Hammersmith A v Kingston A, Thames Valley League division 1 match played at the London MindSports Centre, London W6 on Thursday 13 February

The Thames Valley fixture list this season determined that our home and away matches with the club most likely to be our main rivals, Hammersmith, took place one after the other. Having beaten Hammersmith 4-2 at home on 27 January, we visited the London MindSports Centre just two and a bit weeks later.

Both teams were missing one player due to illness, but Kingston were very fortunate to have as a late sub Peter Finn, making his debut in this competition. The addition of Peter to the team meant it had four players with the same first name, always a good augury. Peter Finn did not take long to get on the scoreboard as White against Cian Ward. In an opening which might be categorised as a Queen’s Gambit Semi-Slav or possibly a Queen’s Indian Defence, this position was reached:

On board 4, Will Taylor (who had selflessly offered to change his first name to Peter in the interests of the Peter-ish team) was Black facing the experienced Carsten Pedersen, who had drawn with Supratit Banerjee in the corresponding match at the Willoughby. Will commented, “I made a big effort to play quickly and was 35 minutes up on the clock at some point (almost unprecedented for me). Alas, I didn’t manage to convert the time advantage into anything serious on the board.” However, he was never in any trouble against Carsten’s Vienna Opening and a draw was agreed in this position:

Black has just played 37…Nxh3. White has a choice between Nxh5, gxh5 and Ne4, but none of these moves would give him an advantage.

Hammersmith soon equalised the score by winning on board 5. From an English Opening, Peter Andrews reached this position against Aryaman Ganguly:

Thus scores were level with boards 1, 2 and 6 still in play. If Kingston members following events on WhatsApp were feeling the tension, for the players at the venue it must have been agonising, especially given the way each of the remaining games veered from favouring one side to the other.

On board 6, John Foley faced the same opponent, Greg Billenness, as in the corresponding match last year. John again deployed the Caro-Kann Defence, but this time forearmed, instead of the Fantasy Variation, Greg chose a line which chess.com tells me is called the Von Hennig Gambit. The opening moves were: 1. e4 c6 2. d4 d5 3. Nc3 dxe4 4. Bc4 Nf6 5. f3 e3. With this move, John explained, he was “trying to move the game into uncharted waters”. The book move is 5…b5. After both players castled queenside, the following position was reached, White having just played 22. f5.

Kingston were now a point ahead, with the top two boards still in play. Peter Large’s game against Ali Hill was on a knife edge. In accordance with one of his New Year Resolutions, Peter had played the Trompowsky Opening for the first time. After 16 moves, this was the position, Peter having just played 16. Bb5:

The last game to finish, perhaps not unexpectedly, was Peter Lalić’s – he was Black against Thomas Bonn (see photograph at top of page). It might have ended with a threefold repetition as early as move 15, but Peter varied from his previous moves to avoid this. A long ending of rooks and knights followed, with the advantage veering from one side to the other. Thomas queened first, and Peter had to give up his rook for the queen, resulting in the unusual balance of forces shown in this position, with Black to play:

This made the final result 4-2 to Kingston, the same result as in our home match against Hammersmith. This puts Kingston in a dominant position in the league at the halfway stage.

David Rowson, Kingston captain in Thames Valley League division 1

Wallington v Kingston, Lauder Trophy semi-final played at Wallington United Reformed Church on 12 February 2025

This match was always going to be tense. It goes with the territory in the Lauder Trophy, where the collective rating of the team cannot exceed 10,500. How do you divide up the rating cake: two strong players and four weaker players; six mid-rated players? The puzzle always takes a lot of solving.

Wallington and Kingston went for very similar teams – two strong players and four very decent players in the 1500-1750 bracket. A close match was guaranteed and so it proved, with Kingston squeezing home by 3.5-2.5 after an evening of high drama.

