When schools break up for Christmas, parents can be forgiven for wanting to find some activity for their children, especially if it has some educational value. A new type of activity is a Brain Camp. The idea is to spend a few days of intensive game activities where the games have a special characteristic. All the games are strategy games. There are no dice or cards – there is no element of luck. The outcomes are down to the skill of the players, which increases gradually through practice and some theory.
The four-day Kingston Brain Camp was organised by John Foley through his chess teaching company ChessPlus, and ran from 18-21 December. It followed the same format as the Summer Camp in July. The children, aged 7-9, played under close supervision at the premises of a local school, Holy Cross Prep. The children were encouraged to learn and play several games. The camp was held in a friendly atmosphere where the emphasis was on learning and having fun. As well as chess and games equipment, we used software resources from LogiqBoard, ChessKid and Lichess. Alongside John were the highly experienced tutors Brigitta Peszleg and Dr John Upham.
Each game has its special characteristics and requires different strategies. The children feel as if they are all on the same level as they all have to learn to play games some of which may be unknown to them. The games included chess, the classic game which has been around for 1,600 years and which will never go out of fashion. A conventional chess camp focuses on chess only and revolves around lectures and competitions. This is appropriate when training talented children who want to get into competitive chess. However, when dealing with regular children it is important to provide a more varied diet than chess.
Following years of research and practice, John has developed an approach to teaching games in which chess forms part of a continuum of games played on an 8×8 board. One of the drawbacks of focusing exclusively on chess is that children drop out too early. They are being introduced too rapidly to a game which takes a lot of effort to play well. Whilst children love competition, the joy of play can be lost if the stakes are too high. There is also a practical reason for playing other games: chess takes too long to play. Children do not like waiting for others to finish playing their games. We did not want to use game timers because these bring a different type of problem – children playing to the clock rather than focusing on the game strategy. If games are to be educational, children should not be under time pressure.
The games played included:
Loser’s Chess – the first player to lose all their pieces wins the game
Draughts – move diagonally on black squares, win by jump-capturing all your opponent’s pieces.
Halma – pieces jump over each other to reach the opposite corner of the board
Reversi – counters are reversed if they are caught between the opponent’s counters
Slimetrail – both players move the same piece and try to reach their corner, never visiting the same square twice
In addition to the games, there were several problem-solving challenges including:
8 Safe Officers problem
8 Queens problem
Knights Tour
Army power minimisation problem
The children were fully engaged throughout and we never heard them say they were bored. The feedback from the children and parents has been very encouraging and we are planning to run another camp at Easter.
In chess there are out-and-out blunders – bad moves that are obvious in retrospect. And there are missed opportunities – glorious (but hard-to-find) moves that elude you. Which are harder for a player to deal with?
Peter Andrews
Peter Andrews reflects on what might have been
What is the difference between a blunder and a missed opportunity? Do we feel differently about them? Are they a metaphor for life? Can our friends enjoy our creations even if they were only unearthed after the event? Or, if you prefer to avoid mental anguish over the Christmas season and would rather not address these philosophical questions, you could just enjoy some of my near-misses and see if you could have done better.
Blunders v missed opportunities
It is not unusual when analysing a game using an engine to find that the computer evaluation of one’s position falls sharply after a move, meaning that the move was a mistake. Sometimes the move was bad: it failed to deal with an obvious threat, lost a piece or compromised the position. We would call such a move a blunder – a player of our ability should have been able to see what was wrong and avoid it, and there were reasonable alternatives available. Probably we knew before we got there that the machine would disapprove of our choice.
Sometimes the change in evaluation comes as a surprise and the reason is not obvious. Perhaps there was only one move which would have maintained the evaluation, and anything else was inferior. And perhaps that move was not one that a player of our ability would expect to find over the board, with all the usual pressures – time shortage, concern about the position in the match, and so on. In such a case we might refer to a missed opportunity.
I recently drew with Frank Zurstiege in a Thames Valley League match against Hounslow but missed a lovely trick to convert my positional advantage into a winning endgame. The opportunity arose in this position:
That Hounslow game also contained a missed opportunity for my opponent in a king and pawn endgame, where a misguided pawn advance by me permitted an instant counter-strike that would have won the game for Black. Happily (for me at least) my opponent missed it and his opportunity was lost. In the next day or so, if I awoke at night, the possibility of having lost that game in such a manner made it difficult to nod off again. The missed opportunities on both sides in that game made me ponder other such moments in my 50-plus years of competitive chess.
The three examples below set a high bar in terms of both the significance of the opportunity and the degree of mental anguish which followed (though there is, as you will discover, a pleasurable coda to the third “missed” opportunity). All three games were against players higher rated than me, so winning would have been at least a worthwhile achievement and maybe one of those red-letter days to be enjoyed for the rest of one’s chess career. They might have given me the illusion that I could really play at the same level as these people, rather than approach it occasionally like an FA Cup upset.
They all involved good play up to the point of the opportunity. Perhaps that is to be expected. If one is to have an opportunity against a player stronger than oneself, it is natural that one has to play above oneself. And they feature attractive play at the critical point. Combining these factors means that the opportunity will be rare – there may never again be another chance to beat that particular opponent or play that particular combination.
