Outrated by approximately 1300 points, Anstey Chess club’s Wylie cup team put on a great fight against a very strong Wigston team

In the hot Thursday evening, the second round of the Wylie Cup was scheduled to take place for our club, as the team was crippled by the absence of “The Dark Destroyer” Matt Connor. Boris “The Toaster” filled in for the team, joining “El Presidente” Ben, Mick “Just Mick” and Julian “Mr. Engine”. The players travelled to the south of Leicester to meet Ben’s old teammates Wigston who were represented by a very strong team, as their third board was outrating all of our players. Nevertheless, our Anstey players were not there to look at the ratings, but to play chess, and in spite of the rating difference, brought the fight to the home side. (Note: refers to focused and attacking play over the board, no real fighting is involved between chess players)

Andrew Pike (Wigston) vs Borislav Lazarov (Anstey) 0.5 – 1.5

Outgraded by less than 100 points, the replacement on the night Boris was designated to be the one to deliver some positive results and did he do this in his first game. Playing with White, Boris went with his d4 setup and attacked immediately the black light-squared bishop, expanding on the king side (K-side) in the process. After both sets of bishops were exchanged, our teammate’s knights started creating havoc on the queen side (Q-side), where both players had castled, picking up two pawns in the process. With the material advantage in his favour, “The Toaster” used a golden opportunity, provided by his opponent, to simplify the position, leaving him two pawns up in a rook endgame. Boris further closed the K-side and started pushing his pawns on the Q-side, eventually exchanging one of them. Left with two “passers”, which he used to win the black rook, “The Toaster” had to be careful not to stalemate at the end, but after a rook sacrifice prior to promotion, his opponent resigned.

Flying high after the great win in the first game, our teammate engaged in the Semi-Slav as Black. The Wigston player tried to attack from all sides, but the players quickly exchanged pieces before the battle for the centre. White tried to gain the advantage on the e-file, but Boris managed to exchange more pieces leading the game to a slightly boring draw. Boris’ opponent further exchanged the e-file rooks and tried to push his d-pawn, however, “The Toaster” further simplified, leading to an opposite coloured bishops endgame with White being a pawn up. The players started shuffling their pieces and quite bored at some point our teammate asked his opponent whether “they should go for the theoretical draw on the board”. His opponent tried hard to get into a position to have some chances, including at times leaving his K-side open for Boris to pick up a pawn. However, “The Toaster” showcased great maturity to not let his opponent’s king to infiltrate Black’s back ranks and after some further shuffling, both players agreed to a draw.

A great performance from “The Toaster” who for the first time in a while did not need a single spell of luck.

Lewis Turner (Wigston) vs Ben Vaughan (Anstey) 2 – 0

‘El Presidente’ (at his second chess home, having played for Wigston before) was facing young Lewis Turner and like in all other games on the night, our Anstey teammate was on the wrong end of the rating differential.

In the first game, with the black pieces, ‘El Presidente’ engaged in his favourite French defence against 1.e4. The game went down the line of the advance variation and the Milner-Barry gambit. However, on cxd4, the Wigston player ignored the re-capture and played Re1, allowing dxc3 which ‘El Presidente’ played. A few pieces were swapped off and what followed was quite simply a demonstration of the gulf in class between the two players, eventually leading to resignation after ‘El Presidente’ hung a rook with check when trying to create a threat for the first time in the game.

With the white pieces, the objective in front of Ben was simply not to make a fool of himself. After a Sicilian Dragon opening, ‘El Presidente’ was hoping to play an English attack castling Queenside and pushing the Kingside pawns. Unfortunately, ‘El Presidente’ did not play the prophylactic Kb1 and thus blundered a piece after Bh6 (trying to trade off the Dark squared Bishops) lost to Nxd4 and consequently Nxe2 (a Bishop) which was check. As good players do, Ben’s opponent forced trades and ‘El Presidente’ resigned in a lost position.

A tough day in the office for our chairman as he had to play against a very strong prospective opponent. Nevertheless, we are confident that ‘El Presidente’ will be back on the winning path sooner rather than later.

Andrew Morley (Wigston) vs Mick Sandham (Anstey) 2 – 0

On board 2 ‘Just Mick’ faced off against Andy Morley – Mick was heavily outgraded but having played his opponent before, relished the challenge. Thinking that our teammate would be secretly hoping to play against the Wigston player, prior to the game ‘El Presidente’ had told Mick that he might face Andy.

