Author: Culcheth Chess Club - Admin

The A team faced defending league champions Atherton for the second time this season knowing that a win would but us two points clear at the top with a game in hand. We had a strong lineup for this one with all of our main players being avaliable.

Atheron also had a strong line up which was shown by the fact that their bottom board Paul Doherty had just recently finished in 1st place in the Blackpool Major.

As usual most of the games we’re very close during the early stages, Furness V Doherty on board 5 and Smith V Mulleady on 3 had a similar symmetrical English pawn structure with pawns on e4 and c4 for white and e5, c5 for Black.

Board 5 was the first to finish as Robert agreed to an early draw against Doherty 0.5-0.5

On board 3 Jonathan’s position began to deteriorate, I didn’t get to see the finer details but I wondered if one factor may have been that White’s Knight on f3 impeded the f-pawn wheras Mulleady’s was free to be pushed. Usually the knight’s are better on e2 / e7 in that Botvinnik type structure. Resignation came for White in the early middlegame as the opposition captain gave Atherton the lead. 1.5-0.5

On board 4 Damian equalized early on in the Black side of an Alapin Sicilian, Lythgoe headed for early exchanges and offered several draws. Unfortunately for Damian he overpressed in a position where he thought he had a winning move but miscounted and it turned out it was Black who was queening first! Ironically the game was probably still technically a draw when Damian resigned in disgust with himself. 2.5-0.5

Lythgoe V McCarthy (bigger screen)

This left the top two boards to try and salvage something from the fixture. On board two Marek was facing Lee Kay as Black. Marek adopted a Stonewall setup against Kay’s Catalan opening. After a balanced Kay managed to turn his weak backward pawn on c3 into a strength on c5, Marek gave up his Bishop to try to create counterplay against White’s King but there was to be no compensation for the loss of the Bishop. 3.5-0.5

Kay V Mazek (bigger Screen)

On top board Tom Quilter was up against Ethan Norris. Tom adopted an aggressive setup against his opponent’s Najdorf. Ethan defended accurately when a very small oversight from Tom resulted in a dramatic shift in the game as Black’s d6 pawn began to run down the board.

In a worse position after this Tom did everything possible to create complications but Ethan held firm to bring home the point for Atherton. 4.5-0.5

Quilter V Norris (Big Board)

CLOSER THAN IT LOOKS

A 4-1 score line suggests that it was an easy win, but the fact is that the A Team’s victory over the B Team was comprised of several very close individual encounters, all of which might have gone either way or resulted in a draw. It would be unfair to ascribe the result solely to luck, but Capablanca’s maxim that “A good player is always lucky” never rang truer.

The first game to finish provided the shock of the night as Keith Maudsley defeated Marek Mazek on Board 1 and arguably Keith’s triumph owed very little to luck and was testament to his enduring great skill. (I asked Keith for some insight into this match and he shared the following:)

“Unluckily for Marek, after a dozen moves we had a position from a game between Anand and Topalov that I happened to have been looking at on the morning of the match. Marek diverged, but in a cramped position found it difficult to organise effective counterplay. We both agreed he should have exchanged off a Knight that landed on f6 (though even then Stockfish gives it +0.8 for white). After that, White developed a dangerous attack that resulted in winning Queen and 2 pawns for 2 Rooks, but still leaving black’s position cramped, with White’s pieces dominating the board. Eventually black dropped a Bishop, leaving Marek trying to conjure tricks with 2 Rooks, and white just having to play sensible moves. When one of the Rooks also dropped, Marek resigned.“

The scores were levelled on Board 4 where Ilya Dubov eventually prevailed over Jonathan Miller in a hard fought game where Ilya was running short of time.

On Board 2 Nick Burriss was putting up stout resistance against Jonathan Smith in a Kings Indian Defence set up. Afterwards Jonathan stated that he felt subjected to a bind for much of the game and had a slightly inferior position. The engine bears out his assessment and he felt he absolutely had to play 25. e5 to break the shackles at the initial cost of a pawn. In the ensuing complications both sides missed golden opportunities and exchanged oversights. The compensating errors kept the position more or less equal but the deciding factor was the clock and Nick’s consistent failure to manage his time in ‘sudden death’ time controls once again cost him very dear. He resigned in an equal position with just 1 second remaining on his clock.

Board 5 staged a battle royal between Bryan Slater and Tom Vout. As the clocks ticked down both sides were getting short of time as Bryan pressed hard on the K-side. It looked as though his attack might break through but a desperately unfortunate blunder cost Bryan a rook and a game he might very well have won or drawn.

And finally on Board 3 John Reyes was holding his own against Damian McCarthy. Once again the clock was a major factor but Damian found a series of attacking moves in a Rook and minor piece endgame causing John to stumble into an irresistible mating net.

So 4-1 it was and the A Team continue to press successfully for top honours in Division 1. Meanwhile the B Team need to maintain their high standards of play to scavenge vital points from stronger rivals in order to avoid relegation.

The A team progressed to the final by a margin on 4-1 against St Helen’s.

Tom Quilter played a fine game on top board against Mark Ellis –

On boards 2, 4 and 5 Jonathan, Robert and Ilya all won smoothly, Jonathan in particular was in relentless mood giving Steve Potter very few prospects of counterplay.

The only upset came on board 3 as Damian faced a new talanted junior Phoenix Lamb. Phoenix produced a fine combination in an opposite side castled position to bring home St Helens’ only point.