The Three Certainties: Death, Taxes and ........

........... the A team beating the B team. Except that there have been 3 extraordinary exceptions to this theoretically unbreakable rule since the B team was most recently promoted to Division 1 in 2019. From 12 matches played there have been 9 A team victories, 2 draws (2021-22 and 2024-25) and 1 glorious/disastrous B team victory - by a score of 3.5-0.5, no less (also 2024-25). As A team captain, club supremo and match fixer extraordinaire, I'm pleased to report that the 13th A v B encounter, which kicked off the new season on Monday night, kept reasonably close to the official script, with the A team notching a 3.5-0.5 victory. But, of course, nothing is ever as straightforward as you'd like it to be.

For most of the evening I thought the A team was going to chalk up wins on Boards 1 and 3 with the White pieces, as Jude and I seemed to be in control against Joshua and Ben respectively. But on the other 2 boards, the White pieces also looked to have the upper hand, as Mike and Gregory were giving Keatan and Rhys a tough time. Not for the first time, though, the final score showed little similarity with my reading of the likely outcome.

Jude, with a stratospheric ECF rating of over 2400, was the only person who bucked the trend. Although Joshua managed to get some activity with a queen and rook, Jude's king was rock solid and the unprotected Black queenside pawns began to fall off, and with the Black king also looking rather draughty, this game was the first to finish. Though, of course, I didn't see the conclusion so anything might have happened at the end!

It was then the turn of Rhys to add to the A team score, as he eventually emerged powerfully from a deeply-defensive set-up to jump out in Gregory's acute time trouble and transform the position into a big attack. Though again, I missed the conclusion, so I could be making some of this up!

Keatan had been labouring with a really grotty looking position against Mike for most of the evening - a backward pawn on c6 which needed perpetual defence from a bad bishop on b7 and an offside knight on a6 which didn't seem to be contributing much to the party. However, time pressure then became the key factor, though perversely it was Keatan who was in big trouble on the clock when Mike lost the thread and game. Consistently, I didn't see the end of this one either!

Which was because I was suffering the tortures of the damned against Ben. After an innocuous opening In gradually got the upper hand and Ben felt obliged to sacrifice his e pawn to give himself some space and piece activity.  But after some moves I was able to reorganise and swap off most of the pieces leaving us with rook and knight each and me having an extra pawn. Plus a rook on the 7th rank and a strong knight on e4, while Ben's rook somehow crawled out from a8 to e6 via b8 and b6 and his knight was stuck on e8 defending a pawn on c7. And to cap it all, Ben was in serious time trouble. I was so sure I was winning I comp,letely overlooked the fact that when his rook eventually made it to e6 it was threatening to take my knight and answer a king recapture with the move Nf6 check winning my rook on d7. Ben, though, had seen it and played it instantly! Suddenly I was a piece down (for one measly pawn) and totally lost. Thankfully (for me) the game then degenerated into an almight scramble during which I very luckily hoovered up all Ben's queenside pawns with my king, while retaining my own a pawn. And thankfully I was able to keep Ben's knight sufficiently tied down by the threat to advance this pawn to force a repetition - before his king entered the fray and started munching my two kingside pawns and queening his own h pawn. A very lucky escape for me. Always analyse checks and captures!!

So the points ended up with the A team, but except from Board 1, where Jude's play was a class (or two) above anything else on display that night, the other games were full of human frailty. As I very unoriginally said to Ben afterwards - "chess is a difficult game".

Just writing about the game has brought me out in a but of a cold sweat, so I think we need something with magical, restorative powers for this week's musical offering. I can hardly believe I've never posted this song before. Long overdue! 

Another Trophy!

Well, the season hasn't even started yet and we've already picked up a trophy! Last Tuesday night we made a sad/glad (delete as applicable) final visit to Tyseley Working Men's Club, to play in the 2026 edition of the Phil Holt Memorial, alongside teams from Olton (naturally), Halesowen and South Birmingham.

Phil was a stalwart of Olton, playing Board 1 for many, many years and was an absolute giant of the Leamington League - winning the League Blitz tournament, for instance, 14 times between 1996 and 2019,  and leading Olton to 18 league titles. He died tragically early at the age of just 52 in 2022 and the first memorial event was held the following summer, when we fielded 2 teams but didn't really trouble the leader board as Halesowen ran out winners. We weren't invited back in either 2024 or 2025, but this year we were there to take part in a 3 round all play all rapid event of 15' + 10 secs.

