Leamington League Division 1 Winners and Runners-Up 2024 Leamington League Knock Out Cup Winners 2024 Leamington League U-8750 Cup Winners 2024 Leamington League U-1600 Cup Winners 2024 Runner-Up - ECF Website of the Year 2018
Tuesday night's match for the E team away against Stratford B was of historical significance. With Deema and Steph in the line up, this was the first time in the history of Kenilworth CC that two women have played together in the same match.
Unfortunately, the match result did not reflect this auspicious occasion. The first blunder of the night was committed by me as I had communicated to the team that the venue was the Methodist church hall in the Old Town, as it was last year. When I arrived with Steph, we found only a yoga class in progress. As it became apparent that no-one would be there for chess, we checked the Stratford CC website to find the correct venue, Venture House. We were able to contact Deema to let her know, but could not reach Roy. We waited until 7:30 to see if he would arrive, but then we gave up and headed to Venture House, to find that Roy was already there.
Very sportingly, Stratford waited for us to arrive before starting the match. We were up against a very strong team, currently top of Division 3, and with an average rating 200 points higher than ours. I was not able to follow the other games, but in my own I thought I was in a reasonable position. The engine evaluation later showed that I had made a mistake, and my opponent was +2. But he was in serious time trouble, and with only around 20 seconds left on his clock, he blundered a rook, and then resigned immediately afterwards.
The final score was 3-1 to Stratford, but against such strong opposition I was not expecting much from this match. We reach the halfway point of the season in mid-table, with a record of W3, D1, L3.
One reader of this blog has pointed out that the photo in my last post was not the clearest of images. (So just to reiterate it showed that the C and D team are first and second in Division 2!!!) In part to try and redeem my (non-existent) reputation as a photographer, here are three snaps from last weekend, when I was at the London Chess Classic at Arsenal's Emirates stadium.
First up, what a terrific name for a hairdressers! GRAND MASTER was near where I was staying. (Which sadly, despite the advertisement, was not as close to the stadium as suggested.) I ended up doing a lot of walking and was sorely tempted to pop in for a haircut, but didn't have time.
So to the second image in our trilogy.
This is a picture from inside the stadium of the pink and yellow lights, nurturing the grass, prior to Arsenal's game against Manchester United. As a Man Utd fan, this is certainly prettier than anything I saw in the subsequent match!
I have to begrudgingly admit that the Emirates is truly a modern-day Cathedral. It was somewhat surreal to see the place packed out with chess players. As one security guard put it to me, the clientele was less inebriated than the staff are used to, but own a lot more carrier bags!
So finally, how about a picture of some actual chess?
This is the area where the rapid and blitz evens took place. I was lucky enough to interview Natasha Regan and Matthew Ball on their excellent new book - Zwischenzug! and you'll be able to see the interview and a standard review in the December edition of the ECF's ChessMoves.
You'll be relieved to hear that I'm not going to give you a blow by blow account of all 32 games I played over the weekend, across 2 rapid and 2 tournaments. The summary would be, Blitz is becoming my number one vice. I'm just not fast/ co-ordinated enough to play it well OTB - but I do enjoy it! The rapid events went better, albeit my first round opponent on the Saturday was a nine year old girl who was clutching a teddy bear. I did win, but however much us chess players see ourselves as warriors, even I couldn't find much to celebrate there. Having said that, I doubt she'll have much sympathy when two years from now she can most likely destroy me!
I always enjoy these big national events and would encourage all our members to look out for future opportunities. Whatever your level, they are always a lot of fun. The next big one to think about is the British in the Summer. (I have a good inside tip that it's going to be in Liverpool.) I'll be playing in the British Seniors for the first time. I'm figuring that means it's unlikely any of my opponents will be clutching a teddy bear.
Either way, I'll try and post some photos in due course... If you are out and about at anything vaguely to do with chess (and this post certainly hits the criteria of being vague) do share it on here!
As Harry pointed out to me when we were in the Bar at Shirley last night, following the C team's 2.5 - 1.5 victory against Shirley B.... Kenilworth C and D are now first and second in Division 2. We've even got the picture to prove it!
This has not been the easiest of seasons for all sorts of reasons. Yet while we are continually having to re-jig our teams, and we know eligibility issues will make this even more challenging in the second half of the campaign, at the Board we continue to put it together. It has made me reflect that for all our difficulties, we still have considerable strength and depth, and a roster that would be the envy of many a club.
I cannot tell you as much about the games last night as I would like, for the simple reason that I spent most of the evening in my seat struggling with a very difficult position, but we'll get on to that in a moment...