On top board, veterans David Rowson of Kingston and Nick Edwards of Wallington (and indeed Coulsdon) faced each other – amazingly, so David says, the first time they have ever met in a classical game despite both being an integral part of the Surrey chess scene for more than half a century.

Nick is a very principled, positional player and opened with d4, to which David replied with an unusual King’s Indian-type line. “Nick and I had a great set-to,” says David, “which we both enjoyed, with some rather unusual positions arising from what I think is called the KID Kramer System. After the game we spent a long time analysing it, but putting it through Stockfish it seems we assessed a lot of the positions wrongly.”

This was a key position. Should Black take the pawn on h4? “Maybe I should have taken,” says David, “but it looked very risky to me.”

Alan Scrimgour had White and a hefty rating advantage on board 2, and his assured win against the very solid David Jones was vital to the Kingston cause. This was how Alan succinctly summed up the game afterwards: “Careful manoeuvring around the queenside majority combined with pressure on the IQP [isolated queen’s pawn] led to win of the exchange. My opponent, despite his time shortage, responded with a kingside sortie that White had under control.” This was the game’s denouement. White is on top, so Black decides to go for broke.

Meanwhile on board 3, Jon Eckert was defending an Exchange French. He felt it was drawish from an early stage, but there were some late complications and he had winning chances. But Jon also recognised that we probably had our noses in front in the match – with good positions with White on boards 2 and 4 – and offered his opponent a draw, which was accepted. The fact that Kingston’s players were all taking stock of the match situation was one of the great positives of this win. Chess is a very individual game, good players are often egoists, and the match context can sometimes be forgotten.

Kingston’s one reverse came on board 6, where Aziz Sannie lost to the promising Wallington junior Mohamed Nasrudeen Meeran. Aziz went the exchange (rook for knight) down and, try though he might, couldn’t generate much counterplay as his opponent liquidated to a won endgame.

On board 5 Kingston captain Ed Mospan was facing Luke Glinton in another match-up between players with almost identical ratings. Neither could establish a significant edge in a series of blocked positions and a draw was agreed. Another important result with Black for Kingston.

That left David Bickerstaff (pictured above on the right of the picture, with Ed Mospan beside him, in a previous match at South Norwood), to put the ball in the back of the net, which is exactly what he did. David had White on board 4 against the slightly higher-rated Robert Davies, but he never gave his opponent a chance with a perfect pawn storm against Black’s KIng’s Indian Defence. Here is the game which took Kingston into the Lauder Trophy final, where we will face Coulsdon, with annotations by David.

Stephen Moss, Kingston club captain

Maidenhead B v Kingston B, Thames Valley League division 2 match played at St Luke’s Community Hall, Maidenhead on 10 February 2025

“And we will get you back for the away trip to Maidenhead.” Words uttered by Stephen Moss at the 2024 end-of-season celebration as he presented me with a special signed copy of his book The Rookie as a farewell gift before I departed for pastures new in Oxfordshire. 

Fast forward eight months, and true to Stephen’s word here I was at Maidenhead’s St Luke’s Community Hall, making my return to action. Also granted the captain’s armband to marshal the team I had captained for the past two seasons in the Thames Valley league. It was great to be back.

On paper, it looked like quite an even match-up. However, Maidenhead’s captain Simon Foster had a decision to make when at 7.45pm his top board Steve James hadn’t arrived and wasn’t answering his calls. Simon boldly decided to sub himself in, only for Steve to walk in the room at 7.46pm, with two moves already on the board. Simon, though, managed to back up his brave decision by defeating the estimable Peter Andrews.

Peter had exchanged his queen for two rooks in what was a complicated middlegame, but unfortunately missed a crucial move that would have resulted in pinning his opponent’s queen. “I saw it the moment I had a made my move,” Peter said later, “and then made several more bad moves while the balance of my mind was disturbed and as time ran out.” A case of not just missing the winning move but knowing you have missed it – the worst of all worlds. Simon appeared very relieved after the game after making a potentially hasty decision to sub himself in, and credit to him for getting the victory. 