All that leads to a regret so palpable that it can resurface after over 40 years. It is an emotion slightly different from that of the memory of a blunder. It is a sadness at something unfulfilled, rather than embarrassment or humiliation – a little like being out in the nineties at cricket before one has made one’s maiden century. No surprise, no shame, but the chance of a lifetime forsaken. Fortunately, to the best of my recollection, none of the three examples below was costly for my team, so there is no guilt on top of the regret.
In each of these examples, I give a diagram showing the crucial position, to allow you to find what I missed before the winning move is shown, alongside some game context.
Position 1: Brandon Kwan v Peter Andrews
This position was included in Chess magazine’s Find the Winning Move in October 2023. I was Black in this game, playing for the Bank of England, against Brandon Kwan of Barclays in the final of the City Chess Association‘s Major Cup on 17 May 2023. Barclays, perennial league winners, are the Manchester City of the CCA. Kwan is a little stronger than me, rated in the 2080s at the time of the game. I failed to find the brilliant win.
Why did I miss this? I had about six minutes to Brandon’s two, and the opportunity to win material and keep an advantage in an important game was so clear as to preclude spending precious time on looking for something else. Fundamentally, I did not see the mating net that Black could weave in mid-board. A shame after achieving such a crushing position as Black against a stronger opponent in only 23 moves. Because I won the game and the BoE won the match anyway, the regret is less sharp than it would have been, but mere competitive success pales alongside not having played the game that I might have done.
Position 2: Peter Andrews v Marcus Osborne
I was White against Marcus Osborne for Kingston B against South Norwood on 29 May 2023, less than two weeks after the Kwan game. Marcus is rated around 2250. I must have only a dozen or so wins against players over 2200 in my life, so it would have been one to remember. And it was an important match – avoiding a large defeat meant that Kingston B avoided relegation from Surrey League Division 2.
I felt at the time, and Stockfish confirmed the next morning, that I had outplayed him up to this point, but time was short and I was not surprisingly worried that his passed d-pawn, supported by his queen, would promote near my king and mate me. I felt that 32. Rf7 was the right move, but if 32… d2 33. Bxg7+ Rxg7 I could not see how to win. The answer of course is 34. Qd8+ Rg8 35. Qf6+ mating, a backward diagonal queen move, notoriously hard to see.
Having missed Rf7, I blundered in the time scramble and got mated. Fortunately we won the match anyway.
Position 3: Glenn Flear v Peter Andrews
Sometimes the lost opportunity is an illusion. In March 1981 I played the strongest opposition of my life. I played IM Paul Littlewood (and lost in 18 moves) in the National Club Championship on 8 March, GM John Nunn in the Oxford University college league on 12 March, and David Goodman, also in the college league, on Friday 13th. I lost both of those as well, unluckily against Nunn where I blundered away a draw just before the 30-move time control (that game was a candidate for this column too, but belongs in the blunder rather than the missed opportunity bucket). On the Saturday I was due to play for Oxfordshire against Surrey in a county match. In those days few university players played for Oxfordshire (whereas the Cambridgeshire county team more or less was the university plus some dons), so the county side was very weak and on this occasion I found myself, with some trepidation, on board 1 against Glenn Flear, already close to 2300 and on his way to becoming a GM.
As I looked at the game for the first time since then, it was clear that the modest 37. Kh1 is a draw, although he might have missed it or been reluctant to concede it against a much weaker opponent. Writing this blog has finally exorcised that regret, as compensation for reliving more recent ones. Perhaps if you have an idle moment over the holiday season, putting your old games through an engine will similarly console you.
So what of the other questions with which I started? Are these missed opportunities over the chessboard a metaphor for life? I can think of a few occasions in my professional life when I should have said something in a meeting that I did not, which might have led to better career outcomes as well as better policy-making, and the odd occasion in my personal life. But those lost opportunities were mainly a failure of courage, whereas my first two examples above were really failures of imagination. Perhaps the last example leads to a saner conclusion: there are all sorts of alternative avenues which one might have tried, some of them superficially attractive, some of them pressed by those around you, but often they might not have made much difference; you end up with what you deserve.
And as for my last question: can one’s friends enjoy our creations even if they only come to light afterwards? That I leave to you.
David Maycock scores 11.5/12 to take first prize in the inaugural Kingston Christmas Blitz, beating perennial rivals Peter Lalić and Vladimir Li to top spot
Donner and Blitzen, aka Ed Mospan (left) and tournament winner David Maycock, in action at the Christmas blitz
What to do to mark Christmas? Sing, be jolly, drink copiously. Well there was some of that, but chess players also like to play chess, so we celebrated the start of the festive season with a well-attended blitz, played at the Willoughby Arms on Thursday 21 December. Twenty-four players took part, including several of our friends from other local clubs, and these were the final standings:
The spirit in which the games were played was great, many mince pies were consumed, and we hope the Kingston Christmas Blitz is now an instant tradition. Thank you to everyone who supported the event: Gregor Smith and Ljubica Lazarevic for organising; Ljubica for arbiting; Greg Heath (and others) for setting up; David Bickerstaff for baking a cake; the members who brought biscuits and mince pies; Rick Robinson, the landlord of the Willoughby Arms, who generously provided a case of beer for the winner; all the players for taking part with such enthusiasm and good cheer; and the spectators who came along to enjoy the chess and camaraderie.
