The traditional Beds League season opener duly took place on Thursday 1st October as Bedford A took on Bedford B.
In the end, Bedford A just about limped over the winning line to record a 3-2 victory.
| Board | Rating | Bedford A | V | Bedford B | Rating |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2098 | Gardner, James | ½ – ½ | Dairi, Ramsey | 2013 |
| 2 | 2097 | Ledger, Stephen C | 1 – 0 | Botteley, Michael T | 2003 |
| 3 | 2057 | Arulnandhy, Ravi | 0 – 1 | Bodily, Richard T | 1987 |
| 4 | 1750* | Hale, Jack | ½ – ½ | Habershon, Paul F | 1945 |
| 5 | 2011 | Collacott, Nick | 1 – 0 | Pike, Steve C | 1840 |
| Total | 10013 | 3 – 2 | 9788 |
We were rather gifted an early point on board 5 when Steve P’s “interesting” opening gambit ( e4 d5, ed Qxd5, Nc3 Qa5, b4 !?!? ) went rather spectacularly wrong very quickly and Nick won after about 15 moves when 2 pieces up.
We decided to leave it to Steve to decide whether he wanted to publish the game – no thanks, Ed!
The rest, however, were far from plain sailing …..
Ravi seemed to get a pretty horrible position, as black, on bd 3, as Richard pointed all his pieces at a rather exposed king before duly crashing thru.
On Bd 1, Ramsey seemed to be whipping up quite an active position, as he does, by offering pawns left, right and centre.
Not sure what the metal monster made of it all but James just about managed to work his way thru the complications and may even have been slightly better when a draw was agreed ( game may follow if it doesn’t appear in the B team report ! )
My own game on bd 2 was far from ‘fireworks on the board’ as a rather insipid opening allowed Mike to equalise, at least, quite quickly with black.
We shuffled a few pieces round for a while before Mike played a couple of rather passive moves, rather than complete his development, that allowed white to grab the initiative. With more space, more time on the clock and a couple of weak pawns to target I was eventually able to infiltrate B’s position and win.
This left Jack’s game, that I had previously thought we would need to win, just needing a draw.
When I saw it Jack was a pawn up, and likely had a winning position, but with both players into their last minute a draw was agreed. So 3-2 to the A team.
Steve Ledger – 04/10/2026.