in the defence of weak queenside pawns and he wasn't seriously opposing Paul's doubled rooks. Meanwhile Simon Patterson was getting on top of his ungraded opponent with advanced queenside pawns, one of them passed. I was tired last
night because I had played the night before and, interestingly, it was another Queen's Gambit Declined, similar to the one I played against Mark Littleton of Wimborne in last night's game in the knock-out tournament. However, my opponent Stephen Disney, ungraded but estimated at 139, played more weakly than Mark. His play was very passive and c6 was quite the wrong square for his queen's knight given that black usually needs to advance his QBP in this line. I
controlled the c file with queen and rook, threated a minority attack on the queenside and also advanced my kingside pawns as I had not castled. But it is one thing to have a major positional advantage with black's white squared bishop trapped and his queenside rook out of play and another to convert it into a win. In the end I broke through on the kingside with my pawn advance and my queen and rook were all over the black position. But just at the end Stephen
launched a counter-attack which nearly succeeded in prolonging the game considerably. It failed because he played his king to the wrong square following a queen check and he resigned when I was about to deliver mate. If he had played his king instead to a6 I would have had to block the counter-attack and then would have had an end-game win in prospect two pawns to the good. Anyway, the result was 4-0 so thanks to everyone.

Phillip Sorensen
[Submitted by crsta]

Poole D played its second match against Bournemouth B last night and again came second! On first board, Stephen Chappell achieved a draw against a much higher graded player and our other three boards were losses. However, all these games went quite a distance but each game was won by the higher graded player. The next Poole D match is against Poole C early next month.
[Submitted by crsta]

Starting from Wednesday 1st February 2012 (3-5.30pm) Poole Chess Club is hosting chess at Flirt Cafe in Central Bournemouth. The venue is situated underneath Bournemouth Library in The Triangle. The aim is to encourage all levels of casual chess in an eclectic ambience and to simply play chess for fun, encouraging chess playing members of the public to join in.

There is no membership required, you are simply expected to buy a beverage and be available to accept a challenge from cafe visitors who would like to play a game of chess. Please come and join us in this exciting new venture, which we hope will raise the profile of the game of chess in our area.

For more information, contact Eric Sachs by email: eric.sachs@btinternet.com




[Submitted by ericsachs]