Kingston lynchpin Peter Large (pictured above) relives personal and team triumph in the recent World Senior Team Championship in Prague, where the England 1 team came first in the over-65s section and he won an individual gold medal on board 4
The World Senior Team Chess Championship took place in Prague in the Czech Republic from 17 to 26 February 2025. There were two events, one for those over 50 (the juniors), and one for those over 65. England usually send a number of teams to these events, and were the current holders of the title in the 65+ event, having won it in Krakow in Poland the previous year.
I started playing in these team events a few years ago, but to my great chagrin I did not get selected for the England 65+ first team which had won in Krakow, Paul Littlewood and Terry Chapman getting the nod ahead of me. I was desperate to get picked this time. Teams can be made up of four or five, with four playing in each round, and with my rating having gone up a bit after Reykjavik last year I happily scraped into the England 1 team for Prague, which consisted of, on board 1, GM John Nunn (an honorary life vice-president of Kingston, as well as a several-time winner of the individual world 65+ title, among his many other achievements); 2: GM Glenn Flear (captain); 3: GM Tony Kosten; 4: IM Peter Large; 5: FM Terry Chapman.
Not a bad line-up, but we went into the event as only second seeds. The top seeds (by average rating) were the mighty Lasker Schachstiftung GK (hereinafter referred to as “Lasker”), basically the German national team, comprising 1: GM Rainer Knaak (the reigning 65+ world champion); 2: GM Artur Yusupov (formerly of the USSR and a living legend of the game); 3: GM Jakob Meister; and 4: Gerhard Koehler. Super-strong, but we felt we might have a chance because Koehler (Fide rating 2215) on board 4 could perhaps be a weak link.
We were therefore a bit disappointed when, a few weeks before the event, they added a fifth member to their team, in the shape of GM Sergey Kalinitschew, putting them even further ahead. In the event, though, and whilst we scanned the pairings anxiously every round for his name, Kalinitschew never actually turned up. France, Italy and a few others also had strong teams led by strong GMs, and even the England second team was pretty good.
I had a great and quite successful time in Prague. Although they have both lived in France since the 1980s, I know Glenn Flear and Tony Kosten of old (I went to university with Tony) and it is always nice to meet up again. In fact the whole team soon bonded, and we made a point of eating together as a team in the evenings, in some of Prague’s many decent restaurants, discussing chess, cosmology and philosophy, and who should be in the team for the next match.
Here are a few memories of the event from a personal perspective – not necessarily the best games, but ones I saw (or played) and remember. I can only cover the 65+ event. The juniors (with England led by Michael Adams) played in a different venue, and I saw none of their games live.
Round 1
England 1 3.5-0.5 Sweden 2
In a Swiss tournament, in the first round, the top half is paired against the bottom half, With no less than 54 teams competing, that meant Lasker would play against the team seeded 28th, and we would get the team seeded 29th – which turned out to be Sweden 2. This could be expected to be the easiest match of the event for us, and we duly won, Nunn and Kosten scoring crushing wins on boards 1 and 2. I blundered a pawn on board 3, but I had taken the precaution of winning a pawn earlier in the game, so material was still equal after my mistake and my opponent then played the endgame very weakly and lost.
Much more significant than that, though, was what happened on the top table in Lasker’s match against VychodoCesi, a local Czech team whom they might expect to beat 4-0.
And that’s not all. Artur Yusupov won for Lasker on Board 2. But on board 1 Knaak (2464) could only draw with Black against FM Jaroslav Mojzis (2089) and board 4 also ended in a draw. 2-2!
This was a hugely significant and unexpected bonus for us. Instead of chasing Lasker, and hoping that they made a mistake or that we could beat them in our individual match, roles were now reversed – they were chasing us, and had to hope that we made a mistake, or that they could beat us. (Spoiler alert – we didn’t, and they didn’t). And we got to play our matches on the top board!
Round 2
Schach-Club Kreuzberg 1-3 England 1
No fewer than 23 teams won in the first round, so in round 2 we were paired with a German team, Schach-Club Kreuzberg, seeded 16th. Again, this should have been a relatively easy match, but on board 1 IM Manfred Glienke found a way to force a repetition of moves as White against John Nunn’s Kings Indian, and on board 4 Terry Chapman as White was unable to demonstrate an advantage in a Maroczy bind. I was able to win as Black against Norbert Sprotte on board 3, so whether we won or drew the match would depend on Glenn Flear, who was White against Christian Weiss (confusing) on board 2.
This game was, as they say, a “fluctuating struggle”. In the position below, Glenn has allowed Black (Weiss) to capture on g2, expecting this would allow him to force a better ending with 22. Nab6!