On Board 1, Andy Ward unfortunately went wrong against Darren Whitmore. These things happen, but it left us 1-0 down.
Harry was losing, I was losing, but Rhys was winning and swiftly turned down Dave Thomas's offer of a draw. None of the games ultimately ended as might have been predicted at the halfway point in the proceedings.
I'm not sure exactly what happened in Harry's game on Board 2, but Keith Ingram perhaps overreached and Harry's resilience paid off - somehow we were back to 1-1.
My position on Board 4 had been excruciating all night. Owen Adams is new to OTB chess but is 2100 on chess.com and has been doing very well in quicker games in the Shirley club. He was much better out of the opening, and I was desperately trying to find some space to ward off a kingside attack. By a miracle, I managed to find an OK defence and to gradually untangle things. We landed in an endgame in which I had two knights vs two bishops (and 5 pawns each.) I had 3 minutes to Owen's 10, but this was probably where my experience showed. I would say I have felt every emotion it is possible to feel at a chessboard except for rustiness (e.g. 32 Blitz and Rapid games last weekend at the London Chess Classic) and I just held my nerve better. I got the knights working more effectively than Owen's Bishop's, found a couple of tactics and picked up a Bishop and a pawn to bring home an unlikely point. I have no doubt that Owen will do really well going forward, but I was delighted to put us 2-1 up!
Somewhere along the line Rhys had lost his advantage against Dave, and eventually ended up playing with just a knight against Dave's two pawns. Fortunately there was no way for Dave to win and they ended up with seconds left on their clocks and just the two kings left on the board, after what was a highly entertaining game. No one could accuse them of not trying!
So a very satisfactory evening. Both the C and D team have one more game before Christmas. Here's hoping we can keep on setting the pace!
Its not only Bernard Charnley who has headed off for pastures new in the last few weeks, as we've also suffered a second blow by losing club legend Joshua, who has gone in the completely opposite direction to Somerset-bound Bernard and headed off to Manchester. Which reminds me of a song!
Of course, this is the second time that Josh has done exactly this, though he returned fairly quickly the first time and we've got to hope that history repeats itself. Though one thing which didn't get repeated was a farewell dinner in his honour. Maybe that's because he didn't so much leave as disappear into thin air, with only a couple of people entrusted with the news of his departure. Typical. As our B team captain, Webmaster, loyal and committed player, Thursday night regular(-ish) and all round interesting and entertaining guy he was a linchpin of the club. He remains as our (remote) Webmaster but his absence does leave a large void in the club. Like Bernard, he was very much his own man and its sad to say goodbye to two such independent personalities in such quick succession. That almost his last act as B team captain was to play his team in an illegal board order against Shirley A and transform a 3.5-0.5 win into a 0-4 loss was an unfortunate way to say goodbye, but we'll forgive him one administrative cock-up after his great contribution to the club over many years. (Though, of course, we'll never let him forget it!)
His first appearance for KCC was in Division 2 for the B team in December 2012, since which time he has made 123 competitive appearances for the club, chalking up some terrific performances along the way - and taking nearly 2 years to lose his first game! The complete record looks like this:-
2012-13 P3 W3 D0 L0
2013-14 P16 W13 D3 L0 (Player of the Year! - and Stanley Gibbins Trophy winner!)
2014-15 P16 W9 D3 L4
2015-16 P10 W7 D1 L2
2018-19 P16 W13 D3 L0 (Player of the Year again!)
2019-20 P13 W9 D3 L1
2021-22 P13 W7 D3 L3
2022-23 P15 W9 D3 L3
2023-24 P17 W8 D3 L6
2024-25 P4 W4 D0 L0
To have gone undefeated through 2 full seasons (plus two more partial seasons) is one hell of an achievement - and he didn't do it by playing stodgy chess, as the win percentages show only too clearly. Indeed, playing for a draw was absolute anathema to him, as was playing long lines of theory. On Boards 3 or 4 in the A team he was basically a points machine. The two times he won the club Player of the Year trophy he scored a fantastic 90+%, and he was top scorer in the whole Leamington League in 2013-14, winning the Stanley Gibbins Trophy. And he'd made rather a good start to the current season, too!
Joshua had a wide range of idiosyncratic offbeat openings that seemed to serve him rather well in practice (1 Nc3 anyone?), however dubious they may be in theory. I recall with great clarity our match away against Banbury B in 2014 when we needed a draw to clinch our first Division One title for 26 years and he turned down a draw offer that would have secured the championship! I was apoplectic, but thankfully the night had a happy ending as we eventually won 3-5-0.5 anyway, though Josh was himself unable to annex the full point, try as he might.
