Another win for the C team, who now have 5 wins from 9 matches. This was a tense affair, with the two teams fairly evenly matched in grading on each board.
First blood went to the D’s, with Nigel succumbing to a vicious attack by Marc and this was closely followed by a nice win from Ben over Peter H, again after a strong attack. So 2-nil down and not looking good.
My game against Neil was a really interesting one. Unusually, I had a good position from the opening, with lots of pressure in the centre, but Neil managed to capitalise on his domination of the white squares, to nullify my advantage in space and set up a useful looking counter attack. I temporarily sacrificed the exchange for Neil’s white Bishop, but had enough pressure to regain the exchange a few moves later. Then Neil played a really dangerous-looking Rook move, but I was able to swap my Queen for his Rook and then pin his Queen against the King with a Bishop, leaving me the exchange up and a Neil with a bad Bishop. So 2-1, and looking better for the C’s. (A less modest version, annotated by the loser, of an impressive win by Gerry may be viewed here – Ed)
Peter G played a solid game against John and ended it with a successful attack, evening up the match score.
So it all depended on Mac’s game and by that stage he was a Rook up, after some fine play, and went on to win well.
All told, a good match and now just one more to go in what has been a great season for the C team.
Gerry Nolan 17/04/2015
(clearly the D team captain’s parents were somewhat remiss when it came to communicating basic handwriting skills! – Ed)
