A Rook, A Bishop, And a Passed Pawn That Didn't Quite Make It

Kenilworth D were at Home to Leamington B on a very cold and rainy Monday night. We ended up 2-2, but that scarcely tells the story of what was a dramatic match.

Proceedings started with us being in the somewhat unorthodox position of having five players in the house. Roy Watson thought there was another game on, but when he found out there wasn't, he stayed for the evening. It was lovely to see Roy and we all appreciated his support and company.

So first to the rook. I was white on Board 2 against Joshua Simpson when we reached the position below. 

 

I suspect if I had been playing 3 minute chess on Lichess, I would have played Rxf7 in a heartbeat and seen what happened. But in a League game, you need to be sure it actually works, or you can end up looking rather foolish. I probably broke my record for my longest ever think (certainly in a 3 hour game) and spent 45 minutes looking at the variations. At the end of which, I was convinced it worked. I still needed to give myself a pep-talk that I couldn't really leave the venue at peace with myself if I didn't play it. So I did! There really is no defence - and Fritz scores white as +7! A few minutes later we were 1-0 up and I was very happy!

Now to the pawn. On Board 3, Bernard Rogers found himself in a fantastic position against Alex Kagkalis. His pieces and pawns were completely suffocating Alex, and it seemed only a matter of time until Bernard broke through and either queened a super-strong passed pawn or cleaned up enough material to make the victory inevitable one way or another. Unfortunately, Bernard hesitated, ran very low on time and missed a couple of chances. This allowed Alex to wriggle free and bring home an unlikely point. Bernard has been unlucky of late, frequently getting into great positions and not converting. But as they say in football, if a striker keeps getting into the box, the goals will follow. It's clearly only a matter of time until Bernard starts securing the results his early game dominance has deserved.

On Board 4, Dan Bayliss was eventually squeezed out, following a good game against Tom Cockell. A slight weakness in Dan's pawn structure and marginally less active pieces were enough to keep Tom plugging away to good effect. An interesting game, but unfortunately we were now 2-1 down.

Finally to the Bishop, which proved decisive in Paul Badger's Board 1 game against Chris Ward. There seemed to be no prospect of Paul securing more than a draw (and indeed Paul had offered one back when Bernard seemed to be winning.) However, at the death, Chris missed a tactic... Paul found a Bishop check which forced a back-rank mate, to give us a share of the spoils after all!

A very lively night, with lots of twists and turns. After which we put all the pieces back into their bags. The rooks, bishops, pawns and all the rest of them, inanimate objects once more. Doubtless waiting for their next opportunity to add further chapters to their stories.