Sheffield Nomads Chess Club

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Geoff seemed to be steadily outplayed till Andrew L won one pawn and then another and eventually forced resignation. Andrew H went wrong on move 3 and was expertly taken to pieces by Allan. Ian had his own favourite plan played against him, always a good idea. Disoriented by this masterstroke he lost the exchange and then almost immediately a further piece. I went for a primitive attack which almost payed off till Mick found a great resource, changing the nature of game and leaving me in a good position but without a plan so I bailed out with a draw. Kev was totally, completely, and absolutely lost, with his king on d8 and queen on c8, knights all over his position, almost nothing developed, central pawns rolling towards him. Then about 10pm he cheerily announced,"You're flag's gone." Bewildering. Simon won in a far more conventional manner. Picking up a knight and holding on to eventually leave an unstoppable a pawn. 2½-3½. Woodseats are now 15/15 and if they make it 16/16 against Aughton we are guaranteed another season in Division 2.

Captain's Corner

Thursday night and the C Team travelled to Rotherham for our rescheduled Home game (Don't even ask why). Another do or die match that we needed to win in order to stay up, ... probably. Paul came up with a lame excuse to avoid taking responsibility for getting us relegated, so I was standing in as captain.

I didn't see that much of the other games but as far as I can tell this is what happened: Geoff was first to finish, taking an early draw in order to spend more time watching the other games. Simon lost his Queen for a bishop early on, by getting it pinned against his King. But rather than resign he took the initiative, then he won back a Knight, then an Exchange, and then mated his opponent. He obviously took it literally when he was asked to stand in for Kevin.

I lost after turning down a draw, Oliver won after being behind, Phil lost but I can't remember much about it. Then all eyes turned to Andrews game where he had a Queen and 3 Pawns against Two Rooks and 3 Pawns. Andrew calmly won one pawn, then a second, then the third, and then both rooks. Hooray.

Staying up may or may not be guaranteed, but it's certainly more likely than it would have been if we had lost.

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Dear Oh Dear :-(

And it all started so well. Kev won very early on, starting with a tactic to win his opponent's queen which turned into a mate. 1-0. At this point Geoff looked as thought he was maybe slightly on the back foot, but nothing serious, Andrew looked as though he might be getting on top, and Ian and Simon had very good positions. The only problem was Phil who had been anti-Benkoed with a4 and was under pressure on the Kingside.

Next to finish was Geoff who held the draw. This was one of the boards where we might have been expected to struggle so a ½ was welcome. 1½-½. Andrew was pressing home his advantage nicely. Ian had a rook on the seventh, had removed the Dragon bishop and retained his own, and was a pawn up. Simon had completely tied down his opponent and won a pawn, it was just a matter of breaking through and finishing off, surely. Phil's game was looking increasingly rickety. Still 4½-1½ wasn't unreasonably optimistic.

Then, near the time control, while struggling to pick from several winning approaches, Simon lost a rook to a back rank tactic. Unfortunate but, still, 3½-2½ would do.

Phil's game played out as expected, 1½-2½, but Andrew skilfully pressed home his advantage. So 2½-2½ and Board 4 would decide. Ian was a pawn up and had what looked like a significant positional advantage. His opponent's only chance was to break out on the Kingside and try to promote his pawn. Both players were deep into the second time control, as the position became increasingly unbalanced with chances for both sides, pawns one square away from promotion. Ian thought he's hit on a winning plan but had taken too long. His opponent did everything he could to make life difficult till Ian's flag fell 2½-3½. So a comfortable win had turned into an uncomfortable loss. Well played to Rotherham.

Captain's Corner

Ian was Falkbeer Counter-Gambited, seemed to have a development advantage but perhaps not enough to start jettisoning material, either on purpose or by accident ("never start an attack till your queen's rook is developed"). I won a pawn very early on but allowed a knight on to b6. It took me a while to hit on the plan of leaving the knight where it was and playing on the other side of the board and when I did I f5ed instead of f6ed, blundering a pawn. I was fairly lucky it was only one but after that it was dead drawn, again. Didn't see much of Kev's game. Both Milan and Joel had very little space and were well beaten. Simon returned to the team after maternity leave with a crushing kingside attack. 2½-3½. Three games to go: two against Rotherham and one against Woodseats A.