I managed to get a strong team together of people who were long standing friends of Phil, and my biggest problem was sorting out the board order, given there were just a handful of rating points between all 4 of us. In the end I chose to use chess activity as the determinant, so we lined up with Bruce on Board 1, me on 2, Andrew on 3 and Andy on 4. I rejected a suggestion by Andrew to order the team by handsome-ness, as that could only have led to large-scale civil war!

In round 1 we kicked off against Olton, who included 3 of their regular 4 LDCL A team, but we were in pretty imperious form and scored a 3.5-0.5 win, with onlyAndrew dropping a half point, though I gather he was winning earlier in the game, so it could easily have been 4-0. Which was the score we followed up with in each of the next 2 rounds against, first, South Birmingham and then Halesowen. The final round encounter on Board 1 between Stewart Fishburne and Bruce was very much in the spirit - if not the accuracy - of Phil's style of play and I'm sure he would have found it massively amusing. Stewart, with White, threw the kitchen sink at Bruce's king, but it was his own king that wound up the more exposed and it was eventually mated on h4 after a vicious counter-attack. This was unquestionably the game of the night from what I saw.

So, the final scores were:-

1 Kenilworth 11.5/12

2=Olton and Halesowen 4.5/12

4 South Birmingham 3.5/12

Our prize, apart from a very nice trophy, was to have the "privilege" of organising the 2027 event! 

Mark Page, whose selection and board order policies were totally vindicated by the results, receives the Phil Holt Memorial Trophy from Rob Reynolds of Olton.

Its been a long time since we had any music, so let's rectify that right now!

Great song. Not sure about the Confederate flags, though!

Game of the Month - July, 2026

Its been rather a long time (no need to be any more specific than that, thank you) since our last Game of the Month, but we're back with a bang, in the shape of a pair of tremendous wins by Jude against the mega-strong IM Brandon Clarke.

Jude had to take a bit of a sabbatical from chess in the first part of the year, due to the looming spectre of GCSE exams, but he has returned to the competitive arena with a series of tremendous results in recent weeks. First there was a 2nd= finish at the South Wales International, where he had an excellent win over GM Peter Wells, and then he actually managed to gain some more rating points as the lowest ranked player in the monstrously strong (Mickey Adams could only manage 50%!) Wood Green Invitational, all play all. But it seems as though he was just warming up in these two events, as he then racked up a superb 4th= placing at the Sussex University Masters which finished yesterday. This included draws against GMs Williams and Kovchan (and a very near miss of a whole point against GM Kjartansson) and wins over an IM and two FMs for a rating performance of 2424, just missing an IM norm! He's definitely redicovered his mojo - just in time for the British Championships.

There were some very impressive games I could have selected from these recent efforts, but instead I've gone back to last year for two splendid, but very contrasting, victories with the Black pieces. The first is ultra impressive, as he sacs a piece for a big kingside attack and then keeps the pressure right through to the end of the game when Brandon sportingly allowed Jude to finish with mate on the board. The second was very significant, as it was the game that got Jude over 2300 ELO and so secured his FM title. Brandon looked set to get his revenge for the earlier game, but Jude defended like a demon, rode his luck and then jumped out to deliver a crushing counter attack (boom!!), which culminated with him twice sacrificing his rook to force either checkmate or the win of the White queen.

This is chess from a much higher plane than most of us can even dream of. Hope you enjoy playing through the games as much as I have.

2026 British Championships - On Your Marks: Get Set: ........

 .... And on August 1st it will be Go! With the Championships taking place right on our doorstep at Warwick University (for the third time after previous visits in 1970 and 2015) a bumper KCC turnout could reasonably be expected and with just over two weeks to go it seems like all the usual suspects, plus a couple of newcomers, will be on the start line come D-Day.

So, as things stand as of today, and as far as I have been able to identify, here is a list of all the intended KCC participants.

By my reckoning, Keatan, Ben and Joshua have entered the most tournaments (4) while the more seriously minded individuals like myself, Jude and Billy have eschewed this scattergun approach and focussed on a single event. Clearly we mean business. (Though I wouldn't be surprised to see the youngsters weaken and sign up for a blitz event or two. I can guarantee I won't!)

Amazingly, Joshua seems to have the best chance of winning a tournament, as he currently sits as the number one seed in the highly prestigious Sunday Rapidplay Under 2000. And with a rating of 1997 its probably unlikely that anyone will displace him from this position!

