A Night to Forget...

 In order to draw a hasty veil over last night's proceedings, we will keep this match report relatively brief. We were reasonably evenly matched on paper against Solihull B, and actually outpointed them in terms of our grading average, but it was fair to say that little went our way.

I was the first to finish, on Board 2 against Julian Summerfield. Not the most exciting of games, it has to be said. A lot of wood came off early, and there was no real way for either side to make progress. I've not had the best of records against Julian in the last couple of years, so was happy enough. We retreated to the bar and had a very nice drink and a catch up. I think both feeling that Kenilworth probably had the edge in the other three games. Still, as we all know, there is many a slip between cup and lip...

Michal had snatched the poisoned "b" pawn, on Board 1 against Tony Sadler, but seemed to have digested it pretty well. Unfortunately, a slight miscalculation saw a promising position turn to dust, and we were down 1.5 - 0.5.

Dhairya's position out of the opening against Ian Brodie on Board 3 was as wild as ever. However, for once, I feared it wasn't better. Yet Dhairya seemed to gradually improve the situation and was certainly winning at one point. However, post my return from the bar, something had clearly gone awry, and he was down a piece. Credit to Dhariya for proceeding to make Ian work exceptionally hard, before finally succumbing when both were below a minute on the clock.

The heartbreak of the night award goes to Solomon, who completely bossed his game against Matthew Allen. At every stage he had the initiative and seemed to be making good choices, without yielding a breakthrough. Finally a pawn race ensued. Matthew queened a move earlier, but Solomon queened with check and still seemed to have the play. However, when the checks petered out, the key factor was the better positioning of Matthew's King. Ultimately the black monarch and consort worked exceptionally well together. Solomon's pawns dropped off and the game was lost. Painful to watch and I'm sure even more so to play. We've all been there. Such is the life of a chess player.

So, a disappointing evening, but these things happen. We know we can do better, and will look to put things right in next week's cup game against the same opponents.