On board 2, the ever dependable Alan Scrimgour (pictured above) was facing Charles Bullock in his penultimate game before flying out to Prague at the weekend to represent the Scottish team in the World Senior Team Chess Championship. Alan played an excellent game with Black, his two bishops synchronising menacingly from distance to home in on his opponent’s castled king. The key moment in the game occurred in the position below:

I had the pleasure of meeting Zubair and Homayoon Froogh (Zubair is Homayoon’s son) – promising new members who have made excellent starts to their Kingston careers. However, it wasn’t to be their night as they succumbed to the very experienced Tony Milnes and Nigel Smith respectively.

Zubair works as a doctor and dashed from his day job in London to Maidenhead for the match – a long drive is far from ideal preparation for a tough encounter like this. Playing with White on board 3, he felt he made a mess of the opening but outplayed his opponent in the middlegame to equalise. He then had an opportunity to liquidate to a draw but decided to push for victory, which in hindsight was perhaps over-zealous as he got trapped in a neat mating net on the edge of the board. On board 4, Homayoon found himself a couple of early pawns down and couldn’t regain them. The extra pawns proved the difference in a tense rook and pawn endgame, with both players playing on the increment. 

I had the white pieces on board 5 against William Castaneda and managed what I thought at the time was quite a smooth victory in the Scotch Gambit. I felt my opponent played too passively in the opening, from which he emerged with a very cramped position. I provoked a pawn break that allowed me to pick up a pawn, and from there I exchanged off pieces, winning another pawn. My opponent resigned as I was about to promote. However, the computer shows my opponent missed a chance to equalise when I sloppily misplayed the move order in an exchange sequence, demonstrating the importance of thorough calculation, something that my rusty chess brain wasn’t up to computing.

On board 6, Adam Nakar got a tremendous victory against the higher-rated John Snead. Adam had felt a big win was just around the corner, and looked delighted (and relieved!) with his result after he had forced home his pawn advantage in the endgame. So the match ended in a 3-3 draw. It is always a good point on the road to Maidenhead, and it was a pleasure to return to the fold alongside some familiar faces. I’ll maybe see you next year in Maidenhead.

Gregor Smith

Kingston 4 v Epsom 5, Surrey League division 5 match played at the Willoughby Arms, Kingston on 10 February 2025

On paper this promised to be a very close match. In reality, Kingston 4 were swept aside by Epsom 5, showing just how much strength in depth dynamic president Marcus Gosling’s club are developing. The saving grace for Kingston was a fine win for Nette Robinson (pictured above – she is a singer and artist, as well as a chess player), who was making her Kingston debut. That at least saved us from the ignominy of a whitewash.

We shall be brief with the obsequies. David Shalom was defeated by the highly rated James Pooler on board 1; Paul Seymour, a new recruit to Kingston, lost with Black to Pietro Silke Balerna on board 2; Sean Tay had winning, then drawing, chances on board 3 against Robert Fairhall but both evaded him; Mark Sheridan on board 4 was well in the game against the experienced Alistair Mackenzie but fell at the final fence and was checkmated; and on board 6 Anqi Yang was quickly in difficulties against the officially unrated Gary Allen.

We live to fight another day, but are impressed by Epsom’s large cohort of 1600-rated players. The Surrey League’s “Minor” division – the official name of Div 5 – is not really so minor after all. It’s a shark pool!

Stephen Moss, Kingston club captain

Kingston v Epsom, Alexander Cup semi-final 10-board match played at the Willoughby Arms, Kingston on 5 February 2025

Photographs from John Saunders unless captioned otherwise

Match report from Kingston match captain John Foley

See also match report from Marcus Gosling of Epsom Chess Club

Kingston, the clear favourites, won the semi-final of the Alexander Cup, the Surrey team knockout championship, by a wide margin but were full of admiration for the youthful Epsom team. At one point during the evening, the balance of the match was evenly poised. The 8½–1½ result flatters Kingston because the games were much closer.

