Anstey Chess Club’s second team scored a narrow home victory to exercise the demons that Latimer are in fact our bogey team. This dates back to the pre-COVID era where Latimer always seemed to beat us or draw with us – much to our frustration!
The evening started off in bizarre fashion – the visiting Latimer team commented on how cold the venue was. Indeed it was a little bit on the chilly side but for one of the teams who have the coldest venues in the County to tell us it was cold, it must have been so! The visitors swiftly gathered around the radiator that was in the middle of the room and huddled, as if to symbolically tell us it was cold. Once everyone arrived and with the warming words from El Presidente that the room would soon warm up – keeping everyone’s ears warm at least! – battle commenced just after 7:30.
First to finish was Boris The Toaster with the white pieces facing off against Mike Garland Senior, father to the Junior version (of course!) but just as sound a Gentleman as his son. The game started with Boris’ trademark 1. d4 opening and the game transcended into a London but with black playing a rapid Bd6 in an effort to trade off the dark squared Bishop. In reply, Boris’s e3 led to Bxf4 exf4 and doubled f pawns. What followed was some very sensible chess, developing pieces to better squares, along with pretty much every trade being accepted, leading to doubled b pawns for black. The Toaster managed to get his Rooks doubled on the open e file which surely yielded an advantage but Mike Snr was able to get his own Rooks traded off with his opponents superior counterparts. In order for Mike Snr to exchange Rooks, he had to manoeuvre a little bit and The Toaster used this time to advance his Kingside pawns. The only real position to show is the one that eventually won Boris the game:
Here, white had played 42. g5 and after hxg5+, 43. hxg5, black simply plays anything but fxg5+, which instantly loses as the advanced white King shepherds his f pawn counterpart to Queening after taking the black g pawn, or after the re-captures, white’s King has the opposition and picks up the remaining black pawns and there is nothing black can do.
Unfortunately for black, Mike Snr played fxg5 and very soon, (as quickly as the pieces had come off the board in the first place), The Toaster had forced a resignation from Mike when Mike was in a completely lost position.
A good win for the Toaster and a well deserved one.
1-0 to Anstey.
Next to finish was Bob on board 4 playing with the white pieces against David Gamble. David is a tricky and slippery customer and there are 1 or 2 members of the club who have come a cropper against him.
The game started with 1. d4 – Bob clearly has been to the 1. d4 section of the club – I was sure he’d played 1. e4 before. Anyway, the game meandered down the Marshall variation of the Queens Gambit Declined and the first out of book move came from Bob with 6. Be5 – planting the dark squared Bishop on a good square and daring black’s counterpart to trade. Eventually it was traded which led to Bob fighting to defend his e pawn as black freely developed his pieces. Looking at his scoresheet, Bob has questioned some of his own moves. Most seem unjustified as the engine (source Smallfish on an iPhone) agreed with some of his moves but the crucial trade down was after the Queens came off, along with black’s light squared Bishop and white’s f3 Knight, leaving Bob with doubled f pawns and a -2.0 position. Despite this seeming disadvantage, Bob pressed on but unfortunately got his pieces into a bit of a tangle and according to his notation, Dave Gamble missed a piece win but did manage to get a good Knight vs a slightly inferior Bishop. Bob carried on fighting and towards the end of the game, had an advantage (assuming that the previous notation was correct):
As we can see, Smallfish sees an advantage for Bob and I think it’s important that he knows this and that d5 was the move here, to undermine the Knight once more, as he had tried to do with f4 previously.
After h4 in the position on the right, the h file got opened and this was the beginning of the end for Bob as the Rook on g8 shifted to h8 and after a rook double, the end was nigh and the fat lady started to clear her throat. With disconnected Rooks, Bob was unable to parry the attack and by his own admission, should have shifted his pieces to defend earlier.
A tough loss for Bob but time to recharge the batteries for him as he’s off to Lanzarote soon for a well deserved holiday.
1-1 and scores are level with 2 to play.
