Monday 29 July 2019

Joshua fails to qualify for the British Championship (part 3)

Today was really the day the championship started properly, with the two main events (the over 50 and over 65 championships) playing their first round. Results throughout were as follows:

Team Sprog

With both Jude and Billy having completed their appearances, David is now left to fly the flag for this team singlehanded. Unfortunately, he may now have learnt just how heavy flagpoles can be, going down to the top seed in the U16 tournament to move back to 50% after 2 games.

Team PAYE

A fine day all around for those in the prime of life, I guess to be expected given these are the first rounds to take place on a working day, when you would expect our minds to be at peak efficiency. Ben makes his first appearances, with a win a draw a fine result on the opening day; indeed a result I felt was so impressive I decided to match it, even if my games were slightly less impressive, with a draw from an entirely lost position, and a win from a completely level rook and pawn endgame. Pride of place here though must go to Andy, who achieved a comprehensive victory against someone 150 rating points higher (see below).

Team Charlemagne

A decidedly mixed bag of results today, with Mark scoring a win with a slightly dubious looking piece sacrifice, Bernard being ground down to a very tedious looking loss, and Roy once again showing he is as good as both of his teammates put together, managing to score both of their results himself in a single day. Half points might not look bad in isolation, but its going to take decidedly more than that to win this tournament.

Team Eclectic

Bruce becomes the very final one of out gladiators to enter the fray, and whilst it was not quite the opening result he might have hoped for, David Howell at least managed to pull his finger out and recover from yesterday's disastrous draw with a win over Lorin D'Costa to mean this team also comes out with a 50% record for the day.

Current standings:

Team Sprog: 71% (10/14)
Team PAYE: 69% (5.5/8)
Team Charlemagne: 61% (5.5/9)
Team Eclectic: 43% (6.5/15)

It's tight at the top, and the adults are coming. A brief mention of ex-Kenilworth star Ed Goodwin is also in order here, who held on in a long and difficult rook and pawn endgame for a very creditable draw against a higher rated player in his opening game. The fact his opponent offered a draw in a position where he had a forced win in no way detracts from that achievement.

Pride of place for our featured game must go to Andy today though. Not only do we have a very impressive mate at the end, but Andy also tells us he was in theory for the first 22 moves of the game, a number beyond my comprehension to reach. it may also explain why we had more time than he started with at that point, after a serious of moves that essentially looked completely random to me. It serves his opponent right for being so predictable with his openings, since he played down exactly the line Andy predicted would occur in our conversation before the game.


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