Congratulations to David on winning with a near-perfect score (though he admitted he was very fortunate to beat me twice, with one game lasting almost 20 moves). David, being a non-drinker, preferred to take home chocolate rather than beer as his prize, leaving second-placed Peter Lalić with the booze. Vladimir Li (sporting a magnificent Christmas-themed tie) was third; Stephen Lovell, showing that he has very much still got it despite playing very little over the past few years, was fourth; Richmond first-team captain Maks Gajowniczek came fifth; and Kingston’s Surrey League first-team captain Peter Andrews and club newcomer Ergo Nobel shared sixth place. Apologies to Ergo, whose “prize” for coming joint sixth (and in the process beating me 2-0) was a signed copy of my Rookie book.
Thames Valley League division 2 match played at the Willoughby Arms, Kingston on 18 December 2023
After about half an hour of this match I had a feeling we’d been mugged. I was on board 4 and, having expected to meet a player of my own strength or slightly below, was faced with Nigel Smith, an experienced player rated around 1900. I was already in a spot of bother after a foolish bishop for knight exchange that left his bishop pair controlling affairs. If they had a 1900 on board 4, what were their top 3 like?
The answer was pretty handy, because Maidenhead managed a clean sweep of boards 1 to 3, despite facing players of the quality of Peter Andrews, Julian Way and Alan Scrimgour. Make no mistake: this was a very strong Maidenhead team, and with these players, including the newly joined Sir Lankan father-and-son duo Ishan and Jenith Wiratunga, strengthening an already very useful first team, Maidenhead are really going places and could be contenders for the Thames Valley division 1 title in the near future.
Going places is of course what Maidenhead have to do. They are quite a long way from their rival clubs in the Thames Valley League and have traditionally been slightly ropey travellers. Generally you could expect them to be a good deal weaker away than at home. But they disproved that dictum here, getting their best players out and winning comfortably despite the long journey.
Peter Andrews lost a remarkable game against Maidenhead’s Stephen James on board 1 – remarkable because of the transformation in his fortunes in the course of a few moves. He pinpoints this position, after White’s 14th move, as the key one. He plays 14…Bc5 here, and things go badly awry.
“Nxd2 was best, “explains Peter, “when play might go 15. Nxc6 Nb3 16. Nb4 Nxa1 17. Be4 Qc8 (d5 is no help because Bxd5 is possible) 18. Bxa8 Qxa8 19. Qxa1 and -0.2 suggests a fractional edge for Black but nothing much. Curious to see both queens in corners. I had originally intended 14…Bxb4, which is also fine. Bc5 was too clever and forced my opponent to play well.”
The game proceeded 14… Bc5 15. Be3 Bxb4 16. cxb4 Qxb4 17. Qg4, leading to this position:
“I thought Qg4 was winning and collapsed,” Peter says with great honesty. This is a fascinating and complicated position, which Peter (accounting for his “hallucination”) describes in the following way in the annotation he did for the game: “This came as a complete shock. A visualisation error on my part; in the lines I had been looking at in advance of move 14, I would have played Nxd2 at some stage, so the queen would come to g5 rather than g4 and I would not now face this pin on my knight.
“When looking at this with an engine, I had expected to find that I was now lost, and was surprised to find the evaluation 0.0. Even more surprisingly, it recommends 17…O-O, which I barely considered because of the obvious 18. Bh6, threatening mate and attacking the knight for the third time. I had missed 18…. Qxb2, guarding g7 from long distance and backwards along a diagonal (hard to see, but it was relevant to my actual choice of 17… Qxb2, so I should have seen it in this context too). The threats of Nxf2 and Qxf2+ constrain White’s choices. Natural and best is 19. Bxe4 Bxe4, when 20. Rxe4 would leave the a1 rook en prise and (best) 20. Qxe4 allows gxh6. Black’s position looks pretty hairy, but he does have two pawns as compensation and with accurate play he can avoid disaster.”
As Peter said, he played the right move, Qxb2 – but too early and without castling. The game proceeded: 17…Qxb2 18. Bxe4 f5 19. Bxf5 exf5 20. Bd4+ 1-0
“17… Qxb2 was tantamount to resignation as soon as my opponent saw that 19. Bxf5 was possible,” says Peter. In the final position [see above] exf5 allows Bd4+, and Black has no sensible way to prevent the white queen giving check next move, followed by annexing the black queen.” A horrible end from a position a few moves earlier of relative security. One concludes for the umpteenth time that chess can be very cruel.
On board 2, Julian Way succumbed to young Jenith Wiratunga. Wiratunga played a Sicilian Dragon, and White countered with the Yugoslav Attack. Julian thought his initial error came in this position:
Here he plays 13. Nd5, leading to a mass trade of pieces: 13.Nd5 Qxd2 14. Nxf6+ Bxf6 15. Rxd2 Bxd4 16. Rxd4 Rc5 17. Be2 Rac8 18. Rc1 h5 19. h3 hxg4 20. hxg4 g5. Black is already heading for an endgame in which he has greater piece activity. White’s light-squared bishop never really joins the party, other than as a rather ineffective defender, and 20. g5! secures an entry point for Black’s king on the dark squares. Simple but very effective chess from Black.