Captain's Corner

The return match from a couple of weeks ago. We won the toss and Geoff chose White against what was likely to be another Benoni from Pete. Having won last time Geoff decided to change his variation to the Knight's Tour: "One of my pet variations that I never win with." The position looked fairly open but chances were even for both sides and draw agreed.

Ian had a pawn but a very passive and draughty position. He returned the material and another pawn into the ending but worked an enormous advantage with bishop against knight with pawns on both sides of the board. His opponent sacced in desperation, Ian miscalculated horribly and allowed White to queen, a bit of a disaster. Milan also miscalculated, Barry forced exchanges, increasing his advantage deep into the ending. Milan thought he had chances but then allowed a knight fork losing his Bishop. Kev had absolutely no space at all to work in and gradually lost more and more material till there were no tricks left.

I felt like I had the advantage throughout my game but, despite playing very quickly, I was well behind on time and couldn't find a way through in an extremely technical position. Phil also looked on top but couldn't find any way through either. 1½-4½. Maybe we've been a bit complacent. A couple or three match points would not go amiss.

Captain's Corner

Ian miscalculated against Evie and lost material. Evie had no trouble holding on and picking up more. Despite my best/worst efforts Louis managed to stay awake during our game. Eventually we swapped off into a very even ending. An unremarked on feature of Kev's games is the unlikely early placement of pieces: 7. Ke3, 8. Qa2, that sort of thing, in this game it was Bb1 well before the first time control. White had a large space advantage and didn't fall for any nonsense. John Fryer dropped a queenside pawn against Milan who made the rest look easy. Unfortunately for Joel he played his opponent's favourite opening - the Modern, his pieces ran out of space, and he fell a long way behind on the clock. Phil assessed his game as "everything was going well, a pawn up in the opening and about to win another, making threats with queen on a file, then a blunder of epic proportions, he pushed my queen away with b pawn, and I thought I'll just put it on b4 and stop him castling to which he simply pulled his bishop back from h4 to e7 trapping my queen 0-1"

Captain's Corner

Geoff played a four pawns attack against a King's Indian/Benoni set up, pushed on the pawns and Black resigned when promotion was unstoppable. Ian took advantage of what looked like some strange moves and broke through on the kingside. I played a long, slow, quiet, manoeuvring (yawns, stretching) game of quiet intensity, which, to the untrained eye, might have looked totally uneventful, but we knew better. The knife-edge tension gradually resolved into a heart-stopping draw. The position on Kev's board was the usual chaos. Kev raided in behind the pawns and cleaned up. Milan's game was pretty even till around the first time control when for four consecutive moves both sides missed that Black could switch from kingside defence to decisive a-file attack. Instead Black swapped off, Milan won Queen for Rook and Black resigned. Marek was equal throughout but made a mistake in the ending. 4½-1½. Firmly cemented in mid-table.

Captain's Corner

The evening started with customary confusion about who was playing for which team, and whether they were playing at all. (Actually this started way before the match with questions about who was registered for which team.) Anyway...first we submitted one team, then we submitted another. (Thanks to John for allowing us to do this.) We could only hope that this knockabout display would induce complacency in our opponents who are part of the top of the table triumvirate, and whose Board 5 was graded 13 points higher than our Board 1. Eventually, somehow the match got started.

Andrew played his Caro-Kann but allowed White to get in c5 controlling an important square in the heart of his position. This meant he was under pressure all evening and after parrying various blows he eventually blundered and his position collapsed.

I faced a Grunfeld and went in for the Exchange Variation, a line which I know fairly well, up to the point where I have to come up with a plan. I offered an exchange sac without much thought which turned out to be theory, this made my position much easier to play. I thought I was on top but chickened out when Black offered a repetition because I still hadn't come up with a plan.

As always Kev's was the most entertaining game of the match. Outgraded 144 to 114, he was being relentlessly pushed back, his queen exiled on h7 behind a wall of pawns, White's pieces roaming freely over the board. Kev came up with a counterattack, even winning a Bishop for two pawns but, with all the major pieces on the board and no pawns at all in front of his king. The stage seemed set for a contest in which Kev had to look after his exposed king whilst trying to make the most of his material advantage, when his opponent said something like, "Yes, you've got me," and resigned. A couple of us played out the position against Kev who never got anywhere near a win. Amazing.

