Rene Butler (MH3) – Oskar Rudczenko (Anstey 2) 1 – 0

A regular game in the last few seasons, the captains played against each other on board 4. After a series of book moves, the players found themselves in the Accelerated London System opening. Further development followed for both players and the Middlegame started with a battle on the queenside with both players pushing their c-, b- and a-pawns. Almost as they are playing bullet and are in time trouble, the players simplified quickly and by the 23^rd move the Endgame has begun. Unfortunately for our captain, he went a little too ‘simplify-happy’ and relinquished the a-file to his opponent. The home team captain managed to further win Oskar’s b-pawn and went on the same ‘simplify-happy’ tangent, giving Oskar the option for a tactical exchange followed by a beautiful bishop sacrifice to free the c-file highway for our teammate’s advanced pawn. Unfortunately, our captain did not see the tactic and White was provided the time to activate his king and cut-off the runaway route in advance. However, a few moves later, Rene completely ignored the same tactic and sent his king the opposite way, but Oskar did not seize the opportunity. Our captain had a few more chances to keep at least some hope for a draw, but a couple of missed ideas and solid play from his opponent led to a white pawn queening with a second on the way to do the same and Oskar resigned.

Leo Abraham (Anstey 2) – George Gowers (MH3) 1 – 0

After a great win in the last week’s second team game against Ashby 3 (more on this match on this link), Leo found himself entering a game against more than 200 points higher rated opponent. Indifferent to the rating difference and galvanised by his success in the previous match, Leo went head on into the bout with a solid opening, meeting his opponent’s threats. The players went on to exchange a couple of minor pieces and a couple of pawns with MH3 player keeping the bishop pair. Leo decided to offer a draw with Oskar’s game still in the balance, but his opponent declined. Our teammate did not seem at all flustered by the latter facts or the semi-open g-file with his king exposed, so our whole team decided to leave him in piece, with the captain Oskar and Boris having a pint with Rene, while Alistair and Mike decided to play a game. In the meantime the players on board 3 reshuffled their pieces for a few moves until George was unfortunate to blunder a fork with Leo picking up his queen. Without his most powerful piece, the MH3 player resigned. A great result for Leo and the team. We are sure many more wins are to come for this young prospective player!

Alistair Geear (MH3) – Borislav Lazarov (Anstey 2) 1/2 – 1/2

Boris had a great challenge in front of him facing the local hero Alistair within a week of the latter winning the minor section of the Doncaster Congress with a 5/5 performance. The game started with the queen’s gambit where our teammate decided to play a weird London system a tempo down, but fortunately the MH3 player was a tad too timid and did not punish Boris by picking up the free b7 pawn. Both players continued their development peacefully with only an exchange of a bishop for a knight until all hell broke loose in the centre with several tactical opportunities for both players. At move 23 our teammate decided to play for a draw and offered it shortly after but as a result of careful consideration (and despite his own evaluation of the game looking like a ‘dead draw’) the young player from MH3 continued playing. Boris did his best to simplify the position and even created an isolated, albeit passed pawn for his opponent. After the kings got active and went to the centre of the board, Alistair finally got convinced by the drawish situation and offered the draw himself to which Boris agreed and both players shook hands, took a selfie (in the slideshow above), and went for a pint. A good result for our more than 200 points lower rated teammate.

Mike Griffiths (Anstey 2) – Cyril Hill (MH3) 1/2 – 1/2

The top board game included our top second team player Mike and about 100 points higher rated Cyril Hill. As usual, Mike played the English opening to which his opponent responded with the Agincourt defense. The players went into a solid game with ‘fianchetto’-ing their king’s bishops and castling short side. Mike attacked his opponent’s f6-knight and managed to exchange one of his knights for it along with the dark-squared bishops. His opponent decided to reply with striking in the queenside with his b-pawn after which the players exchanged their other two knights. Mike decided to further exchange his light-suqared bishop for his opponent’s one, leaving only ‘the big guns’ on the board. The queens started shuffling around until they finally got exchanged themselves at which point the game started looking more and more drawish. The players positioned their rooks strategically and started pushing pawns while also activating their kings as a rook endgame requires. Pawns started exchanging and a set of rooks also left the board. After further pawn marches, the second set of rooks also got exchanged and following further reshuffling of kings and pawns, the players decided that a draw is the most fitting outcome based on the position, with our top board player getting another valuable half point for the team.

Next week our second team is back in action with an away game against Loughborough 2 where they will try to get more points and cement themselves in the middle of the table.