But looking at the real championship events, we really should take a moment to glory in the fact that Jude and Billy are playing in the main event for what seems like the umpteenth time, despite their tender years. While in the Under 8 events, the terrific twosome of Riyaan and Anish are very hightly ranked, which is all the more remarkable given that they will both be eligible for this event next year so are giving away a whole 12 months to most of the field. Our other particiapnts with single figure start rankings at the moment are Joshua (again!) who is 3 in the Weekday PM Under 2050 (he really is homing in on the most important events, isn't he?); Rhys, who is 4th in the Weekday AM Under 1900; and Dhairya who, fresh from his splendid return from the chess wilderness in the 1st leg of the Club Quickplay Championship this week, starts at number 5 in the Under 16 Rapidplay.

In all, we are presently due to have 13 KCC participants, but with events to fit all playing strengths, ages, time limits and days of the week, there's still plenty of time for others to put their toe in the water and play at the national championships. I'd be willing to bet that it won't be this convenient again for a few years, so don't let this golden opportunity pass if you are even slightly tempted.

Good luck to all. Including myself. If we are lucky Joshua may be moved to repeat his daily reporting that has been a feature of selected previous championships, even if some (one?) of us most vividly recall the day he didn't post a report and so avoided having to mention my triumph (shared) in the 2019 65+ event!

No reason whatsoever for today's musical contribution. Except that it suddenly came to mind and it seemed like a good idea.

Adios Amigo

Well, I tried to stop him going, but it was inevitable that in the end he would. Maybe I should have tried a personal musical plea like this? Though I doubt it could have had any effect. Some things just have to be.

And so the unthinkable has finally come to pass - Javier has departed from our shores and returned to Spain, after three and a half seasons playing very high quality and successful chess for Kenilworth. Of course, we won the Leamington League Division 1 and Open KO Cup double in each of the 4 seasons he played for us, as well as the Coventry League for the first - and only - time in 2023.  His record for the club was truly remarkable:-

In total his score was 40 pts from 52 games - all of them on Board 1, except when Jude was playing - with a performance score of 76.9%. Fittingly he saved the best for last, with a record breaking 8.5/9 in the most recent season, which saw him crowned as our Player of the Year. This was richly deserved, as he had finished runner-up in the two preceding seasons.

Javier receives the small, but highly prestigious, Tilley Trophy as the KCC Player of the Year 2025-26. (Though he wasn't allowed to take the cup away, of course!) Chairman Bernard doing the presenting.

But numbers only tell half the story. As well as being a tremendous player, Javier was just a great guy, and while he drove me nearly mad by habitually arriving late for matches, I shouldn't really have panicked, as he always turned up in the end. Even when he went to the wrong venue once last season it was only a minor inconvenience, as he forgot we'd moved to the Holiday Inn and went to the Abbey Club out of habit! Or maybe it was out of a deep affection for that venue, as it was where he turned up (on February 13, 2023 if I'm not mistaken!) and - talk about serendipity - happened to bump into another Spanish-speaking strong player in the shape of Paul, who was there monitoring the performance of three of our juniors (Katya, Zac and Lionel) in a D team match. And almost instantly he knew that Kenilworth was the club for him, and we knew that Javier was the player for us!

For the sake of posterity and historical record, I feel obliged to record the names of the 5 people who actually managed to beat him in Kenilworth matches. In the Leamington League he lost only to IM James Jackson and Stratford's Ben Larkin, while in the Coventry League - which clearly didn't suit him nearly as well - he lost to the very strong Warwick University players Viktor Stoyanov and Arya Cont and also to ............. Joshua!!  How that happened I don't know. Maybe Javier had eaten a dodgy paella or a stale bocadillo and wasn't feeling well? It surely can't have been because Josh played better, can it??

Thankfully there is no record of that game, but there is a record of this one. It wasn't played in a Kenilworth match, but it did happen close by, in Daventry, while Javier was a KCC Member, so we can share a bit of the glory. I have a feeling he might not have been the first Kenilworth player to beat this particular GM, but for the life of me I can't think who might have done it first. Maybe the name will come back to me sometime.

Javier will be massively missed, but we were very lucky to have had him in our club for nearly 4 years. I'll certainly miss him as a friend and as a very loyal and reliable team player, both for KCC and for Warwickshire Select in the 4NCL, where he helped us get promoted into Division 1 - and stay there! I'm sure we all send him our very best wishes for the future and hope that one day we may even get to see him again. But come what may, he already has a firm place in KCC history as our one and only Man of La Mancha. Thank you, Javi. Buena suerte and adios, amigo. 

