A thrilling four board match produced twists and turns with our team claiming the win at the end
The summer cups are now in full swing and our club’s Chapman Cup team played their second round against Braunstone on last Thursday, 9th June. A strong Anstey team, consisting of Julian “Mr. Engine”, Mick “Just Mick”, Boris “The Toaster” and Valdas, hosted the leaders of the table prior to the game – Braunstone. Our opponents turned up with a relatively strong team, outrating our players on almost every board, with Julian being the only one playing against an equally rated opponent. Following the rules of the Chapman Cup, the captains promptly calculated the rating difference, leaving the outrated by 541 points Anstey team with a half point advantage at the beginning of the game.
Daniel Wilkinson (Braunstone) vs Valdas Matutis (Anstey) 1/2 – 1/2
Following his competitive OTB debut in the Harrod Cup, Valdas made his debut in the classic format against young promising player Daniel Wilkinson. The Braunstone player arrived with plenty of confidence after a win in the previous round against more than 200 points higher rated opponent, but Valdas was determined to show that he is in for the win. The game started with King’s pawn to which our teammate replied with the Caro-Kann. The young player from Braunstone chose the exchange variation and started loading quite a bit of power pointing towards the king side (K-side), expecting that our teammate will castle short. Valdas’ opponent even played the awkward Kd1 in order to bring his h-rook to the party, but after careful consideration of the position, our teammate decided to castle queen side (Q-side) basically asking all of White’s pieces why are they pointing in the wrong direction. Our teammate placed a great knight on g4 and kept control of the centre while in preparation to break it open, taking advantage of the white king looking a little out of place on d1. After bringing his queen and bishop to the Q-side, the Braunstone player decided to start his attack with Ne5 which basically blundered a piece as the white queen was hanging, but unfortunately both players missed the tactic. Valdas continued his plan to push the centre pawns, while his opponent finally decided to develop his other knight. The players exchanged some minor pieces and the queens then Black’s central expansion started from the K-side with g5, attacking the white dark-squared bishop.
The rest of the K-side pawns got exchanged and in the process Valdas played first e5, then e4, creating a “passer”. Our teammate also managed to exchange the dark-squared bishops and on move 38 offered a rook exchange. At this point ‘El Presidente’ Ben, who was hovering around and watching the games closely, noticed that the clock has been set incorrectly and there is no increment. With our teammate down to less than five minutes, Ben tried to add the increment to the clock, unsuccessfully. Valdas stopped notating and continued the game for another eight moves, during which his opponent managed to equalise a losing position before offering a draw which our teammate, quite down on the clock at this point, happily accepted. After the games Boris “The Toaster” admitted that he was most likely the perpetrator in the clock situation and apologised several times to both Valdas and the team. In spite of not taking the win, Valdas showcased again that he is another great addition to the team this season and we all look forward to see him playing again, hopefully with a clock not set by Boris. As to the latter, he would like to apologise again to the whole team and especially Valdas as “The Toaster” potentially stripped him of a win against 150 points higher rated opponent.
Borislav Lazarov (Anstey) vs James Bingham (Braunstone) 1 – 0
The highest difference was on board 3 where Boris “The Toaster” had to play against more than 200 points higher rated James Bingham. Boris opened with his favourite Jobava London which was met by a somewhat different reply by the Braunstone player who immediately challenged the bishop. A few moments of tension followed after which both players decided to abandon the ‘cat and mouse’ game and focus on development. Boris’ opponent decided to expand on the Q-side after easily equalising in the opening, while “The Toaster” placed a beautiful knight on e5. Both players finished their development and castled swiftly and in his typical fashion in his last few games, our teammate started the middlegame with a blunder, leaving his otherwise good looking knight on e5 to be trapped. After exchanging the knight for two pawns, Boris started a battle for survival with Black’s pressure leading to exchanges of our teammate’s remaining minor pieces followed by a rook-led black battery on the f-file aiming to infiltrate White’s K-side. Boris started pushing his c-pawn and converted it into a passed pawn, only to be blocked by the only bishop on the board which was not really doing a much deal anyway. Black brought another rook to the battery, but our teammate was doing his best to hold on. With the centre blocked and the Q-side frozen, Black turned his attention to the K-side and more concretely on the h-file where our teammate managed to play series of inaccuracies to lose the h-pawn.
