Marple B 3 - 3 ECB

Last night's match featured two B teams for clubs who don't have A teams!  Over the last few years playing against the Marple first team was a formidable task with all their titled players but this year their stars have moved on to pastures new.  They still put out a decent team last night - although grading wise we were favorites.

John had an entertaining well fought game game in his contest but had to be content with a draw.  In my game I thought I had the edge but in the end was happy with a draw and then the ever reliable David T also weighed in with a draw.

At this point it was looking good with Geoff B and Jim both looking in good shape.  Unfortunately though Geoff was tempted to take an extra pawn which turned out to be poisonous as a few moves later he was left with the choice of either losing his Q or being mated.  It's a tough game!

Meanwhile Steve Mc had gone a pawn up but his position was awkward and with time trouble issues was happy to settle for a draw.  The match therefore rested on Jim who needed to win for us to draw on the night - no pressure then.  He was a pawn up in an endgame and after some patient maneuvering was able to make it count and claim the full point.

Next up is the trip to Chorlton on December 19th and then a Charnley Cup semi to be arranged probably in January.

1/2    Paul Kirby (154) v John
1 - 0  Alan Hall (151) v Geoff B
1/2    Andy Jenkins (142) v Paul
1/2    Chris Baker (126) v David T
0 - 1  Tony Doust (105) v Jim
1/2    Martin Cutts (108) v Steve Mc
3 - 3

Macc c 1 - 5 ECB

Keven's report below (with a postcript from Tudor) on a great much needed win by the B team...

Under the inspirational leadership of former ‘Captain Kev’, with such useful orders as “ don’t shoot until you see the whites of their eyes”, we comprehensively defeated a relatively weak but decidedly pleasant Macc C.

# Mike Renshaw 0    John Reed 1   -- comfortable win against a rather improvised hybrid Benoni defence.

# Tony Lane 0         Geoff Brindle 1 ---- Geoff’s employed his beloved b6 system and beat off a rather overly ambitious Kings-side attack and quickly tuned the tables forcing resignation.

# Marc Jouannet 0   KRH 1 – A tricky customer Marc, who also used the b6 English Defence and threw everything at me but positionally I had a strong hold on the game and took my own tactical chances to force an easy win.

# John Astley 0    David Taylor 1 ---  David tried to deploy his favourite Nimzo but his opponent didn’t oblige and a a rather slow QP game ensued. Latterly  White rushed his end game and crumpled into defeat.

# Tom Robson 0   Tudor Rickards 1   -- didn’t see the game but Tudor with the white pieces played his standard QP stuff and clearly won convincingly.

# Alan Cope 1  Jim McKie 0 --  strange game, a sort of passive unorthodox Sicilian where Jim won a quick pawn. He then lost the exchange and elected  to defensively hunker down and allow the pawn structure to get locked. But he got ground down by Mr Cope’s ‘mogadon’ strategy and ultimately his opponent found a way to break though and force a win.

Captain Kev ---  retired . (again) 

Quiz – name a Chess Club in the Stockport & District league that Francis Moan has not been a member of ?? !!!!

First prize a ticket to see Stockport County’s U21  team. Second prize = two tickets !!!


Tudor's comments !....

"Still stands the clock?"

"Er, yes, unfortunately"

Age shall not weary them, the East Cheshire pensioners. Conscripted again, Cap'n Kev retains his awesome leadership characteristics.

One further story of our glorious victory. The swanky new clocks at Macc Served to defeat the efforts of some the home side to crack the code permitting the required Fischer time limits of the match.

Increasingly frenzied efforts went unrewarded.  After four moves, the clocks at my board showed we had both added  half an hour each of time, and gaining by the move.

The efforts to correct this were rather like resetting the clock in the car to from Summer Time recently, more trial and error than accomplished know-how.

Unlike in the poem, the clocks eventually tired of toying with their operators, and the games began. 

By then, Cap'n Kev was well into walloping his opponent, and the seeds of our glorious victory had been sowed.