Kingston v Coulsdon, final of the Lauder Trophy, played at the Peace Memorial Hall, Ashtead on 29 April 2025

Photograph above: The Kingston team ahead of the Lauder final: (from back left) Moss, Kerremans, Bickerstaff, Eckert, Andrews, Scrimgour (Photograph: John Foley)

The Lauder Trophy is a mathematical puzzle: you need six players and have a maximum of 10,500 rating points to play with. How to slice the cake – three 2000-strength stars and three under-1500s, or six middle-ranking players? It’s a conundrum.

As Lauder Trophy captain, I didn’t really feel I’d cracked it ahead of this final. I was only using 10,342 rating points for the team, which is criminal really. A key player rated around 1900 had dropped out with illness a few days ahead of the match and I’d stepped in with my anaemic grade of 1750. I felt we were underdogs and had resigned myself to likely defeat against a Coulsdon side that I knew would allocate their points with discrimination.

The only consolation was that we were playing the Alexander Cup final at Ashtead on the same night and, since we had managed to put together a tremendous team, I was reasonably confident we would win it for the fourth year in a row. The Lauder, though, was in the lap of the gods, and my expectations were low.

Alan Scrimgour, with White, and Ian Calvert – both very solid and experienced players –quickly agreed a draw on board 2. That could have been predicted. Peter Andrews was Black and outrated by almost a hundred points on board 1 – that would be tough. I also feared the worst on board 4. where David Bickerstaff was Black against a junior, Arnav Jayaprakash. David was sitting next to me and from an early stage I disliked the cramped nature of his position.

I knew we would have chances on board 6 – Robin Kerremans hadn’t played a classical game for a year, but I felt his rating of 1250 was lower than his true strength (underrated players are gold-dust in the Lauder). But the match, I believed, would be decided by Jon Eckert’s game on board 4 and mine on 5. Fortunately, Jon had had an excellent win the previous night and was in good fettle, and for once I felt reasonably focused (having White was a bonus).

My game was next to finish after the board 2 draw. The course of the game was decided by a decision I made on move 14. My opponent had played a French Defence, but castled queenside – a choice that invariably makes for an exciting game as White attacks on the queenside and Black does the same on the kingside. We pick up the game as I make my defining decision.

We were 1.5-0.5 up and went further ahead when Robin Kerremans won on board 6. White is already much better in the position below, but Black lashes out with 25…f5 and and his position quickly falls apart.

2.5-0.5 to Kingston, but now came the reverses. David Bickerstaff’s game was another French in which he castled queenside, and once again White’s queenside attack was faster than Black’s putative kingside assault. David was already under the cosh in the ugly position below, but then made what he considers a key error:

“Overall quite an uncomfortable game.” was David’s summing up afterwards. “The computer agrees with my general analysis during the game that his queenside pawn storm was not a threat without his pieces also supporting and so could be ignored. In that respect I handled it well. My pieces, though, were quite uncoordinated and threats of back-rank mate with my king on a8 and white pawn on a6 made it difficult to find an advantage. Trading off some additional pieces earlier and finding more space would have helped improve my position.”

Coulsdon were now only down by 2.5-1.5, and the scores were soon level when Timur Kuzhelev got the better of Peter Andrews on board 1. Peter had been a little behind after shedding a pawn in the opening, but fought tenaciously and felt he had a drawing chance in the position below.

With the scores tied on 2.5 all, it was now down to Jon Eckert on board 3 with Black against Coulsdon captain Matt Darville, who outrated Jon by 80 points. I couldn’t bear to watch, knowing that even a drawn game and a tied match would give the title to Coulsdon on board count.

Jon, though, was not going to let it slip. He played well in a French Advance and always stood slightly better, with two bishops against two knights. But time was becoming an issue and the last position we can conclusively establish before the players stopped recording under the five-minute rule is this one, where Jon has a pawn on the second rank protected by his light-squared bishop.

This is winning for Black – not because the c-pawn will get home, but because while White has to spend time neutralising it with his rook, knight and king, the Black rook and king will mop up enough white pawns to create a winning advantage. The pawn on d4 is likely to fall to the marauding Black rook and, once the white knight is exchanged – necessary to take Black’s c-pawn – the Black king will penetrate on the kingside.

Matt battled on, but it would have taken a time-induced blunder – always possible of course – to rescue him, and Jon was not in the mood to make one. Black eventually forced victory, giving Kingston both the match and the Lauder crown (for the second year in succession) by 3.5-2.5. A great triumph for an outrated team, but also a considerable personal success for Jon Eckert in a high-pressure, must-win game.

Stephen Moss, Kingston club captain and Lauder Trophy captain