Round 3
England 1 2.5–1.5 Sweden 1
Normally, before the start of every round, a prize is given to the player of the best game in the previous round. But today that was replaced by a minute’s silence. The Finnish top board in the 50+ event, Ari Issakainen, had passed away overnight. Very sad, especially for his family, his loved ones, his friends and his team-mates. But perhaps it’s a bit surprising that in an event for older players this sort of thing doesn’t happen more often. And I couldn’t help thinking that when my time comes, it would be good to go during a tournament. Or even during a game. At least that way, like Ari, I would have kept it going to the very end.
As it turned out, the next day the prize for the best game played in round 3 unfortunately, but deservedly, went to Nils-Gustaf Renman for his game against Glenn on board 2 of our match against Sweden 1.
Nunn won impressively on board 1, and I won as Black in a Three Knights Opening on board 4. But our prospects on board 3 didn’t look too good at one stage. Tony Kosten had played his favourite English Opening as White, but sitting next to his board after Magnus Wahlbom’s 16…b5 it seemed to me Black was already getting an advantage, and I couldn’t see what Tony was going to do.
Round 4
Italy 1.5–2.5 England 1
In round 4 we faced one of our closest rivals, Italy, the fourth seeds. John Nunn drew as black against GM Carlos Garcia Palermo on board 1, and Tony drew as black with FM Ivano Ceschia on board 3. That left Glenn and me to do the business with the white pieces. I, however, had stupidly decided this was the right time to experiment with the Trompowsky, equipped with a theoretical knowledge derived from a book. As might be anticipated, the experiment was not a 100% success, and I dropped my first half point, offering a draw on move 20 before my position turned too bad. Still, they say you have to play new things if you want to improve.
But Glenn came back from the previous day’s disappointment to win us the match. The position below is Flear v GM Lexy Ortega, after Glenn’s 15. Qd4.
Lasker faced England 2 in this round, scoring a narrow 2.5-1.5 win. It was a creditable performance by the English second team, with Paul Littlewood holding Knaak, and Tony Stebbings defending well to draw with Yusupov. But it could have been even better. The position below was reached in Knaak v Littlewood after 29. Rg4, when Paul, having played the black side extremely well against Knaak’s Bf4 line in the Queen’s Gambit Declined, accepted Knaak’s offer of a draw.
But the position, despite appearances perhaps, is not equal. If Black had played 29…Qc2! he would surely have won – White is quite unable to defend his second rank. 30. Qxh6 fails to 30…Qxd1+ and 31 …Qxg4, and 30. Kh1, hoping to defend g2 with a rook on g1, loses to 30…Qxd2 31. Rxd2 Re1+ 32. Kh2 Rc1, and the rook on g4 keeps the king locked in. White’s best is something like the abject 30. Rf4 Re2 31. Qxc2 Rcxc2 32. Kf1 Rxg2, when Black should win comfortably. A narrow escape for the Germans – nearly another dropped match point.
Round 5
England 1 2–2 Lasker Schachstiftung GK
After round 4 we were in a clear lead, with eight out of eight match points. Lasker and Israel both had seven. But today it was our turn to face Lasker. Obviously a crunch match, so we put out our strongest team, and the pairings were Nunn v Knaak, Yusupov v Flear, Kosten v Meister, and Koehler v Large. As they were half a point behind us, we felt a drawn match would leave us in a good position.
Nevertheless, and although I was Black, I felt obliged to try to beat Koehler. He is a strong player of course, but not of the same earth-shattering calibre as the rest of their team, and mine was the only board where we had a significant rating advantage. I was therefore pleased to be allowed to play a Hedgehog, an opening in which White has no easy route to a dead position.
In the Hedgehog, Black is usually at least equal if he can achieve one or both of the pawn breaks b5 and d5. The game proved to be a perfect illustration of this principle. In the position below, White has already gone a bit wrong.
Meanwhile, on board 3, things took a comical turn in Kosten v Meister.
Later that evening over dinner, Dr Nunn patiently explained. After 13. …Ke8, White should play 14. Qxb5+! Qd7 15. Nxd5! exd5 (15. …Qxb5 16. Nc7+) 16. Qd3!, where with queens on the board and Black’s king stuck in the centre, White has an advantage. (A game Shevchenko v Saric continued 16. …Bb4+ 17. Kf1 f6 18. Kg2 Kf7 19. Bf4 Rhe8 20. Rac1 Kg8 21. Rhd1 Rad8 22. Rc7. Qe6 23. Rxa7 Qe2 24. Rc7 Qxb2 25. Rb1 Qa3 26. Qf5 Bd6 27. Bxd6 Qxd6 28. Rbb7 Qf8 29. Qg4 1-0). Why doesn’t everyone play Qxb5+ on move 12 then if this line is so good, instead of wasting time with 12. Qc6+ and 13. Qc5+? Because, of course, in the position after 12. Qxb5+ Black can still castle! After 12. Qxb5+ Qd7 13. Nxd5 exd5 14. Qd3? Bb4+ 15. Kf1? Qh3+ 16. Kg1 0-0 (now legal, which it wasn’t in the Shevchenko v Saric game), Black is much better. We live and learn.
