Despite a fairly ordinary league campaign, Solihull can put out a pretty strong team when all their players are available, so we needed a powerful quintet to repel the challenge. Thankfully we had exactly that, and ran out 4.5-0.5 winners of the cup match, and 3.5-0.5 winners over the top 4 boards for the league points.
As in seemingly all matches these days, it felt pretty tense and very much in the balance for the initial phase of the evening, but as the clock approached 22.00 things turned decisively in our favour. When the going got tough, our guys got going! When England played a match against China in Liverpool in 2008 (6 rounds of 8 boards), the games kept swinging in China's favour (they won 28-20) during the fifth hour of play. To such an extent that this period was christened "The Chinese Hour". We're not quite in the same league as that Chinese team (Wang Yue, Ni Hua, Bu Xiangzhi, Hou Yifan etc), but - last night at least - we definitely mustered a "Kenilworth Half Hour".
The one person who didn't really contribute to this was Andrew, but only because he had already won after a very polished performance with the Black pieces against Ray Carpenter on Board 4. Not only did he win a pawn, but the extra pawn was passed and on f3 tying down the White pieces. A nifty rook manoeuvre won a second pawn to give connected passed g and f pawns, and while Ray was able to reach a minor piece ending and set up a blockade with his king and knight to prevent the further advance of these pawns, Andrew then started a king march towards the wide open White queen side pawns. In an impossible position Ray lost on time.
Earlier I had been initially optimistic about Javier's position on Board 2 against Andrew McCumiskey, especially as he won a clear centre pawn and doubled the White g pawns. But this had come at the cost of weakening his own kingside, so that he had to castle long. Andrew then uncorked a very nice knight sac which couldn't be taken, and when the combinational smoke cleared the extra pawn had gone and White looked to be pressing against some weak Black pawns. But Javier kept his cool - marching his king down to b3; installing a rook on c2 and threatening to break decisively in the centre with an e4 push that would have created a monster passed pawn on d4. Andrew could have kept some chances of holding the position if he had swapped a pair of rooks off, but failing to do this, Javier doubled rooks on the c file and suddenly - from almost nowhere - it was unstoppable mate! The Kenilworth Half-Hour was up and running!
And then the big match up on Board 1 between Jude and Don Mason also resolved itself after a very interesting, and pretty high level, encounter. Don played very actively and seemed to have an initiative, but Jude first shored up his position and then started jumping into some good squares with threats against some weak Black pawns. He eventually won a pawn and with his time about to expire Don couldn't find a way to continue and resigned. It was apparently not yet a completely won position for Jude, but with the extra pawn and extra time there could only have been one winner.
So that meant we were home and dry, with a 3-0 lead in both the league and cup matches. Keatan was pushing hard to chalk up another win against Akshath Shivakumar on Board 4 and tried everything possible to engineer a breakthrough in a knight ending, where he had just a slight space advantage in a near symmetrical position. But there was simply no way to create a passed pawn or infiltrate with the king or knight and he had to reluctantly agree to a draw.
This left Bruce in action against Julian Summerfield on Board 5, in a game which was something of a slow burner. But as the time control approached Bruce went for the jugular with a king side attack. His queen jumped in to the Black position and it became extremely difficult for Julian to hold the defence together. Despite terrible time pressure he managed to neutralise the direct attack, but only at the cost of a seemingly irrelevant (to me) pawn on a6. But in fact it was exceedingly relevant, because a couple of moves later a White pawn got to a7 and shortly after - once Bruce had made sure not to allow even a glimpse of a perpetual check escape - it cost Black a whole rook when it went one square further. Tense, hair raising stuff - but once again the Kenilworth Half Hour had worked its magic!
This double victory meant we finished 8 points clear of Warwick University in Division 1, for a sixth successive league title. Unfortunately the students finished the season - as I had suspected they would - by winning against Olton and Leamington on successive nights (by a score of 7.5-0.5!) to pip our B team to second place on game points. In the Cup, we will be going for a sixth successive victory against Leamington on finals night at Olton on May 12th. When Ben's u-8750 team will be attempting to make it three wins in a row.
It only remains to choose this week's musical offering. Something dynamic and upbeat, I think, to reflect my mood. And you can't get much more upbeat than this. Absolutely brilliant. Can music be any more uplifting and life affirming? Who wouldn't want to be a rock star after seeing this?!
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