The club's winning start to the season stretched to 4 games last night, as we triumphed 3.5-1.5 in our Open KO Cup quarter final (aka the first round!) away at Shirley. But in the process our unbeaten individual record went for a burton, as Joshua was given a right going over on Board 3 by Darren Whitmore. Still, we can hardly lament that too much, as for a large part of the evening I figured something far worse was going to happen. All five boards were in a highly fluid situation, but we appeared to be losing on Board 3, and slightly off the pace on boards 4 and 5. And not clearly winning on Boards 1 and 2 either! But maybe what was once known as "the Chinese hour", when China's men's team all seemed to shift into overdrive, has (temporarily, I'm sure!) become the Kenilworth hour, since the match moved decisively in our favour as 22.00 came and went.
On Board 5, Bernard C got out of a rather awkward middle-game and into a good knight v bad bishop ending. I'm not sure whether it was worth him playing on in the final position, but possibly relieved at surviving an uncomfortable position, Bernard was happy enough to take a draw against Jonathan Dale. Joshua duly disappeared down the plug hole (have I already mentioned he lost horribly?) but Andrew kept his impressive start to the season going, by defeating Dave Thomas on Board 2 after a slightly hair raising game. His extra queenside pawn was countered by Dave's kingside pressure, but at a crucial point the tide turned. Andrew won two pieces for a rook and took over the whole board to secure the win and level the match. Another fine win with the Black pieces for him.
Meanwhile, I was trying to win a bishop v knight ending against Phil Purcell, but apparently my belief that I was much better was a total delusion according to Mr Fritz. Nevertheless, I was too stupid to know this, so kept pressing and eventually Phil's resistance just failed in severe time trouble. I sacrificed my bishop to get my king in, and with the Black king too far away to help out, my h pawn could not be stopped from queening. Then, having reached 2.5 points to ensure victory on board elimination, another point arrived almost immediately as Lionel (welcome back!) turned a bad/lost position into victory when Keith Ingram tragically blundered a whole piece. So a comfortable looking margin of victory in the end, but it was anything but that for most of the evening.
A semi-final at home to Leamington or Stratford in the New Year now awaits us, as we attempt to hold on to a trophy we have won 4 times in the last 6 editions.
No prizes for guessing this week's song. I'm rather amazed its taken me this long to get round to choosing it!
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