| Home Team: Bedford B | Away Team: Leighton Buzzard A | |||||
| Board | Name | Grade | Score | Score | Name | Grade |
| 1 | Alex Taylor | 2050 | 0 | 1 | Gary Kenworthy | 2283 |
| 2 | Qais Karimi | 1949 | 0 | 1 | John R Sharp | 1945 |
| 3 | Paul F Habershon | 1949 | 0.5 | 0.5 | Kevin J Williamson | 1953 |
| 4 | Okwose Marc Obi | 1938 | 0.5 | 0.5 | Brian J Valentine | 1924 |
| 5 | Evan Lewis | 1746 | 0.5 | 0.5 | Adrian Matthews | 1878 |
| 1.5 | 3.5 | |||||
| Played: 06/01/22 |
On 6 January The B Team looked to bounce back from their opening defeat, but faced tough opposition against Leighton Buzzard B. With Richard being laid low with Covid, Evan made his B Team debut.
The first two games to finish were the top two boards, and would have a decisive impact on the overall match. Qais grabbed an early pawn against John Sharp, but at the cost of leaving his pieces particularly uncoordinated, particularly on the queenside. Whilst trying to unravel this, John turned his attention to the kingside and Qais’s king. John sacrificed a bishop on h3 but was able to open the h file with a discovered check and force the white king up the board to its doom.
On top board, I was playing Gary and I would like to say I played an enterprising exchange sacrifice of a rook for knight and pawn, but truth be told I missed a tactic. However, once I had consolidated my position it improved – indeed the computer suggested that I was +1 at one point. However, I missed the right plan which allowed Gary to regroup and then break through decisively on the kingside.
Evan played an enterprising game against Adrian. He had a solid position with black and in the middle game was able to win a pawn. Adrian then built up some pressure on the e-file, and Evan went slightly wrong to leave himself in trouble. Adrian, however, injudiciously captured Evan’s knight to allow a perpetual check, when ignoring it would have been good enough to win.
The other two boards seemed to be quiet affairs. Marc had the advantage of more space and more of the open d-file, but it did not really amount to much. Kevin was trying to attack Paul’s king, but this was fended off with good defence, and at the end Paul stood better, but (wisely) he decided to accept a draw given the match was already lost.
A 3.5-1.5 defeat was a little disappointing, but some good play particularly from Evan.
Alex Taylor, 20th January 2022