Thursday 09/02/2023. Anstey 1 made the long, arduous journey to the bowls club in Kirby Muxloe for this LRCA Division 2 fixture against friendly rivals Kirby Muxloe 1 (although one town’s very like another when your head’s down over your pieces, brother). Without the services of John Robinson due to ill health (we wish you all the best John), super-sub Boris Lazarov was once again called-up.

As the venue very slowly began to warm up, the captains exchanged team sheets. With the teams evenly matched on paper (7,175 vs 6,933) it was going to be a close contest. The players shook hands and battle commenced.

Mick Sandham’s game against Ray Townsend on board 3 was the first to finish. In a repeat of the reverse fixture Mick was hoping to do the double over Ray. Coming out of the opening with more space and a lead in development, Mick brought his queen into the game and starting probing black’s defence to make weaknesses. Ray brought his queen over to defend and to try an exchange of queens but was so focused on it he dropped a piece, oops.

Which fails to 19. Bxf5 of course. Ray carried on blitzing out moves to try and rattle Mick and create some counterplay on the queenside. Mick calmly ignored it, kept the pressure up on the kingside and then set a nice discovered attack trap to win black’s rook for a knight. A rook down, Ray resigned. Kirby 0 – Anstey 1.

Boris played Dave Walker on board 4. In what can only be described as a masterclass of handling the black pieces (91.2% accuracy), Boris calmly defended Dave’s attack and lured him into a tactical mistake:

Black’s h-pawn had been pinned for a couple of moves, Dave missed that 14. .. Ne7-g6 defended the pin. Play continued 15. … hxg5 16. Rxh8 Nxh8 and a piece up Boris proceeded to swap off the remaining white pieces and picked up an extra pawn in the process. In a hopeless position Dave resigned. Kirby 0 – Anstey 2.

In another re-match from the reverse fixture Julian Tarwid played Simon Lazarus on board 1. Coming out of the opening the position was fairly even but with Julian (as white) play more attackingly (is that a word?). Simon made a couple of mistakes but Julian didn’t take advantage, making a few mistakes his own. Julian sacrificed a piece for 2 pawns and an exposed black king but Simon defended well. In the end after a few queen checks from white a draw was agreed even though black appeared to stand better despite his dodgy pair of h-pawns:

The draw was sufficient to secure match victory so well done Julian. Kirby ½ – Anstey 2½.

Matt Connor’s game again Gijs Kruitbosch on board 4 was the last to finish. Matt had told the team going into the match that the game plan was to win with white and draw with black. Unfortunately, he took that a little too much to heart, opting for a really passive setup from the opening. This allowed Gijs as white to freely develop and slowly build up pressure. In an effort to get some play Matt expanded on the queenside but missed the opportunity to try and open files. White’s knights then got in behind the pawns and black was squeezed hard, really hard. As time ran short Matt missed a move that would have kept the defence up for longer but then blundered in time trouble giving Gijs the deserved win. Kirby 1½ – Anstey 2½.

Anstey move up to third in the (still hotly-contested) division:

Anstey’s next game is against Market Harborough 2 on the 23^rd February, a game in which they cannot afford to drop any points to keep their title aspirations alive.

Anstey captain Matt Connor told Inside Bowls:
I’m very disappointed with my personal performance after contemplating a much more combative line but a massive shout out to Mick and Boris whose wins brought home the bacon. With 6 games to go there is still all to play for! We just need to make sure we don’t slip up against the bottom 2 teams and we’ll be in the mix come crunch time.