13. a3 or perhaps g5 would have been better for White, and 18. c3 is a better way to defend the c-file than Rc1, because it doesn’t tie the rook down to defence and opens up squares for the light-squared bishop. In the game as it unfolded, Black got all the play, won a pawn and sealed the deal with some very precise endgame play, leading to the final position below when Julian resigned. Wiratunga Junior is a player of whom we are going to hear a great deal more.
Wiratunga Senior was also successful for Maidenhead on board 3 against the redoubtable Alan Scrimgour. They had a fierce and complex battle in which neither side could establish a decisive advantage, despite pressure on Alan’s uncastled king. In the position below, Alan felt that in retrospect he should have recaptured on e4 with the queen to force a queen exchange.
He retook with fxe, which the engine prefers, but it led to long-term pressure from the white queen on Black’s now exposed kingside. “My opponent began to create threats,” says Alan, “but I was still holding until an unsound and unnecessary exchange sac on move 44. I was dead lost after that.” A very classy game, though, in which both players made excellent moves over a long period in a series of complicated positions.
I managed a barely deserved draw against Nigel Smith on board 4. In the position below I thought I was about to be mated:
I do, though, have a rather desperate resource: 24. c4, buying myself some time to stop the black rooks combining on the h-file while the black bishop occupies c4 to cut off my king’s escape route. My position remains very bad, but at least I am still alive and can create problems, which is exactly what happened. The rooks were traded, my knight became active, time began to run short, my opponent blundered a pawn, and we reached an endgame with opposite-coloured bishops in which I just about hung on. One of those draws that feels better than a win.
Kingston captain Gregor Smith had what he freely describes as a “boring draw” on board 5, with material being liquidated down to a rook and pawn endgame after 20 moves. Nevertheless a good result against Maidenhead veteran Nigel Dennis, who has been a fixture on the chess scene for almost 60 years and retains a very respectable rating.
Our only winner in the match was Nick Grey, continuing his good recent run of form with a victory against Simon Foster on board 6. Nick played the Advanced Variation against the French Defence, and the game quickly descended into a blizzard of tactics. In the position below, Nick thought he was completely busted, and the truth is he probably was.
Black plays the correct move here: 21…Rxf6! White recaptures with the pawn, but is now in serious trouble because 22… Nxg3 is potentially a killer move.
23. fxg3 is losing on the spot – mate in two. The engine recommends playing 23. Qe1 (23. f7 is a close second best) and just giving up a piece to the discovered check, with the hope of some back-rank counterplay later. But neither of these options is very pleasant, and both would be likely to end in defeat. Nick found something that is objectively worse in the short term, but maybe in human terms better because it at least muddies the waters: 23. Ne5, blocking the discovered check.
23…Nxe5 here would hand back a substantial plus to White. The best move for Black is 23…Nxf1+ because, if, say, 24. Qxf1, then 24…Nxe5 25. dxe5 Qxe5+ 26. f4 Qxf6 27. Qf2 Bxc2 28. Rg1 Rxg1 29. Kxg1 Qxc3 is winning. But Black actually played 23…Nxe2, which appears to pick up a piece but is far from conclusive unless he follows it up, after White’s 24. Qe3, with 24…Qd8, relinquishing the knight in order to get threats which will force White to give a piece back to avoid mate.
All very complicated and Black proceeded to lose his way completely, playing 24…Rg4 instead of Qd8, and, after 25. Qxe2, 25…Bxc2, believing White would play 26. Qxc2 and Black would have at least a draw by perpetual. But Nick did not capture the bishop on c2, instead playing f3! (f7! is also strong).
Further complications ensued – Black tried the tempting (but misguided) 26…Bd3? – with neither side playing perfectly as time started to get short in a very double-edged position. But Nick never relinquished the advantage he now had, and Black was eventually mated. Very satisfying for Nick, and welcome relief for Kingston after the reverses elsewhere.
Surrey League division 5 match played at the Willoughby Arms on 18 December 2023
Surbiton 3 came with a very strong team for this fixture and ran out comfortable winners by 4.5-1.5. But as ever there were many positives for Kingston and naturally we will dwell on those, while passing on congratulations to our neighbours on their victory.
On board 5 Jaden Mistry spurned not one but two draw offers from Surbiton captain David Morant before losing a rook endgame. Good to be bold and play for a win, though Jaden now accepts that it might have been sensible to accept the second offer. But, as GM Ben Finegold once told me, nobody gets to be a better chess player by taking a draw and forgoing the chance to play more chess.
On board 6 another Kingston junior Ethan Bogerd lost to Paul McCauley, who is surely underrated at 1430. Ethan played well in the opening against Paul’s Sicilian, but then hung his queen as he got overexcited about the possibility of launching a kingside attack. An unfortunate denouement.