Milan got into some tactics and seemed to be surviving but Black square weaknesses meant his opponent had too many threats.

Perhaps the best result of the evening was Marek's draw on 6. He seemed to have no trouble at all against an experienced opponent very capable of testing his understanding of the game. 2-4 was a good result against opponents who out graded us by an average of (well) over 20 points.

Captain's Corner

My opponent Evie was clearly tired and hung her two bishops in the space of seven moves either side of the time control.

Kev was in a worse position from very early on and wasn't able to complicate.

Oliver emailed this about his game:

After my opponent took some initiative in the opening i was able to react to most of the threats and unwind, i made a central queen move with a couple of threats of my own which forced trading down to an endgame in which he had the bishop pair and slightly stronger pawns. i thought i had drawing chances but eventually his technique won over and was able to win my knight by applying rook pressure on the f-file - material deficit quickly led to positional defeat with mate imminent. After an idiosyncratic use of his bishop in the opening, Milan was a pawn down for a long stretch of the game but won it back with a tactic in the ending. Black's exposed king was then exposed to the threats of R+Q.

On three or four inspections Simon seemed level most of the evening then, on the fourth or fifth inspection, he seemed to have one less queen than his opponent. So 3-2 with top board to decide the match...After what can only be very grudgingly described as an imaginative exchange sacrifice Ian built up a massive attack against Louis who, despite having a bishop and two rooks, was reduced to pawn moves while Ian marched his king up the queenside with the idea of winning rook and bishop, at which point he noticed this allowed a mate. There were still good/clear winning chances but Louis posed enough problems to eventually break free and win the ending and the match.

Captain's Corner

Andrew and his opponent blitzed their way to the time control in what might be record time. Andrew was the exchange down, this only seemed to get worse to the extent that I'm pretty sure at one point he was down to a bishop and a pawn against lots of material. (Turns out I overlooked a the knight on g1 which didn't get going till move 37.) Then about ten minutes later he cheerily came over and said he'd drawn.

Ian got into one of those positions where both players are one or to moves from mating, and got out of it by accepting a draw offer.

Kev won in what looked like remarkably straightforward style.

I went for a risky/reckless/ridiculous plan and could have lost in several ways, fortunately my opponent didn't manage to kill me off, and then blundered an important pawn immediately after (what we thought was) the time control. I hung on, won another pawn and eventually mated with about 20s left.

At one point Oliver (loudly) thought he'd blundered a Bishop but managed to create a retreat square with a Queen check. After this the position was just very level.

Eric seemed to have a lot of pieces swarming against a castled king but either through a mistake or an unsound sac he lost a piece and couldn't recover. 3½-2½ and lower-mid-table safety is within our slimy grasp.

Captain's Corner

Phoenix's fiendish attempt at securing points by choosing a venue at the top of a bare windswept cliff with the only access a steep winding icy path in the driving snow nearly backfired as we all turned up early and four of their own players were late for the match.

Once we got started the games moved on at a fairly rapid rate. First to finish was Ian. In a Sicilian Sveshnikov Phil Beckett allowed Ian's knight back into the game from a3 to c4. Ian then played a nice tactical sequence removing defenders to set up winning the exchange with knight c4 to d6 forking king and rook. 1-0.

Phil P won a piece at about the same time I lost one, the games were played out but the positions only got (much) worse, 2-1.

Simon won a pawn early on and kept it simple from there, swapping almost everything else till promotion was unstoppable.

3-1 looked good but Andrew was in a very weak position, a pawn down with an exposed king and very poorly co-ordinated pieces, he did what he could to make life difficult but Farshad coped with everything calmly, 3-2.

So for the second match in a row everything hung on Kev getting a result from a lost position, this time three pawns down, including strong central connected passers. Kev abandoned defence and aimed everything at White's king. A dodgy knight sac on f3 could have been accepted because White had both rooks on his second rank, but wasn't. This set up the chance of two different queen sacs and a rook mating on g1 and for three moves in a row we all looked on as Kev missed all this and played instead for regaining material and drawing. Fortunately at the end of the sequence White had forgotten about a Bishop stuck on the queenside covering a check. The position was now clearly in Kev's favour but rather than play for a win, which might have given White the chance to make something of his pawns, he forced a repetition and won us the match, again.

