Friday 22 October 2010

A New Venture I

This season I'm captaining Muswell Hill in Division 1 of the Middlesex League, taking over from the extremely capable Tom Peet. Insert your own cliché about pressure, or lack thereof, here. Yawn.

Not wanting to appear too keen, we were the last team to kick off the season at home to Metropolitan I last night. At the nominal start time, a scene more akin to a Sambuca Sharks 4NCL fixture swam before me, with only half of the team present. I've now figured out a legal reason why my 4NCL outfit are so successful - the four latecomers managed 3½ points between them. Obviously I've told Dan Hall to not bother showing up until the default time for the next match.

My individual game saw me paired against D. Ian Calvert, a regular Middlesex teammate. To do retreads of previous 'unknown initial' material would be reprehensible, so we won't bother. After all, my university are always on at me about how self-plagiarism kills babies and widens the ozone gap.


D. Ian Calvert (168) - (185) Philip J. Makepeace


1. b3 d5 2. Bb2 e6 3. Nf3 Nf6 4. c4 Be7 5. g3 c5 6. cxd5 exd5 7. Bg2




7... d4! would have already given me a solid edge, due to the complete lack of scope for b2 Bobby. However, Nigel was screaming to be sent on, so I listened to him instead; as he reached c6, Brian interjected, "Shotgun"...

7... Nc6 8. d4 Bf5 9. 0-0 Be4?!

...and perhaps got a little carried away. A move to mix things up, that's all really.

10. dxc5 Bxc5 11. Nc3 0-0 12. Na4



12... Be7 13. Nd4 Bxg2 14. Kxg2 Qd7

White's position lacks cohesion and the a4 knight is offside. Nevertheless, 15. Qd3 here would maintain the threat of Nf5.

15. Rc1 Ne4 16. f3 Ng5 17. g4?




A strange decision, especially considering Qh3+ wasn't much of a threat. Yes, the knight now has a potential outlet on f5, but I can ruin that plan in short order.

17... Nxd4! 18. Bxd4 Ne6 19. e3 f5!

Ronnie can now join the party.

20. Nc5 Bxc5 21. Bxc5 Rf6 22. e4?




Kamikaze Eddie's plan doesn't work and, what's more, he gets Fergal involved in an unwinnable fight.

22... fxe4 23. fxe4 Rxf1 24. Kxf1

24. Qxf1 Nxc5 leaves Gary unprotected.

24... Qf7+ 25. Kg1 dxe4 26. Qd5 Rd8 27. Qf5!

The best hope is to get rid of the queens and hope the bishop can out-muscle the knight's influence. 27. Qxe4? Nxc5 28. Rxc5 Rd1+ 29. Kg2 Qf1+ 30. Kg3 Qg1+ 31. Kh3 Qxc5 32. Qe6+ Kf8 leaves white with no checks.

27... Qxf5 28. gxf5 Nf4 29. Rc4 Rd1+ 30. Kf2 b6 31. Be3 Nd5 32. Rxe4 Ra1

33. a4?

I had assumed that 33. Ra4 a5 would be good for me, but of course 34. Bd4 shits all over my biscuits. Harry now falls, and with him, the game.

33... Ra2+ 34. Kf3 Rxh2 35. Bf4 Nxf4 36. Kxf4? Rh4+


0-1



Board 8 saw a quick chop for London Met's Tom Villiers, who I'm predicting big things for this season. His appearance means that seven universities have been represented in Muswell Hill teams in 2010. Student chess is by no means dead.

Dickson - Hall and Russell - Doye were similarly lukewarm affairs, with my co-conspirator on these pages having exhausted his inspiration the previous evening at Athenaeum, of which more to come.

Oliver and Dick appeared to make light of their grading advantages without too much trouble while Tryfon on Board 1 couldn't convert his bind. Mr. Chessworld is our very own Dennis Bergkamp - extremely talented but reluctant to play away from home. It's just as well the rest of my squad are more like John Terry.

Alecos played the best game of the night, a Karpovian grind that betrayed his relatively poor form of last season. Expect to see him pushing 200 come the summer.


THE FACTS:


MUSWELL HILL
ECF
Result
ECF
METROPOLITAN 1
1
Tryfon C. Gavriel (w)
199
½ - ½
199
Cengiz Hasman
2
Daniel J. Hall
188
½ -½
178
George Dickson
3
Alexandros N. Ethelontis
186
1 - 0
173
Petr Vachtfeidl
4
Philip J. Makepeace
185
1 - 0
168
D. Ian Calvert
5
Christopher Russell
187
½ - ½
153
Peter C. Doye
6
O.D.R. Butt
170
1 – 0
140
J.A. Moore
7
Richard House
162
1 - 0
150
Geoffrey L. Bishop
8
Thomas Villiers
160
½ - ½
147
John F. Kitchen
Average
179.6
6 - 2
Average
163.5

1 comment:

  1. Surely no report of a win by a Shark against Ian Calvert is complete without reference to this classic?

    [Event "Coulsdon Easter Challengers"] [Site "CCF"] [Date "2007.04.03"] [Round "7"] [White "CALVERT, Ian"] [Black "LINFORD, Charlie"] [Result "0-1"] [ECO "A01"] [WhiteElo "2070"] [BlackElo "2141"] [Annotator "Scott Freeman"] [PlyCount "76"] [EventDate "2007.03.31"] 1. b3 f6 2. Bb2 Kf7 3. e4 e6 4. d4 d5 5. Nd2 c6 6. Ngf3 Bb4 7. c3 Ba5 8. Bd3 Nd7 9. O-O h5 10. Qe2 Nf8 11. h4 Nh6 12. g3 Ng4 13. Rfe1 Bc7 14. Nf1 Bd7 15. Rad1 Qe7 16. c4 Re8 17. Ne3 Ba5 18. Rf1 Qd8 19. e5 Bc7 20. Nxg4 hxg4 21. Ne1 f5 22. f3 gxf3 23. Nxf3 Nh7 24. Bc1 Reg8 25. Ng5+ Nxg5 26. Bxg5 Qf8 27. cxd5 cxd5 28. Bb5 Qe8 29. Bxd7 Qxd7 30. Qd2 Rc8 31. Rc1 Bb6 32. Be3 Qb5 33. Kg2 Ba5 34. Qf2 Qd3 35. Rfd1 Qe4+ 36. Kg1 Qg4 37. Kf1 Rc3 38. Rxc3 Qxd1+ 0-1

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Release The Kraken by Philip Makepeace and Christopher Russell is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License.