Colin Lyle fought hard against Alexey Markov, even when he went the exchange down, but in the end Alexey had too much nous to let his advantage slip. Ed Mospan also lost on board 2 against David Cole, a very rarefied presence in the Minor Trophy, with a rating close to the 1790 cut-off for the division. It was a tough struggle and David was well behind on the clock, but with both sides hunting a checkmate the Surbiton player got their first.
I have, though, saved the best (from a Kingston perspective that is) till last: Jameel Jameel’s debut victory in a league match for the club, with his victim no less a player than distinguished Surbiton (and former Kingston) veteran Malcolm Groom. And what a fine game Jameel played, giving great hope of a rise up through the teams in the future. Malcolm made a key error in this position:
He should just play 13. Nxe5 here to retain a small plus, but his speculative 13. Nd4 (preparing f4?) immediately drops two pawns: 13. Nd4 Nxc4 14.Ne4 Qxd4 15.Qxd4 Bxd4 16.Bxc4 Bxb2. Malcolm looked for counterplay, but Jameel resolutely closed all doors and in the position below, with another pawn about to fall, Malcolm resigned.
Not surprisingly, after a couple of losses when he said his play had been unnecessarily ambitious, Jameel was delighted, and said he realised coolness was the key in classical chess. “I think I’m getting the hang of this over-the-board thing,” he said “Typically I try to force through ‘beautiful moves’ impulsively – I can blame online chess for that – but tonight I was conscious of taking my time and playing less speculatively.” A great win for Jameel and a big step forward.
Thames Valley League division X match played at Egham Constitutional Club, Egham on 14 December 2023
Kingston C captain Stephen Daines neatly christened this a “watery encounter” – Kingston upon Thames away to Staines upon Thames, in Dix X of the Thames Valley League naturally. It was going to be sink or swim – and, happily, Kingston swam.
One warming point to remember about this match is that none of these players was even at Kingston before the pandemic of 2020/21 shut us down for a prolonged period. All four, including the captain Stephen Daines (who is doing sterling work running three league teams), have come on board since we resumed operations, which shows what strides we have made as a club. Half of our entire membership have joined since over-the-board chess came back in 2021.
At Staines, Dieter Mcdougall on top board showed his great potential with a decisive win against David Bean, who has a far from negligible rating. An excellent victory for Dieter, who has played only a handful of matches for the club so far, but is making a solid case for second-team chess. Colin Lyle, a relative tyro and always very modest about his play, also enjoyed a good win, but the captain was not so fortunate, essaying the Dutch for the first time and coming unstuck as he tried, in his words, to “wing it”. He failed to take flight. A Double Dutch perhaps.
That made it 2-1, so at least the ship could not go down with the captain (metaphors are being horribly mangled here). Even if Ergo Nobel lost on board 2, we would still have a draw. At one stage, that did indeed look like a danger: Ergo was the exchange down, with rook and knight against two rooks. Often that spells disaster, especially if rooks can be exchanged to leave one fast-moving rook up against a creaky knight. But Ergo fought admirably, was able to avoid his opponent simplifying to a won position and eventually a draw was agreed, giving Kingston the match by 2.5-1.5.
A result achieved against the tide? Actually no: that was just a pathetic attempt to end on an aquatic note. It was never in doubt. Well done to Captain Daines and his crew.
Thames Valley League division 1 match played at Fircroft, Long Ditton, Surbiton on 13 December 2023
Kingston players (on left) do battle with their Surbiton counterparts in a thrilling local derby at refurbished Fircroft
Surbiton have returned to their old venue of Fircroft in Ditton Road, which has been very nicely redecorated. The pristine white walls may have aided clarity of thought among some of the Kingston players, but sadly this was not my case, as will be explained.
Both teams were at full, or nearly full, strength, so a competitive match was promised and delivered, even if Kingston outrated Surbiton on every board. The first result came on board 3. After some lengthy manoeuvres in a Sicilian Defence, David Maycock, realising that Altaf Chaudhry’s pieces were mainly committed to the queenside, probed on the kingside with h4, inspired, David said, by AlphaZero. Altaf allowed the pawn to advance to h6, then captured it, but in exchange White gained Black’s d-pawn and, more importantly, Black had a weakened kingside. In the position below David found a nice finish.
He played 39. Nf6+ Kf7 40. Qxg7+ winning back the queen (and being a piece up) by the fork on h5. Black resigned.
Meanwhile, on board 1 an intriguing battle between Vladimir Li and Mark Josse was unfolding. In the position below Vladimir played 13. e6.
If Black accepts the pawn sacrifice with 13…fxe6 White can play 14. Nf4 with the idea of Ng6, preventing Black castling. In the game there followed 13…Ne5 14. exf7+ Kxf7 when Black can’t castle anyway. His king looks vulnerable in view of the weakened white squares around it, but it is not so easy to take advantage of this.
After 15. Bc2 (it’s important to keep this bishop) Rf8, Vladimir attacked with 16. f4, but, as he said, this creates a long-term weakness on e3. He added the interesting comment “I played ‘faster’ than the position demanded.” Black replied 16…Nc4 and then Vladimir played 17. Qd3. The queen and bishop battery along the b1-h7 diagonal looks very dangerous, but Black’s king would actually have been safe on f8 if he had played Re8, increasing the pressure on e3. Vladimir remarked “Thankfully, it is not easy psychologically to play …Re8 when he had just played …Rf8 – especially given the king on f7.”
