Prescient chap that Duke of Wellington - even if he never actually said or wrote the famous words. Far from referring to the Battle of Waterloo, I think he was actually looking forward to September 17th 2016, and our away KO Cup match against Banbury.
In this repeat of last season's final (which we won 3.5-1.5), our hosts had considerably beefed up their team with the inclusion of James Jackson on Board 1, while we fielded virtually the same side except we substituted Andy P for the inevitably absent Andy B. This meant the two teams were almost evenly matched on average grade, even though there were large discrepancies on some boards.
Carl was first to finish on Board 4. With Carl playing Black against the whirlwind Chris Evans, I was very glum when I first looked at the position. Material was dead level, but Carl's king (castled on the queenside, was under what looked like a big attack with a horrible knight fork on b6 threatened. Then I realised that it was actually Carl's move and that the dangerous knight was en prise. So, Carl was a piece up, and a few minor alarms later we had the first point in the bag. (BTW, Carl had hotfooted it to Banbury straight from work and, immaculately suited and booted, effortlessly also won the best turned out prize.)
I was engaged in a Cup Final rematch against Dan Rowan, and we played the same variation as twice before - both of which I had won. He improved on his previous play, but still the Black position was hanging by a thread as his king got stuck in the middle on an open e file. He bailed out to a double rook and bishop ending a pawn down but then blundered what we both thought was an exchange, though it wasn't. Nevertheless, his resignation was correct as he was about to lose a second, and probably third, pawn anyway. 2-0 to Kenilworth.
At this point I was pretty confident, although Board 1 was a concern, as Paul had done his usual impractical thing of spending far too much time in the opening. He emerged with an advantage, as Black's entire queenside was virtually stuck, but he then opened the game too early instead of applying a squeeze, and Black's pieces came to life as the massive clock discrepancy proved crucial. Score now 2-1 to us.
Still, I wasn't worried, as Ben seemed to be playing a good game against Gary Jackson on Board 5, and was definitely doing all the pressing. A temporary pawn sac seemed to have really clogged up Black's position and I was hopeful of a full point. But when I looked again, Ben was a pawn down in a double rook ending and although I was hoping it was still a draw, it didn't end that way, so the scores were all tied up at 2-2.
But even now, I was supremely confident. On Board 2, Andy had been well on top against Paul Rowan from just out of the opening. He grabbed the open c file, hopped in with a knight, won a pawn and penetrated to the seventh rank. The White position collapsed and further material was lost - game surely over in our favour? Not so fast! When I returned from my post-mortem a hurricane had blown through the position. Andy was queening a passed f pawn (crucially with check) but White had somehow created connected passed e and d pawns which were not only going to yield a queen, but also win a bishop. And Andy was well down on the clock. With a large crowd watching, and our man apparently completely unaware of the match situation (or the tie break rules), he reached an ending of Queen and 3 pawns against a queen and knight. Thankfully Andy had a perpetual (he so nearly had a forced win of the White queen) and now my only worry was that he'd think he needed to try to win - hardly practical with about a minute left! - but, still in blissful ignorance of the match situation, a handshake signalled the ending of hostilities and the match was tied 2.5-2.5.
I had taken the precaution of checking the rules to establish the tie break method. If it had been Board Count, we would have lost 6-7, but - praise the LDCL Committee - it is actually Elimination, so with Banbury's win on Board 5 removed, we were the victors and we had, just, cleared the first hurdle in our defence of the Cup. And so its on to a Semi-Final at the end of January against either Leamington or Solihull.
No comments:
Post a Comment