The match started with a one-minute silence following the sad news of the death of Stewart Reuben. Most of those present would not have known Stewart, so I have posted a short blog about his enormous contribution to chess.

Board 4: Chris Wright (Epsom) v Mike Healey (Kingston) [1-0]

The first game to finish was at 9pm when Mike Healey trapped the queen of Chris Wright, a former Kingstonian. Sometimes it is easier to capture an unsuspecting queen rather than a well-defended king. The full brevity may may have some instructional value.

The final position

Board 10: Alan Bates (Epsom) v David Rowson (Kingston) [2-0]

As the match progressed, the game positions became harder to judge and the ratings advantage of Kingston seemed to count for naught. It was not until 10pm that the next result came from David Rowson. His opponent, Alan Bates, even though massively outrated, held the advantage for most of the game. Unfortunately, the game ended suddenly when Alan retreated his threatened knight to the wrong square.

The white knight under attack moved to the middle of the board 30. Ne4? but this lost to 30. Nd3 attacking the white queen whilst revealing an attack on the Ne4. White resigned immediately. The saving move would have been 30. Na6!, which goes against the usual advice that knights should not be placed on the edge of the board. However, the Na6 cannot be captured because White has counterplay, eg pin and win the black knight or else give the knight an escape on c7 with Qg3.

A quarter of an hour later came a flurry of results with Ash Stewart, Luca Buanne, Peter Andrews and Peter Lalić all winning and Will Taylor settling for a draw. Kingston had won the match.

Board 5: Ash Stewart (Kingston) v Marcus Gosling (Epsom) [3-0]

Ash Stewart played White against Epsom team captain Marcus Gosling in a Classical Catalan and accurately built up the pressure. Marcus, a man of action not content with a defensive posture, boldly opened the position – unfortunately to his own detriment and soon Ash had doubled rooks on the seventh rank.

Here Marcus played 26…b4 forking the rook and knight. Ash gratefully grabbed the Bc7. Black had no further counterplay after capturing the knight on a3. I glanced at the board at this point and wondered if Black could give up the c7 bishop 26…Bxf4 prior to playing the b4 fork on the desperado principle. Although White still has the advantage, at least Black would have an extra pawn compared to the game.

Board 7: Luca Buanne (Kingston) v Lev Razhnou (Epsom) [4-0]

This game always looked positive for Kingston. Lev doubled his rooks on the g-file hoping for a breakthrough. Meanwhile Luca had a free hand on the other side of the board and grabbed some pawns. Eventually Lev had to give up the exchange resulting in a RR v NR ending which Luca successfully navigated.

Board 6: Arnav Kumar (Epsom) v John Hawksworth (Kingston) [4½-½]

The best Epsom result of the evening was achieved by Arnav Kumar, who drew against an international master. His brother Sachin also drew on board 8. These two brothers are a formidable addition to the Epsom squad. John Hawksworth was disappointed with the result, but credited his opponent for a very resourceful tactical defence.

Board 9: Peter Andrews (Kingston) v Maya Keen (Epsom) [5½-½]

Peter Andrews essayed the English against Maya Keen who replied with the Agincourt Defence. Maya came out of the opening with a solid position, but ambitiously sacrificed a knight and a bishop for a rook and a pawn – an exchange which is usually regarded as disadvantageous. Peter entered the endgame with his two bishops dominating Maya’s rook. Maya, with her mother sitting behind lending moral support, put up a good fight in the ending time scramble. Peter visibly suffers from nerves under time pressure but managed to steer the game to a successful conclusion. One interesting point about the game is that although the sacrifice was unsound, so was Peter’s reply.

After 18…Bxf2+, White played 19. Rxf2 automatically but should instead have played 19. Kh1! This quiet retreat wins a piece for two pawns because Black cannot save both the Ne4 and the Bf2. Peter expressed some embarrassment afterwards at missing this elementary tactic. It underlines the point that a won game is not exempt from error. Indeed, the dictum that one learns from one’s losses should be replaced by the dictum that one learns from all one’s games.

