The second round of the Harrod Cup was an interesting match for Anstey 2, as every player on Anstey side was out graded. On the top board (Oskar Rudczenko from Anstey vs Paul Gibson from Ashby) Oskar was outgraded only by 70 points, which isn’t that much in over the board chess (or face to face chess). However, the rest of the Anstey players were severely out graded, as the rest of the Anstey team were rated under 1300, whereas the whole of the Ashby team were rated well over 1350. Boards 2, 3 and 4 from Anstey were all out graded by at least 200 rating points.

Even though Anstey was out matched, it doesn’t mean we were going to buckle under the strength of the Ashby players. The first to win was the second board Anstey player Leo Abraham, (playing against Nick Wyld) who had to take a long break from chess to do his GCSE exams, and Leo still plays well even after only playing a couple of other matches throughout the past year. The next to win was an Ashby player named Dominic Lennon (playing against Anstey player Aarav Sinha), who is a strong player but is also a regular at the Anstey chess club, as he said he had played at Anstey for the last few weeks before this match.

The next match to finalise was board 4 with Jakub Miller playing for Anstey (against Ashby player Jamie Rhodes). Jakub is a new member of the Anstey club, and he is quite tricky. I have played against him a few times and he can cause some chaos on the board, which can make it hard to keep track of what’s going on. Unfortunately, Jakub could not cause enough chaos for this match, but Jakub did last for a long time against a very strong Ashby player.

Board 1 was the last to win (Oskar Rudczenko from Anstey vs. Paul Gibson from Ashby), and both games played that evening were close and of good quality. Oskar is a player who has worked hard since playing for the club (when he was a chess beginner), he is not improving quickly but he is improving, and he is sure to keep working on his chess. Oskar had won the first game against a strong Ashby player, unfortunately, he could not keep up his performance in the second game as Paul won the second game between the two top board players.

Leo had lost as well on the second board, Jakub on the last, but Aarav on the third winning his second game against Dominic Lennon. This results in the match between Anstey 2 and Ashby 3 to be 3 points to Anstey and 5 points to Ashby (result table below).

As I’ve said before, we were out graded but it doesn’t mean we should give in. We had won some games, but with every loss we get the more we can learn, that’s how it works in chess and in all sorts of other things too. Anstey 2 play against Latimer in the next round of the Harrod Cup, and Latimer are a strong team but Anstey are quite a strong club filled with players who are full of potential. We’ll see what happens on the night, but until then it’s a bye for now.