Tony and I left the playing hall with Glenn fighting hard to save a draw in a difficult ending against Yusupov, and John fractionally worse against Knaak. John was made to work hard for his draw by Knaak, but accurate play in the ending secured the half point. Glenn eventually succumbed to his Illustrious opponent on move 65. But we had made 2-2!
Rest day
There was a rest day after round 5. I hadn’t seen much of Prague up to this point, so I considered taking this opportunity to explore the city. But I was expecting Glenn to rest me in at least one of the next few rounds, when I could explore, and I like playing chess. So I decided to play in the blitz tournament which the organisers had put on.
I assumed it would be like the Wednesday morning events at All Saints, but it wasn’t. It was much stronger than I expected it to be, with a number of strong GMs from the 50+ event participating, including the famous Jaan Ehlvest, and Igor Glek (both formerly of the USSR and now playing for the USA and Belgium respectively), Aleksandr Shneider and Alexander Reprintsev from Ukraine, and Jurij Zezulkin from Poland. I don’t pretend to be any good at blitz, so I was pleased just to get to play big names like Ehlvest, Glek and Zezulkin. I lost to those three, and got 7/8 in my other games. Ehlvest won the tournament with 9/11, and I finished seventh on 7/11.
Round 6
England 1 3–1 Israel
In round 5 Israel, ranked 11th, had scored an extremely impressive 3-1 win against Italy. That meant we were equal first with Israel on nine match points out of 10, and now we had to play them. Glenn rested himself for this match, and therefore I was on board 3, facing IM Leon Lederman, who I remembered watching play an entertaining game 43 years ago against Viktor Korchnoi in the Lloyds Bank Open in 1982.
I was lucky to win a second brevity in a row, winning my opponent’s queen in 25 moves. I say “lucky” with no false modesty, because sometimes there is a kind of luck in chess. My opponent played straight into a line which I knew very well, and which is lost for Black. In my preparation, I noticed that in a previous game Lederman had played 4. …g6 in a favourite line of mine (1. e4 c5 2. Nc3 Nc6 3. Bb5 Nd4 4. Nf3 g6). There is nothing wrong with 4. …g6, but you do have to know how to defend in some tricky tactical lines. I didn’t expect him to play it again, but just in case he did I refreshed my memory on the theory that morning. He did play it, he didn’t seem to know the theory well, and after 13 moves we reached the following position:
When I finished, John and Tony had both already drawn, and only Terry Chapman’s game against Moshe Gal on board 4 was left. I was slightly worried that he might be in trouble in the position below. White is to move, and black’s pawn on a7 is loose.
Round 7
France 1 1-3 England 1
Our win in round 6 left us in the lead with 11 match points out of 12. Lasker were keeping up with the pace in second with 10, while France, England 2, Israel, Hungary and a Norwegian team all had 9. So with three rounds to go we were still a long way from winning the tournament, and now we had to play the very strong French team, the third seeds.
Fortunately, John Nunn chose this moment to play his best game of the event (probably THE best game of the event) against the French board 1 GM Anatoly Vaisser. Nunn usually plays the King’s Indian Defence if given the chance (I think he might have lost a bit of faith in the Benoni), and Vaisser always seems to play the Four Pawns Attack against the KID.
On board 4 I won my third miniature in a row, against IM Louis Roos (a former French champion and the strongest player I faced in the event). I had to be a bit more creative this time. In the position below, from a well-known line in the French Defence, I normally play 7. g3.
So we were 2-0 up, but on boards 2 and 3 Glenn and Tony had a lot of tough defending to do. Glenn eventually found a perpetual check from a position where he had been much worse against Aldo Haik, and Tony managed to find a lot of resources to draw a worse ending against Sharif. 3-1.
Round 8
England 1 2.5-1.5 England 2
Our win against France left us in a fantastic position, with 13 match points from 14. But Lasker were still keeping up the pressure on 12. Behind them were no less than six teams on 10 – Saxonia, Italy, Sweden, England 2, Israel and Hungary. Having played our main rivals, we were paired with England 2.