Board 3: Peter Lalić (Kingston) v Robin Haldane (Epsom) [6½-½]

Peter Lalić is a chess magician: his openings are passive: he tries to exchange queens early and he doesn’t mind losing tempi as his knights retreat to their starting square. Yet, all of a sudden, through a mysterious sequence of pointless moves, he is suddenly in a winning position. The reader will be pleased to know that this did not happen on this occasion – Robin Haldane did not allow Peter’s Mieses Opening to mesmerise him. Robin, a veteran of the Surrey league, played positionally gaining the upper hand. This is where the second part of Peter’s strategy comes into play – his opponents take so long to figure out what’s going on that their clock runs down. In the diagram below, Robin is a good pawn ahead and his rooks are actively placed. However, by now he was playing on the 10-second increment, which is no friend of accuracy.

Black saw a chance to simplify the game and exchange knights and so played 37…Nf5?? Unfortunately this knight had been doing a vital defensive job protecting the d5 square. Peter instantly lashed out 38. Rd5+ forking the king and rook. Game over.

Board 8: Sachin Kumar (Epsom) v Will Taylor (Kingston) [7–1]

Will Taylor seemed to be cruising towards victory when he was tempted to place his rook in the heart of enemy territory. It looked crushing but he had overlooked a tactic which his young opponent found. We join the game at the critical moment.

As usual, the top two boards were still slugging it out. Zain Patel had an advantage over David Maycock, who was playing on the increment in the endgame. However, David’s accuracy proved decisive. The final game to finish was the IM encounter on board 1 between the old adversaries Peter Large and Graeme Buckley. Peter played 1. d4 for the first time in 40 years and a defensive game drifted into an insipid rook endgame and an agreed draw.

Board 2: Zain Patel (Epsom) v David Maycock (Kingston) [8-1]

Zain knows Kingston well, playing for us in the 4NCL and having played against us previously. He had the confidence of managing to draw with David Maycock the previous week although he had lost to him last year in the final of the Lauder Cup. Zain played the solid Colle System, which led to an equal game. David thought too hard about finding a way to punish such a dull opening and ended up having to play on the increment from move 18. By the end, both players were playing within 10 seconds each. Inevitably mistakes were made. Zain had chances to reduce the position to a theoretical draw.

Board 1: Peter Large (Kingston) v Graeme Buckley (Epsom) [8½-1½ ]

The encounter on top board between two international masters was a dull affair, with neither side conceding an inch. In the end, each player had a rook and three pawns on the same side. A draw could have been agreed at almost any point during the game.

The final

Kingston march on to our fourth final in as many years. Epsom last reached the final of the Alexander Cup in 1939. Only two teams have won four in a row – Mitcham and Redhill. Will Kingston share in this illustrious honour? The final against Guildford (to be played at Ashtead on Tuesday 29 April) should be a very competitive match.

John Foley, Kingston Alexander Cup captain

CSC/Kingston 1 beat Scottish flagbearers Alba to get on the scoreboard in the first division and raise hopes that we might after all survive in this shark pool

Well, we will not be whitewashed. After a tough opening weekend when we lost both matches in the very testing 4NCL division 1, we finally got on the scoreboard on the second weekend in Peterborough. We were beaten 6.5-1.5 by Guildford Youth on the Saturday, but on Sunday we defeated the Scottish side Alba 5-2. We were helped by a weather-induced default, but even without that we would have won the match.

French FM Ulysse Bottazzi made an excellent debut for CSC/Kingston against Wood Green Youth, drawing with the very strong Polish-born FM (surely soon to be IM) Maciej Czopor, winner of the 2024 Kingston Invitational. The prodigious Supratit Banerjee went one better even than that, beating Polish player Tomasz Sygnowski on board 8. Supratit’s game was highly tactical, and it hinged on the position shown below. Sygnowski playing Black is actually on top at this point, but goes wrong in an exchange of pieces and Supratit emerges with a winning advantage.