Captain's Corner

Administrative Bungling 2009/10. Episode 43. At various points throughout the recruitment process we had between four and eight players. Eventually we settled on seven with an eighth, Geoff, joining us later in the evening, but Stannington insisted on playing with the customary six boards, so yours truly had to nobly sit out and make inroads into the stocks of Scampi Fries behind the bar.

First question was board order and where to put Milan. He's had some good wins and I thought it was time to give him more of a challenge, as it turned out he ended up playing the same opponent he had faced, and lost on time to, for the D Team.

First to finish was Oliver, who saw what I saw, which was a combination to win a pawn, he also missed what I missed, which was Bg7 forking rook and knight, thereby dropping a piece. There really was no way back and Oliver resigned fairly soon after that to watch the rest of the games.

In what looked like a Grand Prix Attack Simon had everything bearing down on f7. He won a piece and then a queen and the game as Black tried desperately to hold it together.

Milan had worked a very strong position, with Black's bishop and rook locked out of the game, it was all proceeding very smoothly till he adopted the standard C Team tactic of misconceiving a plan, "attacking" and then retreating ingnominiously as the plan clearly didn't work due to some basic oversight. Still, active major pieces and a very well placed knight against a wandering king, all was not lost. Eventually Milan timed his breakthrough and worked out a nice finish winning queen for rook.

Ian and Andrew had been under varying degrees of pressure throughout the evening but it was never anything particularly threatening. So 3-2, with just Kev's game left.

Going into the endgame Kev had very optimistically offered a draw, but his pawn structure looked tatty and White's knight gracefully waltzed around picking pawns off one by one. And then there were none. At this point with a K+B against K+N+3 connected passed pawns I said to Ian, 'Even Kev's going to have trouble winning this.' But he didn't need a win, he 'only' needed a draw. Kev optimistically attacked the remaining pawns, and in a foretaste of what was to come, White allowed one of them to drop off, but, no matter, he was still a Q+P to the good. He placed his Q behind his pawn, Kev threatened it, and the rest is another chapter in the legendary escapological escapades of Kev. 3½-2½.

Captain's Corner

From the scoresheet two results stick out like a baboon's backside. It's hard to say which was the most impressive: Andrew's draw with Allan Potts or Phil's draw with Nigel Carpino. Both players were outgraded by ~45 points. Andrew played a Caro-Kann, Allan tempted him with 3 f3, the Fantasy variation (which can turn very nasty very early), but Andrew declined and played sensible solid chess. Towards the end of the game he even induced a blunder (as I've said before Andrew has this happy knack, even against the strongest opponents), though it was only a pawn hanging, and at the end of the game was ahead on material and time. A great result.

When I filled in the match card before the game I thought the biggest mismatch was on 4. But, blissfully ignorant of the rating of his opponent, Phil was on top for large parts of the game, with major pieces threatening a draughty king. After swapping off to an even R+2P ending, Phil got his king cut off, and it looked like he might have problems, but he manoeuvred his rook behind the pawns to stop his opponent making any progress, and in the end drew comfortably.

We're pretty sure Milan won his game but as the scoresheet read 1.d5 d4 (for 1. e4 e5) and continued with unerring consistency in the same manner throughout (ie with the board rotated 180°) we're not quite sure.

My last words to Ian before he sat down to play were, take it steady and outplay him in the ending. Ignoring this completely Ian played the King's Gambit. He didn't seem to have much for the pawn and soon lost another one, clearing the path for Black's kingside pawns. He won back a pawn and seemed to be working his way back into the game but an oversight in time trouble and the position collapsed.

I was Blackmar-Diemered in 22 moves. In my time at Nomads I don't think I've been more comprehensively outplayed. My opponent only ever had to stop to think which of several winning continuations he preferred.

Simon seemed to be on top with a large space advantage but again an oversight (or two) in time trouble and he lost a piece.

With better support from the other boards Andrew and Phil's heroic efforts might not have been in a losing cause but, as it was, 2-4.