Both Nunn and myself were due, and wanted, a rest this round, having played in all the seven rounds so far. There was consequently a decision for Glenn as captain to take. He reasoned that we still had to keep winning and that John, as our best player, should therefore play against whichever of the two remaining opponents we would have to face was the stronger. We were likely to play Saxonia or Hungary in the final round, having played everybody else, and they were both weaker than England 2. So I got my rest, and John gracefully abided by the captain’s decision before resting in the last round. I did a bit of tourist stuff, and visited the old city centre (beautiful) and the Franz Kafka museum (very interesting), but I was back later in the afternoon to watch most of our games online (spectators not being allowed in the tournament hall).
I think we were all a bit worried that something would go wrong against England 2 (who comprised Paul Littlewood, Anthony Stebbings, Chris Baker and Ian Snape for this match, captain Nigel Povah resting himself). Obviously the right thing for them to do would be simply to concede the match to their betters, so that we could win the tournament. This was, after all, a Fide World Championship, which surely every patriotic Englishman would want England to win. But that didn’t seem to be their approach at all. Over breakfast they tried to trick us by making deliberately misleading remarks about who would be in their team, and when it came to the match itself they made every effort to beat us, and didn’t miss by much.
On board 1, Nunn v Littlewood, a draw was agreed after 22 moves of a Spanish, both players demonstrating 97% accuracy according to the engine. But England 2 were making the most of the white pieces on boards 2 and 4. On board 2 Stebbings achieved a very promising-looking position against Flear, and on board 4 Ian Snape threw the kitchen sink at Chapman, in the line 1. e4 c6 2. d4 d5 3. e5 Bf5 4. h4 h5 5. Bd3 Bxd3 6. Qxd3 Qa5+ 7. b4!?
Spectating, I therefore thought our best chance of a win lay on board 3. This is the position in Kosten v Baker after Chris’s 10. …g6?
On board 4 Terry found all the right moves to defend against Ian Snape’s initiative, and I thought he was going to win. He eventually took a perpetual, I think for the team, when he was somewhat better. By that time Glenn had managed to break out of Stebbings’ bind, at the cost of accepting the worse side of a R+4 v R+3 ending, which, with the pawns all being on the kingside, he was eventually able to draw fairly comfortably. So 2.5-1.5. That result meant we could be sure of winning the title if we won in the last round.
But I was getting excited by events in Lasker’s match against Italy. Koehler was very much worse against Ceschia on board 4, and on board 1 Garcia Palermo seemed to be obtaining an advantage as black against Knaak. If Italy could win the match, we would win the title today! This was the position in Knaak v Garcia Palermo after Black’s 25…f5!
It wasn’t all bad though. Italy did manage to win on board 4, and with the other two games drawn, Lasker had dropped another match point. We hadn’t won yet, but we would only need to draw in the last round.
Round 9
Saxonia 2-2 England 1
I’m not going to pretend anything of interest happened in this match. Saxonia were the ninth seeds going into the event, but they had come through from nowhere and after a great win against Hungary in the previous round were now sitting alone in third place, behind ourselves and Lasker. I was slightly worried that they would risk everything to try to beat us, to support their compatriots, but they were about as patriotic as England 2. In fact they were even more anxious to draw than we were (and one of them said afterwards they would rather see England win than Lasker!).
We had agreed before the match that we needed to avoid a situation where three of us agreed a quick draw, only to leave one of us defending a bad position. So when my opponent, having played the ultra-tedious London System, offered a draw on move 3, I reluctantly declined, feeling I needed to see what was happening elsewhere. Tony soon got a very good position though, so by move 11 I thought it was safe to offer a draw myself, which was immediately accepted. Terry, Glenn and finally Tony followed suit, and we had won. Yay! In the event, Lasker failed to win in their match against France anyway, so we could even have afforded to lose in the last round. Lasker failed to defeat any of their main rivals – ourselves, Italy and France – and that, rather than their cock-up in the first round, ultimately proved to be the difference.
The final standings were:
1. England (16 match points)
2. Lasker Schachstiftung GK (14)
3. Saxonia (13)
4. Israel (13)
5. England 2, France 1, Italy, Sweden 1, Switzerland and Czech team Coriolus (12)
I won the gold medal for the best score on board 4, and I got to shake Yusupov’s hand several times during the prize-giving, so that was all good. As I said at the outset, I had been desperate to get into the England team for this event, and I was desperate to win and to be able to say I was a world champion (of sorts). When we did win therefore, I was elated for a couple of days. But I find that if you want something really badly, and then you get it, before too long you get a bit of a flat feeling. As Peggy Lee sang, “Is That All There Is?” If you’re a chess player, you need another tournament, and another win. And as it happens I am now in Poland for the European Senior Team Championship….