Third to finish was El Presidente who was facing off against his old friend/adversary Granville Hill with the black pieces on board 3. Granny and Ben have played a few games and after initial dominance from Granville, El Presidente has started to even up the scales going in to the match.
The game started with the French defence: Schlechter variation that El Presidente had slipped up on in the past. Knowing this, he changed the move order a bit and played dxe4, going for Bxe4 and developing the f6 Knight with tempo and Bf3 being played – thus meaning that white had moved the light squared Bishop 3 times in the first 5 moves. Black was never really in any trouble after this apart from how his light squared Bishop would get in the game and try to trade it’s white counterpart off and when to play e5. Happily the opportunity to play e5 presented itself which meant white replied d5, blocking in said light squared Bishop. Play ebbed and flowed as pieces found homes. Granville tried to attack first with 12. Ne4 which meant an advantage to black and although El Presidente misplayed the move sequence (thinking he was trapping the light squared Bishop when he wasn’t), black never looked back, retaining a slight advantage until picking up the c pawn for nothing that had advanced too far to be defended. Granville did make El Presidente sweat a bit with a dangerous Knight hopping around the board and protecting key squares and causing trouble with his rooks, forcing defence from El Presidente and level positions every now and again.
El Presidente was simply trying to get the Rooks off and the pawn ending was won. After 46. Kc4 from Granville in the position on the left, the opportunity presented itself and it was taken.
White had the passed a pawn but El Presidente knew that white’s King would be on c5 and too far away from the e and f pawns and it was time to find a breakthrough with f4 followed by e3.
El Presidente’s King was always ‘in the square’ to stop the a pawn, and as soon as Granville tried to push his a pawn, e3 was played and a resignation followed.
A good win for El Presidente – 2-1 to Anstey.
Finally we go over to the Griller Brian on board 4. 2-1 up with his board to play, he was facing tough opposition in the shape of Brian Slater with the black pieces.
Starting with 1. d4, Brian replied with his favoured Slav defence, fianchettoing is dark squared Bishop. The players set about developing their pieces with white successfully trading off black’s light squared Bishop and not castling until move 17. The Griller got a well-timed e5 followed by e4 into the game whilst white completed development. A few piece trades followed whilst a battle for the b file was in operation and at point, Brian was in a poor position of +4.2 in whites favour at move 27. The Griller must have felt under the cosh as at move 29, he sacced a Knight for two pawns, hoping for some play. The engine (not Julian) didn’t like it but it isn’t unreasonable, if only to get inside the head of his opponent:
As The Griller stopped notating, he had played c5 which is visible to the right. We can see that those connected c, d, e and less so the f pawns are very dangerous and with the Queens on the board, anything was possible.
Sure enough, the Griller got the pawns rolling and whilst Latimer’s Brian was trying to beat The Giller on time to claim a team draw, The Griller emitted a calm persona whilst using the time that was accruing with his increment.
A slightly unsavoury incident occurred with Latimer’s Brian claiming a 2 minute time penalty to add to his 26 minutes on the clock, after The Griller pressed his clock too early. Indeed, this is the first time that a time penalty has been requested this league season and followed through with, so El Presidente wanted to ensure that it was done correctly. We are sure that both Brian’s had chance to calculate the position on the board and El Presidente reminded Latimer’s Brian that he had to notate, which whilst trying to beat the Griller on time, had seemingly escaped his attention.
As the Griller manoeuvred one of his passers to the second rank, Latimer’s Brian was forced to repeat moves by repeatedly checking Brian’s King and a draw was amicably agreed, securing the match for Anstey.
El Presidente told Sky Sports’ chess channel:
Relieved to get over the line to be honest – Latimer have been and probably always will be our bogey team and to come out the right side of it is very pleasing. They’re such a tough team to play. Well done to the team and to Brian the Griller for holding his nerve and delivering for the team in a precarious position, despite telling me at the end that he was freezing cold!
Anstey Chess Club 