Captain's Corner

We were massively outgraded on the top four boards and 5-1 was the kind of score (along with 5½-½ or 6-0) that might have been expected at the start of the night, but we had our easy (peasy lemon squeezy) chances and really should have drawn. At least. A highlights package would include Andrew blasting the ball over the bar from about 3 yards, followed by me picking up the ball in my opponent's penalty area, and, with only a one-armed keeper to beat, dribbling it backwards the length of the pitch then sticking it neatly in the top corner of my own net. Dear oh dear.

Anyway, the games: Mike's description was that his pieces were distracted to the Queenside by the prospect of picking up a Bishop, in the meantime White was arranging his forces for an attack on the king. I thought this sounded like a Bishop sac where you don't actually lose the piece. It worked for White. Andrew forced a very strong position and had a relatively simple tactic to pick up a piece. He saw the idea(!) but interposed a move(?), miscalculated(??) and lost. In his own words Ian got blown away, by what looked like a Levenfish attack against the Dragon. My opponent has a deserved reputation for playing very quickly. I decided to try to match him for speed. I won a piece in the early middlegame and forced exchanges but with too many pawns I couldn't hit on the right plan or deployment of R+N v R. Credit to my opponent for making life hard. Eventually a series of truly dreadful moves and a win turned into a loss. More conventional chess from a clearly domesticated Kev on 5 and a good draw. Simon forced an early Kf7 from his opponent but couldn't quite cover all the flight squares. A series of exchanges and a frustrating draw. If these things really do even out then in the return match we'll hang pieces left, right and centre and win 4-2. As it is we have to look at a scorecard 1-5.

Captain's Corner

Phoenix, who have two teams in this division, could only field four players, this meant defaults against Andrew (for the second game out of two), and Eric, who had kindly stepped in at the last minute. A 2-0 start was good for the team but not so good for those who have committed themselves to playing.

Against Phil's Scandinavian Ian found a way to exchange off queens and win a pawn at the cost of structure. He centralised his king and Phil resigned rather than suffer for 20 or 30 moves while Ian converted pawns. My opponent met the Caro Kann with the adventurous 2.f4 but struggling to save a central pawn hung a piece allowing 15...Nxe3, which also forked the rooks, and resigned. Kev was under pressure on the clock and on the board and didn't get a look in. (As a footnote, in what might be analysed as a symbolically significant gesture, Kev once again castled: No more solo adventures for The King who now seeks comfort, safety, familiarity, reassurance, stability and security behind a wall of pawns. Makes you think...) Simon produced a powerful rook sac to clear away the pawns from in front of his opponent's king and mate with his remaining major pieces. 5-1. A good win for the team but I think we'd rather have achieved this without the defaults.

Captain's Corner

Andrew's opponent didn't turn up, which is not good when you've travelled out to Wombwell, and sorely tested Andrew's annotating skills, but it did mean we were a point up early on. In Mohammad's game both players had bishops stuck behind pawn walls, after shadow boxing on the queenside White struck first, and then followed up with a kingside sac which couldn't be accepted, and picked up an important pawn. Mohammad's pawns were looking increasingly ropey. He tried for a kingside attack but White held it together and won well. Ian sacced a piece for two strong central pawns and a promising position, he then blundered his first piece of the night by overlooking a backwards knight recapture. He won that piece back with very little material on the board, but then went on to leave a bishop en prise. With almost nothing left to work with he managed to cause enough trouble for White by leaving him with a rook's pawn (+wrong Bishop+Rook v Rook) and at one point could even have played for an unlikely win on time. Sensible chess on Board 4 with Masrura forking a Bishop and a mate on g7. Black did his best to hold on but instead of cashing in Masrura increased the pressure relentlessly and won convincingly. Married life is meant to settle you down but Kev was clearly having none of it, playing an early Nh5 and Na5 and following up with Kf7. White came out of a liquidation the exchange up and didn't fall for any traps. Simon got a strong attack but omitting Kh1 allowed a check forcing exchanges. He may have pushed the resulting passed pawn too early which was rounded up by Black's rooks. Black's king was one step closer to the centre and invaded quickly. Well played to newly promoted Wombwell. 2½-3½.