Instead, Black played 17… Bf6 and after 18. b3 Nxe3 (18…Nd6 was even better, because 19. Qg6+ can be met with 19…Ke7! when the black king is safe due to Black’s dominance on dark squares), giving this position:
There followed 19. Qxe3 d4 20. Qe4 dxc3 21. Rd1 Qb6 22. Qc4+ “a cute trap (White has already secured the perpetual)”, comments Vladimir, as 22…Be6 23. Rd7+ Be7 24. Bg6+ Kf6 25. Qxc3+ Kxg6 26. Rxe7 is good. As it was, Black played 22…Ke7 and the game finished with a repetition after 23. Qe4+ Kf7 24. Qc4+ Ke7 25. Qe4+.
On Board 4 Silverio Abasolo and Jasper Tambini contested a Closed Sicilian by transposition. Tambini sacrificed a pawn on f5, but his hoped-for kingside attack did not fire at that point and he lost another pawn. Possibly in desperation, he sacrificed a knight on h7 and this position was reached:
Play continued 26. Be4 Kh6 27. Bf3 Bd4 (preventing Rg1) 28. Re1 e6 29. Rf4 b3! This either leads to a promotion on a1 or wins the d3 pawn.
White tried 30. c3, but Silverio countered 30…Bxd3! 31. cxd4 b2 32. Rg1 (threatening mate on h4) 33. Bg6, giving the king a retreat square on g7. Black resigned as the b2 pawn is about to promote and win a rook.
Thus Kingston were ahead 2.5-0.5, and we were very hopeful that Will Taylor, playing Black on board 6, would get us over the line. He had got some good opening preparation in, resulting in an objectively winning position as well as a lead of more than 40 minutes on the clock.
David Rowson (foreground, right) taking on Liam Bayly and Will Taylor up against Angus James on boards 5 and 6
In a position with a choice of promising continuations, Will thought for 44 minutes, which is an especially long think when you only have 80 minutes plus 10-second increments for the whole game. He said that at the time it reminded him of Ding Liren’s freeze on move 32 of game 7 of his world championship match against Ian Nepomniachtchi. He didn’t choose the most incisive path, and a mistake a few moves later returned the game to approximate equality, with a draw agreed soon thereafter.
Still, this result made it 3-1, and the prospects were looking good for Kingston until my board 5 game entered a very double-edged phase. In the position below my king is very hemmed-in, but I’m a pawn up and threatening to force a queen exchange with Qd5.
Liam prevented this by 24…Nf6, allowing 25. Nc7 Qd7 26. Nxa8 Rxa8.
The exchange up, but worried about my king’s safety, I played 27. Re3? in order to eliminate the black pawn on f3, but overlooked the counter 27…g4, after which my position is very problematic, especially under time pressure. We were both down to our last minute (excuses, excuses), and following 28. Qf1 Rf8 29. hxg4 Qxg4 (threatening Qg2 and mate) 30. Nxf3 Nxf3 I resigned. Even after 31. Qg2, forcing the queens off, my position is lost.
So Surbiton had got within a point of us, at 3-2, and all would hang on the final game, Peter Lalić’s, as so often. This was a fascinating game from the opening on. Peter sacrificed his h-pawn on move 6 and gained space on the kingside. In this position David Scott has just played 15. e4 to contest the centre:
Peter continued 15…f4!, threatening f3, and after 16. gxf4 Nh4 17. Rg1 exf4 18. Nexf4 Bxd5 19. Nxd5 Nd4 Black controls the f3 square. Curiously, a few moves later an exchange of knights on b4 gave Peter control of the mirror square to f3, c3:
Although Stockfish assesses this as only slightly better for Black, it looks very difficult for White, as his king is stuck in the centre, Black’s king’s bishop is a monster, and he can use the half-open a-file. Both players were soon in time trouble, but Peter strengthened his position step-by-step and by move 43 White could no longer defend against the threats:
There followed 43. Rb2 Bxb2. 44. Qxb2 Rxa2. 45. Qxe5 Ra1+ 46. Resigns. It’s remarkable that Black began by attacking on the h-file and finished by sweeping down the a-file.
Peter’s win gave Kingston the match by the score of 4-2. We have now won three and drawn two matches in Thames Valley League Division 1, which means we lead the table from Hammersmith (who have a match in hand), but we face many challenges in the new year if we are to retain our title.
David Rowson, Kingston captain in Thames Valley division 1
Thames Valley League division 2 match played at the Willoughby Arms, Kingston on 11 December 2023
Kingston B struggled at times last season in Thames Valley division 2, but so far this year all is going swimmingly, and there is even talk of promotion (though would we really want two teams in division 1? – opinions within the club are divided). Hounslow B held us to a draw in the first Kingston B match of the season, but here we had a slightly strengthened team and ran out emphatic 5-1 winners.