World Cup Fever - How Chess Can Help You Pick the Winner!

It may, or more probably may not, be coming home, but despair not - even if England are not going to win the World Cup - and let's be honest, it really doesn't look like we will - we can still secure ourselves a little bit of glory by correctly tipping the winners. And while the bookies have France as very strong favourites, I think I have found a way to outwit them.

We all know that chess is the greatest game ever invented - certainly better than Snap or Old Maid or that other card game that very old people play when they've given up caring - so why wouldn't it also help to work out the winners of the greatest sport ever invented? Answer: it would! Which means I have hit on a fool-proof way to work out who will be lifting the Jules Rimet Trophy (oops, showing my age there, its now been replaced by the uninspiringly named FIFA World Cup Trophy) after the final. Clearly the winners are going to be the team with the most Grand Masters in their team!

Well not actual Grand Masters, of course, as England's chances would be even lower if we were relying on Ray Keene between the sticks, for instance. What we need to look for are teams that have players with the same name as Grand Masters - the more they've got, and the higher they're rated, the more chance they've surely got of winning the World Cup? So let's see how they all stack up.

Team	Grand Masters	GM Country	Rating
Mexico	Martinez	Mexico	2650
	Martinez	Cuba	2455
South Africa	Williams	England	2455
	Adams	England	2622
Canada	Jones	England	2639
	Davies	England	2276
Brazil	Santos (Latasa)	Spain	2632
	Santos (Ruiz)	Spain	2604
Scotland	Adams	England	2622
	Gordon	England	2429
	Shankland	USA	2647
Paraguay	Sosa	Argentina	2546
	Fernandez	England	2539
	Fernandez	USA	2420
	Fernandez	Spain	2350
	Gomez	Spain	2371
	Gomez	Philippines	2365
Turkey	Yilmaz	Turkey	2556
USA	Turner	Scotland	2460
	Adams	England	2622
Curacao	(Curt) Hansen	Denmark	2590
	(Sune Berg) Hansen	Denmark	2490
	Hansen	Norway	2383
Ecuador	Rodriguez	Argentina	2422
Germany	Anton	Spain	2657
	Pavlovic	Serbia	2406
Japan	Nakamura	USA	2792
Sweden	Smith	Sweden	2439
	Smith	USA	2367
New Zealand	Smith	Sweden	2439
	Smith	USA	2367
Spain	Garcia	Colombia	2475
	Garcia	Italy	2396
	Ruiz	Colombia	2474
	Williams	England	2455
	Munoz	Peru	2316
Uruguay	Martinez	Mexico	2650
	Martinez	Cuba	2455
	Rodriguez	Argentina	2422
France	Hernandez	Mexico	2398
Norway	Berg	Sweden	2474
Argentina	Martinez	Mexico	2650
	Martinez	Cuba	2455
	Gonzalez	Cuba	2530
	Gonzalez	Mexico	2466
	Gonzalez	Costa Rica	2453
	Gonzalez (Garcia)	Spain	2426
	Gonzalez (Perez)	Spain	2391
	Lopez	Spain	2486
	Fernandez	England	2539
	Fernandez	USA	2420
	Fernandez	Spain	2350
Colombia	Munoz	Peru	2316
	Rios	Colombia	2405
	Rodriguez	Argentina	2422
	Hernandez	Mexico	2398
	Gomez	Spain	2371
	Gomez	Philippines	2365
Portugal	Costa	Germany	2540
	Fernandes	Portugal	2298
Uzbekistan	Yusupov	Germany	2537
England	Gordon	England	2429
Ghana	Williams	England	2455
Panama	Martinez	Mexico	2650
	Martinez	Cuba	2455
	Rodriguez	Argentina	2422

As you can imagine, we aren't going to have an African winner, as they can only manage 3 name-alike GMs in all their squads combined, despite a double appearance by the Ginger GM Simon Williams for South Africa and Ghana. And its even worse for Asia, as it can only muster 2 GM name-alikes - though that does include the highest rated chess player at this World Cup in the shape of the 2792 rated Hikaru Nakamura - but he couldn't win it for Japan by himself, which explains why they've already been knocked out!