Mick started off with the white pieces and the game seemed to be quite close. ‘El Presidente’ who was the website’s correspondent responsible for both Mick’s and his own game, had the difficult challenge of watching both boards and try to compete and did not have the opportunity to closely monitor “Just Mick”‘s first attempt at taking the W. Nevertheless, after looking at different positions throughout the game, it was obvious that Mick gave a good account of himself against his experienced opposition but eventually was forced into resignation.

With the black pieces, Mick engaged in his usual and familiar St George defence, which seemingly took his opponent by surprise. The Wigston player opted for a slightly passive version of the white side and Mick had some well-developed pieces. Unfortunately, the 2000+ graded player succeeded in trading his weaker pieces for our teammate’s stronger ones. Unfortunately for our teammate, the Wigston player eventually got control of the game as the undefendable black b-pawn was hanging and about to be picked up to give a decisive material advantage for White in a rook endgame. Facing a strong opponent perfectly capable of converting his advantage, Mick decided to call it a day and resigned. Post match analysis showcased how greatly versed ‘Just Mick’ is in the St George defence and our teammate actually educated his opponent with some of the lines from his repertoire.

Regardless of being on the wrong side of the results, Mick could hold his head high having given Andy a run for his money.

Alan Byron (Wigston) vs Julian Tarwid (Anstey) 1 – 1

Julian found himself in the position he wished for, playing against 2200+ opponent. “Mr. Engine” had to play with the black pieces first and both players engaged in the very theoretical lines of the Caro-Kann defence. After a typical first few moves, our teammate stroke in the centre and the players exchanged a pair of knights. Our teammate continued the development of his pieces but found himself attacked by the white dark-squared bishop. Julian decided to lose the ability to castle, exchanged the dark-squared bishops and picked up a free pawn in the process. The Wigston player attacked our teammate’s remaining knight, but in his typical style “Mr. Engine” counter-attacked the remaining white bishop, and after the exchange Black found himself dominating the light squares. Both players started bringing their pieces to the centre of the board at which point our teammate decided to sacrifice a pawn in order to create a “passer” on the d-file, supported by a queen-led battery. Julian got his queen on the K-side eyeing the white king at which point his opponent decided to exchange the ladies, losing a pawn again in the process. The Wigston player placed his knight on a beautiful outpost on the sixth rank, but the piece ended up being completely dominated by the remaining black bishop. White tried to hold the position with his two rooks and shuffle his knight to create threats, only for the notorious clumsiness of the minor piece to be exposed by “Mr. Engine” who picked up a second pawn in the process. Seeing the black central passed pawns marching towards the first rank and with a great positional and material deficit, evaluated as -7.6 by Stockfish (depth = 20), Julian’s opponent gave our teammate the credit he deserves and resigned.

Following his great win with the black pieces, “Mr. Engine” started confidently with his d4 setup and before long the dark-squared bishops were exchanged. With the white queen in the centre, the Wigston player started gaining tempi and eventually managed to pick up a pawn. Our teammate used the pawn sacrifice to take the initiative himself and started lining up his pieces pointing towards the castled king, then pushed his K-side pawns. Finding himself under pressure, Black went for counterplay on the Q-side and started pushing the b-pawn. Unfortunately for Julian, he oversaw an idea, then went for a dubious knight sacrifice and from this moment on his game turned the tide. The Wigston player put great pressure on the K-side with a gain of tempo and was just fast enough to protect his K-side. Finding himself with too few pawns and pieces to create the opportunity for the final blow, “Mr. Engine” lifted one of his rooks to bring it into the attack, but his opponent had the faster attack and brought one of his knights within reach of mating attack on our teammate’s king. Seeing the mating attack, Julian jokingly asked his opponent whether he would want a draw which was met by the Wigston player rigorously shaking his head and following the amusing moment our teammate resigned.

Outrated by almost 400 points, Julian proved again that he is well ready to challenge the top rated players in the county having won one game and managing to get a winning position at times in the other.

Although on the losing side of the match, our players demonstrated great play and amazing improvement against a strong Wigston side. This is a second consecutive loss for our Wylie Cup team and we are scheduled to face Syston on Thursday, 30^th June at home.

We were also very happy to see our second top-rated player John “The Torturer” who was at the Wigston Chess club for his individual county championship game. Our teammate managed to get the win in his classical game and is looking to challenge the other top players in his division for the first place.