Its been a long time since I played on consecutive nights for Kenilworth, but Monday and Tuesday of this week saw me back in double action and also gave me the chance for another twofer post, when you get two match reports for the price of one.
On Monday the A team hosted Olton A in the Leamington League. We were distinctly below strength, though still fielding a pretty respectable team, but with Jude, Billy and Keatan all in the Isle of Wight this week, we were missing the youth dynamic that has been a feature of our success in recent years, and Javier was also absent. Fortunately David made one of his rare appearances for the club (nice to see you again!) but he's virtually an old man now that he's in his twenties, so we weren't expecting too much of a youthful dynamic from him, and he didn't disappoint! In fact, he was the first to finish, agreeing a draw with Mark Cundy on Board 2 after his non-mainstream approach failed to get anywhere against Mark's Dutch Defence. My game finished next, with me victorious against Richard Liszewski. Richard went wrong in the early middle game, and after some distinctly sub-optimal play from both parties I eventually won a piece for a couple of pawns and then swapped off all the pieces to secure the point. Unfortunately, though, Andrew lost on Board 1 against Alan Lloyd, and it was all level again. This left Mike to decide the match against Richard Reynolds. Mike had been pressing slightly for most of the game, and I had hopes that Richard would find the defence too difficult in time pressure, but when Mike went the wrong way about winning a stray Black pawn, Richard was able to steer the game into an opposite bishops ending that was easily drawn despite the pawn minus. So only 2-2 in a match we would have hoped to win, though it was enough - just! - to send the A team back to the top of the table ahead of Banbury A, who had also dropped a point in their most recent match against Stratford A. All still to play for.
Regrettably there was pretty much nothing left to play for in our penultimate Coventry League match of the season last night against Nuneaton A, with bost teams destined to finish amongst the also rans behind Warwick Uni A. But our encounters usually result in competitive matches in which both sides can fancy their chances when play starts. Though I didn't fancy our chances much last night almost from the off, when Ben made a horrendous blunder in the opening against Tony Green and was immediately 2 pawns down and lost. As he admitted afterwards, he almost resigned and went home, but thankfully he stayed, rolled up his sleeves and tried to find some way of making life difficult for Tony. And somehow or other he must have succeeded as he produced a miracle save to make a draw!
Which was what also happened on the other three boards as well. In each game White was better/winning, but this counted for nothing in the final analysis as all 4 games were drawn. Paul was a pawn up against Colin Green on Board 3 but was unable to hold on to the extra material in a heavy piece ending, while Mike had to tough it out on Board 2 to get a half point against Paul Davies when the position turned against him and he was saddled with a backwards d pawn and very weak light squares. But tough it out he did to secure the half point. And it was the same result in my game on top board against Phil Briggs, though in this case the White advantage was +2 or +3 for most of the time according to the engine. Not that I realised this completely at the time, as Phil played in his normal imaginative fashion to set plenty of tactical problems, which eventually I failed to solve, and just when I should have been crashing through to victory I wimped out and swapped pieces off to reach a drawn ending. Rather a waste of an overwhelming position, but at least pleasing for those who like a symmetrical result on the match card. 2-2 did neither of us any good - but nor did it do us any harm. And it passed the time quite engagingly ..... though the journey to/from Nuneaton is something of a trek, so thanks to Paul for acting as chauffeur for Mike and myself last night.
Regular readers will be expecting some splendid music to finish this post off, and here it is. Timeless magic from - good grief - over 50 years ago. RIP Dickey Betts, guitarist extraordinaire. In the right hands, I think the electric guitar may well be the greatest invention of all time.
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