“The Toaster” decided to contest the h-file himself and eventually managed to take control of it, albeit at the price of another exchange, this time of a pair of rooks. With the pieces on the board being reduced by the minute, our teammate sacrificed another pawn to close the K-side while looking to infiltrate Black’s back rank from the h-file. The experienced Braunstone player managed to consolidate his position, finding himself at move 43 with completely winning position, evaluated at -20 by Stockfish (depth = 20). However, Boris’ opponent never looked to capitalise on his winning position and did not play the winning move …Qd3, which would have been at minimum crushing and at certain moments was even leading to a forced mate in 7. Instead Black tried to bring defenders to the back ranks, completely abandoning the opened h-file and leaving it for White to infiltrate first with the queen and then with his remaining rook. Our teammate seized the opportunity and took complete control of the h-file after which closed the Q-side, rendering Black’s bishop useless. Eventually, “The Toaster” went on to coordinate his two pieces to attack the king and managed to get himself in a position to grab the black rook or just draw the game with a perpetual check. However, at move 53 the Braunstone player fell victim to the old tunnel vision, completely ignoring a dovetail checkmate, which Boris delivered quickly, unable to believe his luck and pulling off the biggest swindle in his short chess career and on the night. Nevertheless, to quote Matt “The Dark Destroyer” Connor: “The game of chess is about who blunders last.”(probably quoting someone famous), so a great win a for Boris against a strong opponent after playing from the inferior position throughout the whole game.
Julian Tang (Braunstone) vs Mick Sandham (Anstey) 1 – 0
The last season has been quite harsh for Mick, who more often than not finds himself playing great against higher rated opponents only to overlook an idea by his opponent and eventually lose the game. Unfortunately, it was another one of those nights for our teammate, as he faced more than 180 points higher rated Julian Tang. The game opened with e4, to which Mick played his trademark St. George setup. Seeing the uncontested centre, the Braunstone player decided to place three pawns there, while our teammate stroke on the Q-side with c5. White started pushing his pawns in the centre, chasing the black knights around and overextending a little bit, while “Just Mick” calmly shuffled his pieces around before attacking one of White’s knights. The players exchanged a pair of bishops and a pair of knights, then Mick’s opponent managed to get his knight on f6 before it was exchanged, fixing White’s pawn structure in the process. “Just Mick” decided to go after the base of the pawn island in the centre which led to a queen exchange. Our teammate continued his attack on the Q-side and started pushing the c-pawn, supported by the black rooks and bishop. “Just Mick” decided to bring the rook towards the third rank, eventually picking up the a pawn and creating pressure on its b-file equivalent. The pressure kept mounting and with the premise of having to play against two passed pawns in the endgame, the Braunstone player decided to sacrifice the exchange and parted ways with one of his rooks for the black bishop.
Mick’s opponent then lifted his remaining rook to the seventh rank, attacking our teammate’s d-pawn. Unfortunately, finding himself in a completely winning position, evaluated at -5.7 by Stockfish (depth = 20), “Just Mick” miscalculated the power of the rook lift and greedily took the b-pawn, providing his opponent the initiative. Mick decided to bring back both of his rooks, but with the solid pawn chain already on the sixth and seventh rank, the experienced Braunstone player managed to consolidate his presence and further to get a completely winning position at which point “Just Mick” resigned. Regardless of the result, Mick should be proud of his performance throughout most of the game, as he again played toe to toe with a significantly higher rated opponent, eventually getting a winning position which he was unfortunate not to convert.
Julian Tarwid (Anstey) vs Michael Salisbury (Braunstone) 1 – 0
Prior to the game Julian “Mr. Engine” found himself on the rise, with great wins against John Manger from Heathcote Arms and 130 points higher rated Ian Clarke in the previous round of the Chapman Cup against Market Harborough. With the white pieces again, our teammate opened the game against equally rated Michael Salisbury using his favourite d4. After a typical London setup, “Mr. Engine” went on to exchange the dark-squared bishops and the queens. The players started the battle for the centre, keeping the pressure on for the first few moves. While the Braunstone player decided to swiftly castle K-side, Julian stayed faithful to his nickname and connected his rooks via what we jokingly call “an engine move” – Kf2. Black started pushing pawns in order to gain tempi on the white pieces, however, our teammate appeared calm under pressure, keeping the game more or less equal during the early stages of the middlegame. Then again, in his characteristic way, “Mr. Engine” went on to play a4, followed by a quite speculative rook lift on the a-file which throughout the game proved rather dubious than necessary. It is worth mentioning that around moves 20-27 was the only moment where the engine slightly preferred Black’s position, but after opening the h-file, followed by a rook exchange, our teammate started a series of improving moves to build up pressure on Black’s position. Julian managed to obtain the better pawn structure and push his opponent’s knights in the direction of the dim area – the rim.
“Mr. Engine” then infiltrated Black’s position with his rook and put pressure on Black’s pawns, eventually snatching the isolated d-pawn. With the otherwise non-pretentious and improving moves, Julian managed to get himself in a +3.7 position with his opponent down on the clock. Realising that he is about to lose even more material, especially under the time pressure, the Braunstone player decided that he had enough and resigned. Another great win for our top-rated player who is deservedly flying high at the moment!
While the match for the Chapman Cup was taking place in the usual spot of the Anstey Methodist Church, in the opposite corner there were plenty of friendly games as the Thursday club night was taking place. Juniors Marcus and John took on the experienced Oskar “El Capitan” and Brian “The Griller”, while Ben hurried to take the opportunity to play against Richard and learn something new. In conclusion, another great evening in the Anstey Chess Club filled with emotions, fun and above all – plenty of chess!
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