Of course, we can't overlook his split loyalties, as he played for Coventry in the Coventry League and never worried too much about turning out against us, even playing - and beating! - Javier in the final match of the 2022-23 season when we needed a draw or win to secure our first ever title. Luckily for future good relations with Joshua, Jude and Mike won that night to win us the title anyway!
With me saying all these nice things about him, this is looking far too much like an obituary for my taste, so lets finish by bringing a touch of harsh reality to proceedings. I have played Joshua hundreds of times at club nights and online, while in standard play over the board games we have had 8 encounters, of which 2 were Kenilworth v Coventry encounters (2-0 to me and KCC!!). Surprisingly, the majority of our meetings were in Coventry A v Coventry B matches (from that long gone age when we didn't have a Coventry League team) and I remember one of them especially fondly as for once it saw a total massacre of one of his typically dodgy openings. If this were an obituary I would have had to include a nice Pink victory, but as we have established its not, I don't feel at all embarrassed about sharing this crushing win. Or in mentioning that our overall score stands at 6.5-1.5 to me (5 wins and 3 draws).
Now, if I knew any songs by Pink I woujld include one here, but as I don't it will have to be another random choice by me to mark the end of KCC's second Pink period. At least I can be very confident that Josh - as a confirmed Grobster in his approach to the chess battle - would totally subscribe to the sentiment of the title. You cannot win, if you do not play!
Thanks to Joshua for everything he has done for the club over the last decade plus and hopefully he will be reunited with KCC in the not too distant future. In the meantime, best wishes to him for his latest northern interlude!
Kenilworth D were at Home to Leamington B on a very cold and rainy Monday night. We ended up 2-2, but that scarcely tells the story of what was a dramatic match.
Proceedings started with us being in the somewhat unorthodox position of having five players in the house. Roy Watson thought there was another game on, but when he found out there wasn't, he stayed for the evening. It was lovely to see Roy and we all appreciated his support and company.
So first to the rook. I was white on Board 2 against Joshua Simpson when we reached the position below.
I suspect if I had been playing 3 minute chess on Lichess, I would have played Rxf7 in a heartbeat and seen what happened. But in a League game, you need to be sure it actually works, or you can end up looking rather foolish. I probably broke my record for my longest ever think (certainly in a 3 hour game) and spent 45 minutes looking at the variations. At the end of which, I was convinced it worked. I still needed to give myself a pep-talk that I couldn't really leave the venue at peace with myself if I didn't play it. So I did! There really is no defence - and Fritz scores white as +7! A few minutes later we were 1-0 up and I was very happy!
Now to the pawn. On Board 3, Bernard Rogers found himself in a fantastic position against Alex Kagkalis. His pieces and pawns were completely suffocating Alex, and it seemed only a matter of time until Bernard broke through and either queened a super-strong passed pawn or cleaned up enough material to make the victory inevitable one way or another. Unfortunately, Bernard hesitated, ran very low on time and missed a couple of chances. This allowed Alex to wriggle free and bring home an unlikely point. Bernard has been unlucky of late, frequently getting into great positions and not converting. But as they say in football, if a striker keeps getting into the box, the goals will follow. It's clearly only a matter of time until Bernard starts securing the results his early game dominance has deserved.
On Board 4, Dan Bayliss was eventually squeezed out, following a good game against Tom Cockell. A slight weakness in Dan's pawn structure and marginally less active pieces were enough to keep Tom plugging away to good effect. An interesting game, but unfortunately we were now 2-1 down.
Finally to the Bishop, which proved decisive in Paul Badger's Board 1 game against Chris Ward. There seemed to be no prospect of Paul securing more than a draw (and indeed Paul had offered one back when Bernard seemed to be winning.) However, at the death, Chris missed a tactic... Paul found a Bishop check which forced a back-rank mate, to give us a share of the spoils after all!
A very lively night, with lots of twists and turns. After which we put all the pieces back into their bags. The rooks, bishops, pawns and all the rest of them, inanimate objects once more. Doubtless waiting for their next opportunity to add further chapters to their stories.
Back-to-back away matches at Shirley saw impressive
victories for the first team. Last Thursday, in the KO Open Cup we won 4½ – ½
(5 board match) and last night in the league, a 4-0 sweep.
2 out of 2 for Keatan (the machine), Bruce and myself. 1 out
of 1 for Paul and 1½ out of 2 for Javier against 2100+
opposition.
