South Norwood 1 v Kingston 1, Surrey League division 2, West Thornton Community Centre, 17 March 2022
This game was played on board 6 in the match South Norwood v Kingston which determined who won the Beaumont Cup (second division) of the Surrey League and hence which team was guaranteed promotion. Each game was tough and none resulted in a draw. This game gave confidence to the Kingston team. We didn’t know why Alan was the exchange down – maybe he sacrificed the exchange for an attack is always the best interpretation. White seemed to escape the king hunt but was not out of the woods. Kudos to Alan for a well-played game. In Alan’s annotations, he includes some possible lines which end in nice mating patterns which he only discovered in later analysis, so he is not claiming that he saw all these at the board.
Epsom 1 v Kingston 1, Surrey League division 2, Willoughby Arms, Kingston, 21 February 2022
The Kingston v Epsom clash produced some notable games. This is one where the advantage was unclear to the casual observer until matters resolved themselves with both players in considerable time pressure. Peter Andrews was not originally meant to play in this match and only stepped in as a substitute at the last minute when our team captain became indisposed. A supersub is born.
Epsom 1 v Kingston 1, Surrey League division 2, Willoughby Arms, Kingston, 21 February 2022
This decisive game shows Will Taylor launch an unstoppable attack against Marcus Gosling in the promotion match played at Kingston. Marcus said that he had only just taken up this defence. There is no good time to try out a new opening and you would have thought that the Fort Knox variation of the French Defence sounded solid, but there is always another chapter to read.
Kingston 2 v South Norwood 2, Surrey League division 4, West Thornton Community Centre, 17 February 2022
Peter Andrews, making his league debut for Kingston, won a dramatic game on top board against South Norwood veteran Ron Harris, who sac’ed a piece early on and launched an all-out attack, blitzing out moves in an effort to unsettle the Kingston debutant. Andrews, though, remained cool under pressure, neutralising the Harris onslaught and securing the win that set Kingston on their way to a 4.5 to 1.5 victory. After the game, Andrews, a league player of 40 years’ standing despite being a new member at Kingston, pointed out that he had last played Harris in the 1985-86 season for Hendon v Mushrooms in the London League “when I was rated about 100 points higher and he was about 450 points higher!”
Kingston 1 v Richmond 2, Thames Valley League division 2, Willoughby Arms, Kingston, 24 January 2022
Peter Lalić offers an in-depth analysis of a vibrant victory against the ever combative Bertie Barlow. If you read through these detailed annotations, you will get a remarkable insight into both the complexity of his concrete analysis and the playful spirit in which Peter plays his games – putting pawns on a4 and h4 on move eight in the game in part because he couldn’t resist the symmetry of the position. Chess as both science and art, war and aesthetic exercise, eventually leading here to an overwhelming attack conjured up after a sustained period in which Peter had been playing on the 10-second increment.
Kingston take on Richmond B, with board one titans Peter Lalic and Bertie Barlow in the foreground
This was the the last competitive game I played before the Covid pandemic. It was played in the World Senior Team Championships in Prague on March 11, 2020 in the 65+ match between Scotland and the team from Ukraine, Kiev Europa 2020. My opponent was the international master Viktor Dovzhenko. The match was shortly before Czechia closed its borders in response to COVID-19. The tournament was truncated after seven rounds with Russia in the lead just ahead of France. Scotland came 11th and England came 30th.
Alan Scrimgour in action for Kingston at the Alexander Cup Final against Battersea in 2023
You catch me on my fifth game as Black (out of six). I have decided to show this game in a slightly unusual way – from the perspective of my trusty steed, the King’s knight, which moved 14 times. It is also a response to ‘Ask the Pieces, a Chessbase DVD by Müller and Becker. This is the Knight’s Tale.
British Boys’ under-18 championship, Hastings, 17 April 1953
Illustrated London News 25 April 1953
The 1953 British Boys’ Under-18 Championship attracted 38 entries and was run on the Swiss System, with nine rounds between Monday evening, 13 April, and Friday night, 17 April. The winner, K. F. H. Inwood, of Tiffin’s School, was the London Chess League’s nominee; he beat T. A. Landry, of William Ellis School, in the last round, by a good king’s-side attack, after the latter had overlooked the winning of a pawn earlier. Landry and G. Jessup, also of William Ellis School, shared the second and third prizes with 6½. M. F. Collins, Sandbach School, Crewe, P. Gough, King Edward VI School, Norwich, J. T. Farrand, Haberdasher’s Aske’s, Hampstead, and A. Hall, of the same school, with P. Starling, of Middlesbrough, all scored 6. Amongst the also-rans was Anthony Leggett, who went on to win the Nobel prize in physics. In the opinion of Sir George Thomas, the general standard of play was higher than last year, but there was no boy outstanding.
Thomas Anselm Landry (19 August 1935 – 11 January 1996) went to Pembroke College, Oxford and played in the Varsity match of 1955. Tom Landry was a noted draughts/checkers player, who held the record for winning the London Championship 11 times in all and also the 1983 Northern Ireland Championship. He was president of the English Draughts Association and personally financed (and played in) the 1973 Great Britain vs America draughts match. He wrote books on the subject. He was a stockbroker and insurance consultant.
Here is the key game from the last round with both players on 6.5/8. The game shows the Inwood hallmark: first a period of calm and balance in which he is always the equal of his opponent and then an inexplicably easy finish against a defence that disintegrates.
The top four members of the England team in the Glorney Cup 1953 were recruited from the event. Ken was on top board with Landry on board two.
Ken, who is 86 and has been a member of Kingston Chess Club for more than 70 years, recently entered a nursing home in Woking. We wish him well.
Ken Inwood playing in a simultaneous display given by IM Stefan Löffler in 2019
Kingston 2 v South Norwood 2, Surrey League division 4 , Willoughby Arms, Kingston, 10 January 2022
Vladimir Bovtramovich won a fine game on top board against the dangerous attacking player Ron Harris which enabled Kingston to secure a draw in the match against South Norwood.
I am acquainted with both players having captained Matthew Wadsworth when he was a junior playing for my 4NCL team and having known Peter Lalić from when we played a memorable game of chess in the Surrey League and subsequently since he joined Kingston Chess Club. Both players are talented and even a blitz game between them is always likely to be full of interest.
