Dhairya and Dan Excel vs Banbury A

 We always knew Banbury "A" Away was going to be one of the C team's toughest fixtures this season. Even if we'd been at full strength they would have been heavy favourites. Missing Dave, Paul and Rhys, it seemed like an even tougher gig. This initial appraisal seemed to be confirmed when we arrived to find IM James Jackson in the house, and an exceptionally strong Banbury line up awaiting us. I guess we have to take that as a sign of their respect for Kenilworth...

In the event we went down 3-1 but with two exceptional performances. First up, Dan shrugged off a near 400 point rating differential against Tom Day to put us 1-0 up. It was an excellent game, in which Dan, making his Division 1 debut, unleashed a supurb tactic to trap Tom's queen. A real testament to Dan's continuing progress. What a great effort! Dan is becoming a force to be reckoned with.

Myself and Dylan (also making his Division 1 debut) both struggled against stronger players with the black pieces. I don't recall playing Georgs Vikanis before, but while I made a game of it, the truth is it was never particularly close. Meanwhile Gary Jackson built up a brutal looking attack against Dylan and we were both finished around the two hour mark.

All of which left Dhairya against James Jackson. I can't remember seeing an effort as good as Dhairya's. Perhaps aided by the fact that he had no idea who James was until afterwards, Dhairya played brilliantly!! While he was never winning, he took James into a level rook and pawn and then a level pawn endgame, which James said afterwards was "extremely difficult." Ultimately James found a way to exploit his slightly better pawn structure, but Dhairya had pushed him to the very limit. A terrific game! Sometimes the result does not tell the whole story, so hopefully this write-up rebalances that, by giving Dhairya all the accolades he deserves for his incredible performance. 

As one of the Banbury players said to me afterwards "where do you keep finding these amazing juniors?" I just smiled - we are very lucky to have Dhairya and Dylan to say nothing of all the other juniors in our ranks, whatever team they are in.

There are no easy Division 1 games, but I'm hopeful that if we keep playing like this, we will win some matches. Even though we lost last night, I left feeling particularly proud of what Dhairya and Dan had achieved.

Billy is a Warwickshire Champion - and Nearly Doubles Up!

Though this report is a bit belated, I couldn't let last weekend's Warwickshire Rapid and Blitz Championships pass without recording the fact that KCC has another Warwickshire Champion! Billy put up a dazzling performance to take first place in Sunday's Blitz event, conceding just a single draw to Finlay Bowcott-Terry, and ending up with 13.5/14 after 7 double rounds. This put him 1.5 points clear of the field, which was dominated by young Warwickshire players.  Billy, who recorded a massive TPR of 2416, follows Javier, who won in 2023, as a recent KCC holder of this title.

And it was so nearly a double triumph for our young Candidate Master, as he was just edged out of first place in Saturday's Rapid event, where his unbeaten 6/7 saw him finish second to Finlay Bowcott-Terry. After a draw between the two of them, the title was decided when Billy dropped half a point to the experienced South Birmingham player Cory Hazlehurst in Round 6. Which meant he "only" posted a rapid TPR of 2350. These are numbers most of us can only dream about!

A truly astonishing weekend then for Billy, going undefeated over 21 games, and conceding just 3 draws! I'm afraid chess really is a young person's game. Which isn't particularly good news for me on the eve of playing in the European Seniors Championships!!

This performance definitely deserves a song. If only we could all have chess days like Billy.

B - Dazzling

After being on the receiving end of a rather brutal score line at the hands of Kenilworth A, the B team's second match of the season saw a complete reversal of fortune as Solihull A were despatched by a very impressive 3.5-0.5. But yet again, and as I seem to write in every match report, the bare score hides the drama of the evening, as every board could well have ended differently. Such is chess at our level! So let's just celebrate a very impressive victory, without getting too hung-up about how we got there!!

David was making one of his rare appearances for the club, but showed that despite (a) now being in full time employment and (b) seemingly hardly ever playing a game of chess, he is still a rather formidable opponent by taking down Don Mason, with Black, on Board 1. David seemed to be taken by surprise in the opening, but when Don failed to play a very strong line early on, David played near perfect chess. He occupied the centre and forced Don into a dangerous, but unsound, piece sac, after which he took over for a very surprisingly quick win, against a formidable opponent who had gone through last season unbeaten in the Leamington League.

Joshua dodged an even bigger bullet on Board 3 against Julian Summerfield as he lost a pawn to a White rook on the seventh rank for - seemingly - no compensation whatsoever. But, as we've seen on countless occasions before, material deficits and dodgy positions don't worry Joshua and somehow he contrived to win back his pawn and then bamboozle Julian into losing a pawn which gave Josh a mighty passed a pawn which duly marched up the board to victory.