Javier won the interim captain’s best game prize for his
win against Phillip Purcell. A kingside attack against the dragon was well
defended by Phillip, but Javier pivoted decisively to infiltrate on the
queenside. It was wonderful to see and sublimely played. Chess can be a
beautiful. Gelfand would be proud.
As most of you will already know, Bernard C is heading off for pastures new in deepest Somerset and his departure is now imminent. He has been a great presence in KCC over the last ten years and we will all be very sad to see him go. I am so pleased I was able to help smooth his departure from the club by gifting him a "going-away point" in this season's Ken A v Ken B match!
The records show that Bernard's first game (a win!) for the club was in February 2015, since which time he has amassed the following stats in club matches, playing exclusively in Divisions 1 and 2, except for a solitary Div 3 appearance in his debut season:-
A very acceptable +12 score (57.6%). Initially we had to share Bernard with Coventry, but in more recent years he played exclusively for Kenilworth and so the match appearances increased markedly. But there is very much more to Bernard than chess, as he is a highly accomplished artist who had his own one man exhibition at Rugby Art Gallery in 2018 and something of an all-round independent and creative thinker and iconoclast who always had an interesting and wry take on any topic which came up at Thursday social chess nights. He has also been a big supporter of the Coventry Chess Academy. For those who need a reminder of his artistic vision (and I warn you - it can be quite disturbing! Think dystopia and multiply by a large number!!) why not revisit this review I posted of his Rugby exhibition.
Bernard has penned a few words of his own on his association with Kenilworth Chess Club and asked me to share them with everyone, so here is what he has written:-
Dear Kenilworth Club members, As some of you know, I’ve been in the process of moving home and that is now, all things being well, completing in a couple of weeks. While I will be nearer family with this move (Frome nestles in the pastoral climes of Somerset), there are many things I will miss and membership of Kenilworth Chess Club is one of them.
Apart from the great friendships made during my time as a member, I simply want to say a few words about those in the club who gave and or presently give of their time to allow players like myself enjoy the pleasure and (a bit too often) pain of having a chess scrap every one or two weeks. In this respect, without doubt, standing on a pedestal of honour should be Bernard (no no not me, the other one)) Rogers and Mark Page. I’ve always been impressed by their double act with Bernard R the ever resourceful backroom manager, especially securing our various hangouts on a Thursday, with Mark flying the flag upfront with a fine blend of wit, creativity (think blog) and all round leadership of the gang. It’s a dynamic duo that has seen a brilliant growth in membership and playing strength. The alchemy with that other bit of magic down the road, the Coventry Academy led by Paul (Lam), has added a phalanx of strong juniors battling on the club’s behalf as well.
The roll of honour, of course, extends to those members who take on the, let’s face it, ongoing headache of team captain, subjecting themselves to recalcitrant late arrivers, non-turnerruppers, rebellious clocks, dubious claims and occasional, always good for gossip, fallouts. So thanks as well to those I have had the pleasure to know such as Mark, Josh, Ben and Harry.
I will be returning now and again to Coventry and if the stars align, drop in to a Thursday session. In the meantime, its farewell and best wishes to all!
Bernard Charnley
The only good thing about Bernard's departure is that we now revert to having just the one Bernard in KCC, so the opportunities for rib-tickling/trouser-dropping Brian Rix-like misunderstandings and confusions have been eliminated.
Clearly Bernard demands a special farewell song. Something which encompasses his creative and independent side. I hope he's not disappointed with my choice!
On Monday,
the A team entertained Stratford. Javier was black on 1 against the dangerous
Ben Larkin, but after 5 minutes of play, and 20 moves of theory, a draw was
agreed and Stratford’s main threat neutralized. A good start to the match.
Next to
finish was Keatan on 4. His opponent sacked a piece for a kingside attack but
Keatan cooly neutralized the threats, swapped queens and easily converted the
full point.
I was next
to finish and managed to win my first game of the season by boring Richard McNally
to death. So, match secured with just David on 3 still in play.
David
pressured Richard Dobedoe’s English style setup and won a pawn, but Richard
played well and fought back. With both players short of time and the game
chances swinging move by move, a draw was agreed.
3-1
winners, hopefully the start of a much needed march.
The D team was at Olton last night, with a new look line-up. Bernard Rogers has now taken over from me as the captain, so I can lead the C team, and Daniel Bayliss got a late call-up to make his D team debut.
At 7.45 I was the only Kenilworth player in the building, and getting a little nervous, but bad traffic was the culprit. Soon afterwards we had a full team and proceedings got underway.