David Rowson led the way on board 1 against JJ Padam. “I thought I had an advantage from the opening,” says David, “but Stockfish doesn’t really agree, which is maybe why I didn’t know how to capitalise on the supposed advantage until we got to the position below and I realised I could play 24…Nd3, exchanging off his strong d4 bishop and getting a pawn on d3.”
After 25. Bxd3 Bxd4 26. exd4 (Qxd4 loses to Nb6) exd3 27. Nf3 Nf4. 28. Qd2 Qe4 White had a very difficult position, but he made David’s task easy by playing 29. Ng5, overlooking the mate on g2.
On board 2 Peter Andrews played the same opponent he had faced in the reverse fixture at Hounslow, Frank Zurstiege, and Peter once again had White. He was very happy with the position after the opening, but felt he was over-hasty in the position below.
“Here I played Nb6 straight away rather than cranking up the pressure with Ne5. Ne5 would have put Black under real pressure, reinforcing the threat of Nb6 winning the exchange.” What Peter played nevertheless retained a plus for White, and after 23 moves this position was reached. Can you spot the best move?
Peter played 24. Nxg6. Perfectly OK and retains an edge. But better is Nc6, which can’t be taken by the b-pawn because White could counter with b7. “I missed the trick 24. Nc6 Bd6 (obviously not bxc6 25. b7 winning, and playing Rxc6 25. Rxc6 is the same) 25. Bxd6 Kxd6 26. Na7!, after which Black cannot oppose rooks on the c-file and White will get a rook to c7, which will win.”
It may, in fact, not be quite that simple, but it is fair to say that White would have excellent winning chances, whereas in reality Peter’s advantage evaporated and the players traded down to a king and pawn endgame. Such endgames can of course be knife edge, and Peter made a slip which could have cost him the game – one of those innocuous pawn moves which allow the opposing king to penetrate and mop up. Frank, though, perhaps having mentally settled for the draw and pleased to have weathered the storm, missed the key move, the chance passed and a draw was agreed.
John Foley, with Black, had a pleasing win on board 3, beating Eugene Gregorio – as with Peter, the same opponent he had played at Hounslow. John identifies this as the key position:
Here White plays 22. N2f3, which John describes as “a positional and strategic mistake”. He says White should instead be looking to activate his queenside pawn majority. “The move allowed my knight to occupy the commanding e4 square,” explains John. “My opponent decided to give up the exchange (22… Ne4 23. Rxe4) to get rid of the knight, but he could have played the defensive 23. Ne2 and held on.” Sometimes you just have to grovel. The exchange up, John was able to trade down to a winning rook v knight endgame.
Alan Scrimgour played the very promising Hounslow junior Vibhush Pusapadi on board 4. “My opponent played a very ambitious line in the French, which cost me a lot of time in the opening.” says Alan. “It was roughly level when we belatedly castled on opposite sides on move 17. My b4 pawn sac [see position below after 18. b4] wasn’t sound, but caused him to fall behind on time.”
The game proceeded 18…Qxb4 19. Nxc6 bxc6 20. Rab1 Qc5 21. Nd4 Nb6 22. Kh1 Nc4 23. Qb3 Na5 24. Qd3 Nc4 25. Qb3 Na5 26. Qd3 Nc4, leading to this position:
Here Alan finds the move which gives him a decisive edge – 27. f5. “When I broke through with f5 he failed to find the correct defence,” he says. “I missed an easier win, but he lost a piece shortly afterwards and ran out of time in a lost position.”
Nick Grey won a nice attacking game on board 6. In the position below, Nick plays the classic Bxf7 sac. Black doesn’t have a good move in response: capturing with the king is met by 17. Ne5+ and the loss of the bishop on g4 to the white queen. But Kd8 as played also gives White a decisive advantage.
Nick’s opponent, Steve Hall, tried to create complications, in turn sac-ing a bishop on h2 in a desperate effort to launch a counter-attack. But in the position below the attack down the h-file is more visual than real, and Black has given up too much material to have serious chances.
Nick plays safe here and opts for 24. Qe5, realising that after White checks on h2 he will be able to force an exchange of queens which will leave him in an overwhelming position.
As for captain Gregor Smith on board 5, he had what he described as a “lucky” draw, dropping a piece for two pawns when he fell for a tactic experimenting with a line in the Accelerated Dragon variation of the Sicilian Defence, and expecting a long and difficult game as a consequence. But his opponent must have looked at the rating gap between the two players, thought Gregor’s extra pawns were more potent than was really the case, and decided to bail out with a draw offer.
It was a narrow escape which gave Gregor time to enjoy his team’s successes later in the evening and to contemplate whether Div 1 would be a congenial place for a second team. Not that we are assuming such an outcome of course: Hounslow A and Richmond B, neither of whom we have yet played, will be stiffer tests.
Surrey League division 4 match played at the Willoughby Arms on 11 December 2023
Guildford are such a large club that even their fourth team, playing here in the Centenary Trophy (Surrey Div 4), are strong, with a player rated almost 1800 on board 1. That Kingston 3, marshalled by (in this instance non-playing) captain Stephen Daines managed to grab a 3-3 draw was cause for celebration, especially when we had been perilously placed at 3-1 and apparently losing on top board 1 at one point.