We had three winners against Alba on Sunday – David Maycock, Roland Bezuidenhout and Supratit again, though this time by default (an Alba player had failed to get down to Peterborough because of a storm on Saturday which disrupted rail links). David’s game against Declan Shafi was brief and brutal, courtesy of two killer bishops.

Roland enjoyed a tremendous win with Black against IM and eight-times Scottish champion Roddy McKay. After positional skirmishing, it suddenly becomes very tactical and White’s position collapses.

CSC/Kingston 2 had a terrific weekend in division 3 (Knights), winning both their matches to put themselves into early promotion contention. On board 1, Peter Finn again won both his games to make him 4/4 so far this season. CSC/Kingston 2 dispatched a strong North West Eagles team with surprising ease on Saturday, but had more difficulty on Sunday, narrowly defeating a Coventry side who on paper were a good deal weaker than their opponents the previous day.

CSC/Kingston 3 had a familiar weekend in division 4, which is a Swiss tournament whereas divisions 1, 2 and 3 (divided into Knights and Bishops) are 12-team all-play-alls. CSC/Kingston 3 won against heavily outrated Barnet Knights D on Saturday, but that propelled them up the table and into a tough match with Iceni 2 on Sunday. CSC/Kingston and Iceni had identical average ratings of 1903, but in a well-contested encounter Iceni squeezed out a win by 3.5-2.5 to leave CSC/Kingston 3 in joint 14th place in the 32-team division.

The next 4NCL weekend is on 15/16 February, with the first and second teams playing in Coventry and the third team back in action in Peterborough.

Stephen Moss, Kingston club captain

Kingston B v Hounslow A, Thames Valley League division X match played at the Willoughby Arms, Kingston on 3 February 2025

This was a well-contested match between two strong teams. Kingston’s 4-2 victory, to make it 6/6 in Thames Valley division 2 so far this season, was an excellent result against a club first team and confirmed that promotion to division 1 for our B team is a live possibility.

On board 1, Peter Andrews with Black closed out a canny draw against the very sold Mateusz Dydak. “I was fairly confident we’d have the edge lower down,” said Peter afterwards, “and Alicia was already ahead when I drew.” This was the position in which a draw was agreed. The engine adjudges Black to have an edge, though it is perhaps not immediately clear why.

David Rowson also drew with Sesh Vaddadi on board 2, but this was a far meatier tussle. There were no undue alarms for David, but despite a time advantage he became a little anxious, perhaps because his opponent had the outside pawn. “I never got the attack I was hoping for and had to be a bit careful near the end,” he explained. “I was glad I found 29. b3.” That occurred in this position, immediately before David’s draw offer.

On board 6 Alicia Mason was indeed winning with White against Eugene Gregorio, but she had a huge time disadvantage – Eugene invariably plays at blitz speed – and, though the exchange up, had to contend with a lively knight. Eugene did have one opportunity to equalise, highlighted by Alicia in her post-game analysis, but happily for us did not take it. It occurred in the position below.

We now had our noses in front and the other boards looked promising too. Alan Scrimgour, with White against Hounslow captain David White on board 4, played an uncompromising game and built a space advantage early on. David ventured an overambitious move in the position below and Alan took full advantage.

Jon Eckert was playing with great panache with Black against Hounslow veteran Leon Fincham on board 5. Give Jon the initiative and he will grab it with both hands, which is what happened here. Using the bishop pair to good effect, he put Leon under considerable pressure and, with time starting to become a factor, Leon thought he saw a tactic that would lead to a back-rank mate. Sadly for him, he had miscalculated and the queen sac he thought was winning actually lost on the spot.

