Excruciating

Me at about 10.15 last night.

Me at about 10.30 last night.

Yes, it was a traumatic evening, and no mistake. We were 1.5-0.5 up on Banbury A and cruising towards an 8th consecutive Leamington League win, when everything that could go wrong, did go wrong. First Joshua had a brain fade and came up with the worst piece of calculation since the designers of the Titanic claimed their ship was unsinkable.  In a position with just a knight and h pawn each, Paul Rowan made a token final effort to win and attacked Joshua's knight, Instead of simply moving it, when he would have been 99% likely to get a chance to sacrifice it for the last White pawn, Joshua thought he could advance his king immediately to secure the same result. Wrong! The knight did indeed get taken, but he had overlooked that on the next move White had a rather obvious king move that ensured the White pawn did not fall off the board. Disaster.

But so what? Instead of 3-1 we will win 2.5-1.5, as Mike is 2 pawns and three minutes up on Nathan Manley, who is down to his last few seconds. For some reason Mike continues to write his moves down, which is always a bad sign. And then it just goes downhill. Mike goes all passive and instead of winning easily, his pawns start to drop off. By the time the queens and bishops have been removed, the two extra queenside pawns have gone, and the last survivor, a once proud warrior on c6, is destined to go the same way. In the knight ending Mike disintegrates and after Nathan fails to notice he can just take Mike's knight for nothing, there is a pawn race in which Mike is one move too late. Black is winning, but executes it incorrectly, and for one brief moment its a draw. But the moment passes, and Black wins. We have lost the match.

I am speechless. Though, in fact, I'm not and say some things that are not in keeping with my normally encouraging and collegiate style of captaincy. Apologies, chaps.  But, really .......... what were you both thinking??

So our 100% record is shot to pieces, and our apparent stroll towards the title is now far less straightforward. Time to regroup and go again.

With future generations of KCC historians in mind, I should just complete the picture by mentioning that Andrew P drew on Board 2 against Gary Jackson and I won against Danut Joian on Board 1. But, and I never thought I'd hear myself saying this, I would rather I had lost and the team won. I've become such a softy in my old age.

I think I can safely say that this was the club's worst night in the Leamington League since the infamous match away to Stratford on April 3, 2014. That ultimately ended happily, as we still won the league title by 4 points, so lets all just keep our fingers crossed that history repeats itself. At least last night we didn't have to experience a rather strained car journey together back to Kenilworth!

Instead of music, I need some soothing images this week. How about a natural wonder, in the shape of a mesmeric starling murmuration?  And for those of a Bill Oddie bent, you can often see a rather smaller murmuration above the unlikely setting of the centre of Dunchurch.

But obviously, all those Byrds have prompted me to include a song after all. Well, I'd hate to disappoint you all, pop pickers!