So 2-0 to us on our 2 Black boards, and the match victory was confirmed when Mike drew against Tony Sadler on Board 4. Mike won a pawn, but Tony generated a very dangerous kingside attack and its quite likely that all three results were still possible when a draw was agreed deep into mutual time trouble.

Meanwhile, I had won a pawn against Ray Carpenter and when I added a second as we went into a rook and bishops endgame I thought it was all over, especially as I had a massive pawn wedge on d5, e6 and f5 . However, Ray got his king to f6, and even though I was two pawns up and bishops came off, it was far from straightforward. As I proved by going wrong, panicking and giving my rook up for Ray's last pawn to give me passed a and b pawns supported by my king against his rook. But the pawns weren't far enough forward, and Ray's king was too close to the pawns for comfort. In desperate time trouble both players traded mistakes on a regular basis, but Ray made the biggest one of all, when he missed a move that would have won both my pawns and the game. Somehow I bluffed my way into queening one of the pawns, and in the resultant q v r ending Ray couldn't get a good co-ordination of his last two pieces, eventually losing on time as I was poised to deliver mate or win his rook. Not a game to be proud of, but all I can say is a win's a win!

Time for some music. And who doesn't love a bit of Blue Sky?

Natural Order Restored

After last season's shocking events when the B team took 3 match points off the A team, the world seems to have been put back on its normal axis and natural order to have been restored. The A team prevailed in the first of this season's 2 encounters last night by 3.5-0.5 - but only after a tough fight. It seemed likely to be a closer result for much of the evening, but as the positions got critical it was the A team players who packed the bigger punch.

Kenilworth B (on right, front to back - Ben, Rhys, Mike and Josh) v Kenilworth A (on left, front to back - Andy, Andrew, Keatan and Jude)

Andrew was the first to bring in the full point, beating Rhys after a chaotic game in which I had great difficulty counting up the pieces for each side. At one point I thought Andrew was two pawns down for nothing. Then I saw he had two rooks to Rhys's one and assumed he had an exchange by way of compensation. Then afterwards I discovered that Andrew had actually been a whole rook up! Good job I wasn't playing. The game finished in a flurry of tactics which ended up with Rhys's queen falling off.

History was made in the second game to finish when the first FM ever to play a match for Kenilworth notched up the full point for the A team. (Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think KCC's first ever FM, Adam Collinson, got the title after leaving the area.) Yes, Jude won the battle of the J-men against Joshua after a very smooth and convincing game, where he ended up annexing a large number of Josh's pawns. Playing Black against Jude is not an easy task these days!

I was then on hand to witness the exciting climax of the Bd 4 encounter between Ben and the seldom-sighted Andy B. Andy had seemed to be better out of the opening, and Ben's position looked a bit passive, but he had somehow whipped up a very dangerous looking attack against Andy's king on a8, with rooks on a3 and b1 (both semi-open files), a queen on b3 and a bishop on f2. Despite being short of time (of course) he then uncorked the very aesthetically pleasing move Qb6 (Black had pawns on a7 and b7) threatening mate by Rxa7+.  (He may also have been threatening Q x N on c6, when bxc6 could have been met by Rxa7 mate, but I can't remember if Black was defending laterally along his own second rank with a rook. Well, there was a lot going on!) A lesser man might have fallen off his chair (or started to run for the hills with his king (Kb8), but Andy had anticipated Ben's Frank Marshall-esque move and uncorked a splendid combo involving QxR on b1 and after kxb1 (Qxb1 Re1 would also have won back the queen) then checks on the first and second ranks with the two black rooks forcing the White king to b3, when Rb1 check won back the White queen on b6 and left Andy with a won Rook and minor piece ending. A very exciting conclusion.

Which just left the possibly even more exciting Board 2 game between Mike and Keatan in play. It looked to me like Mike was better/winning, but the position  was ridiculously tactical, with unprotected pieces flying around the board in all directions. Keatan's king seemed to be in the bigger danger, but Mike's was not entirely safe either. The complexity was making my brain hurt so I left the room, and the players did the same shortly after when neither of them could stand the tension any longer and a draw had been agreed. Though Mike tells me that he had a winning position at the end, but with no time to find the only winning move in a still ridiculously complex position. Full-on, no holds barred chess!

So a mirror image of the score-line from the corresponding fixture last September, and one that sits rather more easily with the natural order of things. The B team still has to play the C team, but at least the A team can now concentrate on playing other clubs!