We had won the match and, with Stephen Lovell holding a slight advantage with Black against the capable Calum Kinloch on board 3, it looked like the scoreline would be emphatic. But time took its toll here too. Stephen had two golden opportunities to win, but, with just a few minutes left on the clock after a testing three-hour game, both went begging. The win disappeared and then, as so often happens, the draw went the same way.

“Time pressure got the better of me,” said Stephen afterwards. “55…d4 was of course a horrible blunder – explained by the fact that I wasn’t looking in that direction, and you somehow don’t expect to fall victim to a knight fork when you yourself have a knight.” An unfortunate reverse, but Stephen will take it philosophically and come back stronger – he is playing league chess regularly again for the first time in a decade. An absorbing game, a hard-fought match and a welcome 4-2 victory over the only A side in Thames Valley division 2.

Stephen Moss, Kingston club captain

Kingston C v Richmond E, Thames Valley League division X match played at the Willoughby Arms, Kingston on 3 February 2025

This was a very good victory for Jon Eckert’s Kingston C side. Sean Tay won smoothly on board 1, winning decisive material advantage and neutralising his opponent’s passed pawn. Jaden Mistry, with rook and pawn against two pieces, drew on board 2. Mark Sheridan won well on board 3, and Rob Taylor squeezed out a rook and pawn endgame on board 4. That made the margin of victory a comfortable one – 3.5-0.5. Captain Eckert, meanwhile, was winning his own game against Hounslow B to complete a very satisfying evening.

Stephen Moss, Kingston club captain

Ealing B v Kingston B, Thames Valley League division 2 match played at Actonians Sports Club, London W5 on 27 January 2025

This was a very tight, competitive match, and that Kingston B managed to run out 4-2 winners was a great achievement. We are now 5/5 in division 2 of the Thames Valley League, though with nine fixtures still to go we should not yet put the champagne on ice.

We were admittedly helped by the fact that Ealing lost their board 6 very late due to illness. Their substitute Aleksei Garifov performed well in the opening and was holding his own, but then misplaced his queen and omitted to castle. Making his debut for Kingston, Homayoon Froogh (father of Zubair, who was playing on board 5) needed no second invitation to launch a decisive tactic.

The Ealing player did not choose the best continuation, suffered even heavier material loss and resigned after 28 moves. A winning debut for Homayoon and an encouraging early lead for Kingston. The other five games, however, were fiercely contested and went on late into the night.

Froogh Junior had a fascinating struggle with Sagnik Chatterjee on board 5. This game was pivotal to the match because if could have gone either way deep into the rook and pawn endgame with which it concluded. The position shown below is probably drawn and there were points earlier where Black could surely have drawn by repetition.

But Sagnik is young, the game had been very competitive and the juices were flowing. He banked everything on his a-pawn and rushed his king over to support it. But he underestimated the power of d6, defended inaccurately in a time scramble and was overwhelmed by White’s kingside pawns before he could get his own passed pawn home.

Frooghs 2 Ealing 0. But Ealing were winning on board 3, where Jack Sheard was getting the better of Jon Eckert. The position below is level, but Jon, playing White, then goes wrong and the game is lost in the space of a few moves.

Alicia Mason, with Black, played well against the higher-rated Matthew Georgiou and in the position below has excellent drawing chances, but, with time starting to become a concern, one tiny slip put her on the back foot and she never quite recovered.

Alicia, who returned from the US last year, is taking her chess very seriously and knows that the secret to improvement is to learn from your losses, so what did she learn from this one? “This was a frustrating game to lose,” she admitted afterwards, “especially since the blunder came right at the moment where I missed the opportunity to get an advantage. The main thing I want to take away from this game is how I handle the clock. I want to avoid the temptation of rushing my moves in order to stay ahead on the clock if my opponent is short of time, and to remember to check all the forcing moves, whatever the situation. Had I done that here, I would have found the capture on a3 followed by d5, which I realised I’d missed as soon as I played 26…Nc7.”