There are currently 6 teams quoted at odds of 20/1 or less, but my method (or maybe I should call it My System?) can instantly rule out four of these. England and hot favourites France have no chance, with only one GM each in their ranks. I slightly favour England of the two, as at least Stephen Gordon is an English GM, while France's GM name-alike comes from Mexico. We can also cross off Portugal and Brazil, as they are not much better with just 2 GMs each and in this case I favour Brazil, with two very strong 2600+ players. Portugal do have one home-grown GM, but he's rather lowly rated these days!

Which leaves just 2 of the big dogs in the reckoning - Spain and Argentina. Europe's top hopes have 5 GMs (with 4 different names including the ubiquitous Simon Williams!) in their squad, but none are even rated 2500 currently, so they are obviously missing a bit of fire power. Which can't said about Argentina, who weigh in with a completely full team of 11 GMs, headed by Jose Martinez (now of Mexico and rated 2650) with Dan Fernandez of England (2539) on second board. (Rather than Board 5, which is where he sits in the recently announced England team for the next Chess Olympiad!) Disappointingly, they can only muster 4 different names - but as they have both a Gonzalez and a Fernandez (the two best names for this game!) in their squad, they have way more strength in depth than Spain.

So there you have it - the 2026 World Cup winners are going to be Argentina, while the surprise runners-up will be ............. Paraguay! Yes folks, you read it here first. The currently 500/1 outsiders are going to upset those odds and make it all the way to the final. (My System told you they'd knock Germany out - and they're going to do the same to France!) They will be outgunned there by Argentina, but what a great effort its going to be. They have - ironically! - Argentina's Tomas Sosa as their strongest player amongst 6 GM name-alikes and it will be interesting to see how the 3 Fernandezes cope with playing for both teams at once! But they are GMs so they're clever guys. I reckon they'll find a way round it. Colombia are another very strong team, also fielding 6 GMs, but they have the misfortune to be in the same half of the draw as Argentina, so they are going to lose that encounter - even though they have 5 different named GMs playing for them - including one of their own in the shape of GM Rios.

I have every confidence in these predictions, even though I am struggling to explain the early departures of Scotland, Uruguay and Panama from the tournament, despite having 3 GMs each. And in Scotland's case that included having two 2600+ GMs led by Sam Shankland (2647). Must have beem bad management, I guess. The system obviously can't be wrong! As Nimzowich doubtless also said after the occasional loss!!

No real need for any music with this post, but I'm afraid that following my recent discovery of "Dark End of the Street" I've become a bit fascinated by the song. It turns out the world and his wife (probably not an acceptable term anymore - sorry!) have covered this song, including some truly great names. How did I get to my age and not know about it? Anyway, to add to the Flying Burrito Brothers and Gregg Allman versions, here are three more. We start with the original recording by James Carr. Then its the turn of Linda Ronstadt and we finish (for now at least!) with the great Aretha Franklin. Choose your favourite, but please do not send me the answer on a postcard or any other form of communication!

Though for what its worth my preferences are, in descending order, - (1) Flying Burrito Brothers (2) James Carr (3) Aretha Franklin (4) Linda Ronstadt and (5) Gregg Allman. But there are at least three more versions that I know of, so the fight for top spot is not over yet!

KCC Chairman Makes Remarkable Claim!

Imagine my shock when I saw the back page of The i Paper on Saturday and this dramatic headline!

Bernard's Outrageous Claim!!

I can only assume that the recent hot spell has resulted in  our revered and beloved Chairman suffering from a serious case of heat stroke which has affected his judgment! I'm afraid that even having Jude and him in the same Kenilworth team would mean we were a bit weak on the lower boards, so its a complete act of self-delusion if he thinks he could get into our national side! Take a reality check, Bernard - the selectors are not picking you for the next Olympiad team!!

You'd never catch me making such ridiculous claims about my personal talents, though a completely reliable source like Wikipedia does say:-

Page is considered to be one of the greatest and most influential guitarists of all time.^[1][2][3] Rolling Stone magazine has described Page as "the pontiff of power riffing" and ranked him No. 3 on its 2015 list of the "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time", behind Jimi Hendrix and Eric Clapton, and No. 3 again in 2023 behind Chuck Berry and Jimi Hendrix.^[4][5][6] In 2010, Page was ranked No. 2 on Gibson's list of "Top 50 Guitarists of All Time" and, in 2007, No. 4 on Classic Rock's "100 Wildest Guitar Heroes"

I rest my case. But if you need more evidence ..........