A purely random musical selection this week. Heard the song for the first time in years at the Abbey Club last night, I like it, so that will have to be reason enough!

Disaster

 I am writing this now, such that tomorrow can truly be another day. Essentially we lost to Stratford and it was all my fault. Dave Ireland had a good win against Richard McNally on one. Dhairya who had answered a late call to play, for which we are hugely grateful, had an excellent draw on three. Paul went down on two, but it was my game against Carl Hibbard which was key.

I picked up a pawn in the opening and built up a very strong attack. As ever, I am my own worst enemy, and I got into time trouble yet again. With a huge advantage on the board, but not much left on my clock, I somehow contrived to pick up the wrong piece. I wasn't sure if Carl had even seen or not, as he was just re-entering the room, but there was no question in my mind that I had to do the sporting thing and play the piece.  Unfortunately, to my horror, all options with it left me completely lost.

Absolutely excruciating, not only costing me the game, but also costing us the match. I would say it was probably the most painful defeat I have ever had, and that's saying something. I don't really have any positives to add. Except perhaps, we've shown again that we can be competitive. Maybe sometimes, we just have to put our personal disasters down to experience and move on.  

There will doubtless be other days, but I am glad this one is done.

C the Stars - but A the Winners

An historic match - Kenilworth C (left, near to far) Ben, Rhys, Paul and Dave v Kenilworth A (right, near to far) Josh, Bruce, Keatan and Billy

In what may - or may not - have been the first ever Kenilworth A v Kenilworth C encounter, the glory was all for the C team, though the spoils - and points - went to the A team. But its Sea The Stars/C the Stars that gets the video!

The games finished in reverse board order, so that Josh and Ben were the first across the finishing line, with Ben's extra pawn in a rook ending countered by Joshua's enormous clock advantage. Black might well have been winning, but he would have to have risked losing to go for the full point and so the game instead ended in a repetition. So slight advantage to the C team with one large rating disadvantage - and one of the A team's White boards comfortably neutralised.

I think I missed much of the excitement in the game between Rhys and Bruce on Board 3, due to socialising with the chess dads (Ed and Nash) in the bar, but apparently the players took it in turn to sac an exchange. Bruce seemed to be a pawn up (I don't really trust my ability to count these days, so I may have got this wrong) but his pawn structure was pretty grotty. Eventually Rhys won back his pawn - after looking for all the world like he was about to fall into a cheapo - and again the A team clock advantage was enough to secure a draw before any of Bruce's weak pawns came under attack.

So not very convincing by the A team so far, but surely the youngbloods on the top two boards would win the day. Eventually yes, but it was by no means straightforward. Keatan seemed to have a really good opening and started building a kingside attack, but Paul B was in no mood to roll over and defended stoutly. At one point Keatan seemed to have got over-optimistic with an exchange sac, but Paul declined to take it and instead started developing his own attack against Keatan's rather exposed king. Black won a pawn (and possibly a second) but in big time trouble Paul found his queen and bishop skewered and when the piece fell off there was no way to adequately defend the back rank. Phew - thank goodness Keatan played this just in time ..............

So at least the A team weren't going to lose, and the match result came down to top board. Dave and Billy had a great set to. Of course, I missed much of the action, but by the time I started watching Dave was up an exchange for a pawn - but Billy had a big mass of centre pawns which was blotting out Dave's bishop on b2. However, White's rook was very active and his queen was also in a very threatening position - but the centre pawns were rolling. It was very tense and there was little time left for either player. Somehow Billy got the exchange back, but Dave then sacked his bishop for Black's three centre pawns, so we ended up with queen h, g and f pawns for Dave and queen, knight and h pawn for Billy. Dave's h3 pawn fell off, but the White queen started checking. And checking. And checking. There may well have been a repetition, but no-one was keeping score. It looked like Billy was making no progress, but he now used the time he had accumulated to find a fantastic plan which ended up with his knight jumping into f3 (check) and supporting it with a king on g4. The engine says it was still drawn but under severe clock pressure Dave couldn't find the only move to save the game, and Billy jumped in on the back rank - crucially with check - to deliver mate. An epic encounter and one that reflected great credit on both players for enormous fighting spirit and imaginative play.

So 3-1 to the A team, but by no means a completely convincing performance. 

Our song celebrates the adventures of Billy's knight, venturing far into enemy territory and - though pinned, seemingly for all eternity - providing the vital support for the Black queen to deliver mate on g1. It was indeed "a long way from home", but crucially it lived to tell the tale! (And yes, I know this song has featured here once before, but I can't think of anything else. It's not easy coming up with something new every post!)