Leeds Rose Forgrove Chess Club

Match report by Rich Archer Rose Forgrove A correspondent

Match Week 2

• Venue: Alwoodley CC
• Date: Saturday, 29 October 2011

First decision - board order. I decided to give Mike and Eddie the black pieces. To give them the white pieces would be like putting velvet hats on a couple of piggies. It makes no difference what colour they play with, it's gonna be dull, they never make use of the advantage of being white. As Fred Trueman would have said it would be "wasted on thee!"

Second decision - Youth policy. Promote me to Board 2 and give the white pieces to Mark White against Jim "the drawmeister" Vickery in the hope that he can grind him down. With his first appearance on Saturday this year we welcomed Taka to Board 1.

Fast Eddie Hurwitz took on Gabor, a contest which the virgin Captain had down for a draw. Queens were swapped early. A bit of manoeuvring ensued. Then, Gabor played an interesting move combination, Eddie initially thought he could win a piece, but soon saw this wasn't the case. They swapped a few bits off and agreed a draw, spending more time on post- match analysing than actually playing it!

Alwoodley A 1.5 - 0.5 Leeds Rose Forgrove A

Andy Bagley played into a line of the Benoni which he liked. His opponent Robin Browne was moving quickly enough to suggest he was also comfortable. Andy seemed to be gaining the upper hand until he confused his lines. Robin needed no encouragement and went on the attack, only a timely trading of queens stopped Andy from a certain death. A quick look at the other positions convinced Andy to shake Robin's hand. After match analysis suggests that Robin underestimated his position when offering Andy a draw in the ending.

Alwoodley A 2 - 1 Leeds Rose Forgrove A

Taka's first outing this season gave him black against John Hall. At the time of writing John's grade is 206 so Taka was going to be in for a difficult encounter, or so we thought! Taka had all the answers to anything John tried. He probably should've won, but John defended resolutely when a pawn down in a rook and pawn ending. Taka couldn't force his isolated past pawn home and took a draw. A great game from Taka, he celebrated by going home and watching the X-Factor!

Alwoodley A 2.5 - 2.5 Leeds Rose Forgrove A

Mark Birkin surprised me with 2.Na3 in the Sicilian (normally I get to at least move 4 before I am clueless about the opening!). So like most of my games I completely made the opening up as I went along. He lined his bishop and queen on the long b1-h7 diagonal but after some clever manoeuvring I exchanged the queens to blunt the initial threats. I then incorrectly played too passively (sitting next to Mike must be rubbing off on me) thinking I was at least drawing. We ended up with 2 rooks and opposite colour bishops each. Mark tried to force the issue and almost gave me the advantage when after the time control he offered the draw. I assessed the other boards (Mark drawing and Mike down, but with his opponent very short of time I thought he'd at least draw) and so took the draw.

Alwoodley A 3 - 3 Leeds Rose Forgrove A

Try as he might Mark couldn't break down Jim Vickery's stubborn defence. Whatever Mark threw Jim defended. Mark was offered a draw around the 15th move and after consulting the captain, decided the match position needed him to win. They ended up with 2 pawns each (g&h) and a rook a piece. Mark had no option but to take a draw and hope Mikey would at least get the same result.

Alwoodley A 3.5 - 3.5 Leeds Rose Forgrove A

Dr Mark Priest outplayed Mike for almost 40 moves. A nice steady opening gave Mark a space advantage and he eventually gained a pawn. The game developed into a rook and knight each ending with Mark being one, then two pawns in front; however it wasn't that straight forward - Mark had less than 5 mins left, Mike had 20. Mark tried to play quicker to allow himself enough time seal the win, but he stumbled into a Round cheapo, which lost his rook for Mike's knight. Mike didn't need any more encouragement and duly converted to give Forgrove the victory.

Final Score: Alwoodley A 3.5 - 4.5 Rose Forgrove A

A great result, well done gents! Once again we have the bragging rights in Leeds. Almost following Taka's lead, I celebrated by going home and watching the XXX Factor (the talent gets better each year!)

The Forgrove Test

Do you know all about our chess club? Find out in our very own quiz