The match hinged on boards 1 and 2: Peter Andrews with White on 1 against Ealing captain Xavier Cowan, and John Bussmann, who is showing renewed enthusiasm and good form this season, against Hristo Colov on 2. The latter was a high-class affair, but, as so often in evening club chess, tiredness and clock pressure decided the outcome, with White blundering horribly (is that a tautology?).

So to the battle of the board ones – a repeat of the same match-up in the reverse fixture when Kingston were at home last November, and with the same result – wily veteran Andrews got the better of the young gun Cowan. We pick up the game on Black’s 16th move when, says Peter, “d5, which I expected, blew up the centre in my favour. I guess Black felt under a little pressure as I had gained space without allowing him chances.” The analysis below is Peter’s.

Peter rushed off for his customary post-game whisky to calm his shredded nerves and that was that. A very good 4-2 win away against a capable side. If we are not careful we might have to start considering our chances of being promoted to Thames Valley division 1, and pose the question of whether we would want two competing teams in the top division. But not yet: there are still many battles ahead.

Stephen Moss, Kingston club captain

Kingston A v Hammersmith A, Thames Valley League division 1 match played at the Willoughby Arms, Kingston on 27 January 2025

In the past two seasons Hammersmith have been our main rivals for the Thames Valley league title. In 2022/23 we were running neck and neck until we beat them at their venue, and last season they looked to have it in the bag before they slipped up mid-season and we showed our mettle by finishing with a run of wins. This year we have seen our squad boosted even further by several very strong additions, to the remarkable extent that our line-up for this match had international masters on boards 1 and 6.  However, although we comfortably outrated Hammersmith’s team on the night, they were still strong and a hard-fought match ensued.

The first result came quite quickly: a very nice, deceptively smooth win for Peter Lalić (pictured above) on board 5 against Paul Kennelly. Having made his trademark pawn sacrifice in the opening, he developed quickly, gained the two bishops and had White’s king in the centre as a target. In the position below his opponent played 14. Rhd1? 14. h3 was correct to stop Black’s next move, which forces the position open.

The second game to finish, on board 6, also resulted in a Kingston win for IM John Hawksworth against Robin Sarfas. From a Slav Defence this position was reached:

So Kingston had a two-point lead, but the remaining four games were all hard to call and, in two cases at least, very tense. The board 1 game saw IM Peter Large play the Hedgehog Defence against Alistair Hill, reaching this position:

It’s hard to know what to focus on when describing the board 2 game between David Maycock and Zain Patel (not named in the scoresheet below as Hammersmith do not appear officially to have registered him with the Thames Valley League), as it had so many twists and turns, with creativity – and, as time trouble set in, errors – running wild on the part of both players. From an unusual variation of the Ruy Lopez, this position was reached:

This meant the score was now Kingston 3 Hammersmith 1, and we only needed a draw from the remaining two games to win the match.

The board 3 game, in striking contrast to Maycock v Patel, was a close positional contest from a Caro-Kann Defence Exchange Variation. Supratit Banerjee and Carsten Pedersen manoeuvred carefully until a rook and knight ending was reached with all the pawns on the same side of the board. Eventually, in the position below, the players agreed a draw, and Kingston had the half-point we needed to win the match.

The final game to finish was the board 4 encounter between Ash Stewart, with White, and Hammersmith captain Bajrush Kelmendi. Ash established an advantage from the position below, which at first sight looks a little worrisome for White:

Thus a hard-fought match resulted in a win for Kingston by 4-2. A very professional performance, one might say, not conceding a single game, even though there was no shortage of tension. As it happens, our next Thames Valley League Division 1 match is at Hammersmith’s venue on Thursday 13 February, so the battle will continue. Having won all five of our Thames Valley matches so far, we are three points ahead of Hammersmith with a game in hand, but there are still more than half the fixtures left to play – and look what happened to Hammersmith last season after they had made all the early running. We take nothing for granted.

David Rowson, KIngston captain in Thames Valley League division 1