Adam Nakar and Greg Heath had secured solid draws on boards 3 and 6, but Kingston new boy Jameel Jameel and returned old boy Ed Mospan had succumbed to Guildford veterans Trevor Jones and Mike Gunn on 4 and 5. That left Kingston’s Davis Shalom and Charlie Cooke battling away on the top two boards, but it was hard to see where the points needed to draw the match would come from.
Charlie, playing Black on board 2 against Richard Duncalfe, had other ideas, though, and defended superbly to ensure we got back to 3-2. His opponent essayed the Cochrane Gambit in the Petrov, not very sound but, like most gambits, likely to give White a fun game in which he can attack at will. He did exactly that and reached this position after 16 moves.
This looks quite encouraging for White, but may be one of those positions where the attack is more visual than real. Engines still favour Black, though White has possibilities if he plays very precisely. 17. g5 is White’s best move here, trying to make space for the white queen to occupy d4 and threaten mate on g7. White has seen the idea but never plays g5, preferring to put the queen on d4 first. Charlie played a series of moves which looked ugly – Ne8 to defend against mate on g7; g5 to block the immediate pawn advance by White – and never let his advantage slip. His opponent sac’d another piece to open the g-file and again had chances in the position below.
But down on material you have to be precise here. Bd3 must be played. Everything else is very bad, and the move White chose, Qf4, very bad indeed. Charlie was now well on top, and was able to stymie all threats, liquidate material and reach a position where his material advantage was overwhelming. White resigned to make it 3-2 to Guildford.
That left David Shalom trying to salvage something from his game against the highly rated Rob Merriman on board 1. Rob was a piece up and David appeared to have very little compensation. What he did have, though, was a significant time advantage, and Rob went horribly wrong in nascent time trouble, taking a pawn with queen (supported by rook) on f7 to check the Black king, but failing to realise the square was guarded by Black’s own distant queen. Rob’s shoulders slumped. That blunder took David from a piece down to the exchange up, and White never recovered. Kingston had against all the odds secured a draw, though you couldn’t help but feel for the Guildford board 1, for whom a sleepless night awaited. Chess is nothing if not cruel.
Thames Valley League division 2 match played at Egham Constitutional Club, Egham on 7 December 2023
On paper this looked straightforward for Kingston B, who put out a strong team against bottom-of-the-table Staines A and enjoyed an average ratings advantage of more than 200 points a board, but in reality it was anything but. The result was in doubt until the conclusion of the final game at the end of the three-hour playing session, and we only just got across the line – winning by 3.5-2.5 to go third in Thames Valley division 2.
Losing with Black on boards four and six did not help the Kingston cause. David Shalom lost to Stephen Payne on board 6, ceding a space advantage to White that resulted first in the loss of a pawn and eventually in an attack by the white rook and queen that would either force mate or drive home a pawn.
I played very loosely on board 4, unsoundly sac-ing a piece in the opening and allowing my opponent, Siddarth Ramaraju, to build a winning position. I somehow contrived to fight back, trapping White’s queen to win back some material. But even then, while I felt I was back on at least level terms, engines confirm I was still behind, and in the position below White finds a tactic which more or less seals my fate.
28. Nxf4 doesn’t just win a pawn here. More importantly, it frees up White’s very cramped position, allowing him to rebuff what at one point looked a promising counter-attack. I kept pushing the h-pawn , but now he was able to marshal his defences and, after a further blunder by Black, it eventually fell. In truth, defeat was what I deserved for such a wild performance.
Kingston captain Gregor Smith had won quickly on board 5, making it 2-1 to Staines on the bottom three boards. It was then left to our three highly rated players on boards 1 to 3 to bring home the bacon, and they did not disappoint.
David Rowson got the better of Staines captain Derek McGovern on board 1 in the closed version of the Breyer Variation of the Caro-Kann. Black had a space advantage in the opening, but made the mistake of locking down the centre and allowing David to launch an attack on the kingside. On move 39, in the position below, David delivers the killer blow.
Here David plays 39. Nxe5! “Not a hard move to see,” he says modestly, “but satisfying to play.” If 39…Qxe5 40. Bf4 wins the queen, but the alternative as played is also losing: 39…Bd6 40. Nxg6+ Ke8 41. Qxe6+ 1-0. In fact, everything is losing. The apparently slow-burning Breyer has done its work.
Alan Scrimgour and Staines’ Ye Kwaw had a bruising encounter on board 2, with Alan launching a violent attack in the opening which at one stage looked as if it might result in another quick Kingston win. But Kwaw fought back and the two reached a position in which each had queen and a rook, with Kwaw menacing the white king. With time running short, Alan was finding the noise in the venue – the bar is rather too close to the playing area for comfort – increasingly irritating, and he was eventually happy to agree a draw.
The score was now 2.5-2.5, which meant the match hinged on the game on board 2, where Kingston’s Julian Way had Black against Jon Barnes. It looked level for a long time, but never underestimate Julian in an endgame. He is expert at squeezing out a win and, a pawn up in a rook and pawn ending, he did it again here. It can be very hard to convert a pawn advantage in such endgames, but Julian played with his customary accuracy and his opponent was eventually forced to concede. A welcome and very hard-earned away win for Kingston.