Bernard was the first to finish, with a pretty quick, very solid looking draw. The other three games were more dramatic. On Board 2, I was up against Trevor Holt. I was in a terrific position out of the opening and despite then making several sub-optimal choices, landed in a relatively routine endgame two pawns up. Somehow I drifted into time trouble, and was conspiring to make it harder than it should have been. However, Trevor unfortunately missed that he was in check, and the only legal move he could replace his illegal move with, lost instantly and he resigned. I would much prefer that this hadn't happened, and having looked at the game briefly this morning, I was still clearly winning. But the rules are the rules, and certainly on the couple of occasions when I've made the same mistake, my opponents have had no hesitation in enforcing touch-move. So we were up 1.5 - 0.5.
On Boards 1 and 4 respectively, Paul and Daniel were both a pawn down, but their prospects looked very different to me. Daniel had a nice tactic to win back his pawn, after which his opponent Kacper Durkarczyk had to contend with a a terrible pawn structure in a double rook and pawn endgame. Daniel played with real fluency, getting his rooks on just the right squares. He then used a pawn lever to excellent effect to break through. A very good debut win, which put us over the line at 2.5 - 0.5!
On Board 1, I really feared for Paul. There was no way for him to get back to material equality, but queen and pawn endgames are always tricky. Paul showed a great deal of imagination in sacrificing more material to open up more lines for his queen. It was pretty high-stakes stuff and made for a nail-biting watch, but Paul had judged the position brilliantly and Rob Reynolds could not escape a perpetual check. A draw ensued.
So 3-1 and a second victory in a row for the team, which has moved us up to 4th in the table. Planning all our teams this season remains a complex task. So, I did just want to echo Bernard's previous plea to some of our less frequent players, to help us out where they can, and to ask that everyone responds promptly to availability asks. A lot of work is going into our selection processes, and everyone can help to make this a little easier...
I would much rather things had landed more happily on the other side of the Atlantic, but at least it was a good night in Olton.
Last night the C team played Rugby A, back at the Abbey Club, 2 weeks on from the D team's victory against them on the road.
This was my first match as C team captain, and we showed only one change from the previous D team line up, with Andy Ward in on one, and Paul, Dhairya and me all dropping down a board. This wasn't a case of me doing an Eric Ten Hag and simply picking the players I had worked with before (with the same risks to my long-term employment prospects!?!). More the vagaries of availability on the night and the challenges we face in managing our squads. On the one hand, we were stronger than the D team which had run out 3.5- 0.5 winners. Yet on the other, Rugby (who were unchanged from that encounter) do possess two 1900+ players, so nothing could be taken for granted. Hence, we were delighted to match the D team result with another 3.5 - 0.5 win!
My own game against Christopher Badley on Board 4 was not one for the album. I was better out of the opening, but struggled to pick up the pace, and eventually found myself in time-trouble. For whatever reason, I was reluctant to play my breakout move as everything looked very double-edged. My hesitation did nothing to help my position. Christopher played the middle phase of the game very well, and despite the good coaching advice I had received from Paul Lam about minimising the risks and making things routine against weaker players, I ended up in a tactical melee that would not have looked out of place in a casino. Christopher had some good chances, but fortunately I was able to find the right tactic to eventually bring home the point. Later in the bar, the two of us enjoyed analysing it with Paul Badger and Phil Wood - one of those games that shows how rich chess really is in terms of the sheer number of possibilities to contemplate. I now just have to brace myself to plug it into Fritz to see how inaccurate we probably both were!
Unfortunately, my battle with the clock meant that I saw nothing of either Paul or Dhairya's games, but both pulled off excellent wins against Patrick Reid and Dave Riley respectively, which meant that we were 3-0 up with the match won! Irrespective of our challenges with player numbers this season, we are truly blessed to have the depth that we do.
We all gathered to watch the end of Andy's Board 1 game against the super-strong Paul Colburn. Andy was grappling to contain Paul's passed pawn, and when he had a 4 minute think which left him a minute on the clock to Paul's five, I feared the worst. However, it transpired that Andy had worked things out brilliantly. Ultimately Paul's pawn was prevented from reaching the 8th rank by a series of very skilful moves on Andy's part, and a draw ensued.
So a terrific result for the team. For all our talk of just making it through this season, whisper it, but we are second in the table with games in hand... We now have a few weeks off, before games against Olton, top of the table Shirley and Solihull to look forward to this side of Christmas. Here's hoping we build on tonight with some future festive cheer!
