Tuesday 21st was another superb night at the club, with the “A” team hosting Alsager “A”; the B team playing Macclesfield, and the E vs F division 3 derby.
The “A” team were at full strength for the first time this season with Richard Lee and Bart Fajfer on the top two boards, ably supported by captain Martin Burns on 3, and Harry Gardiner on 4. What looked on paper to be a one-sided match with the visitors missing their top two players, proved to be anything but plain sailing. The deciding factor was Harry’s early win, followed by draws in the other three games, to give a marginal win for the “A” team – 2.5 vs 1.5, to take us to 5 pts from 3 matches just behind leaders Fenton “A”.
The B team were also at full strength with Lee Farrington on 1, Carmel Barwick on 2, Simon Layhe on 3 and Cyrus Pereira playing his first game for the Bees. Cyrus blew away his opponent in under an hour to put us in the lead. Carmel’s attack was too much to withstand on 2, and Simon slowly strangled any life out of the opposition on 3, to secure the match with a 3-0 lead. Final score 3-1.
The E vs F clash was always going to be a close call,with less than 200 rating points separting the teams. Kobus Nienaber won for Es on bd 4, while nothing separated the games on 2 & 3 to give the Es a 2-1 lead. F team skipper Dave Price salvaged the match for the F team with a win. Final score 2-2
In addition to the 3 matches, there were a further 4 games played in the Club Championship. Neville Layhe won in div 1; Julian Bulbeck and Ebube Christian drew in div 2. Jamie Roberts extended his lead in div 3 with another full point in a cracking game with Malcolm, and Andrew Caccamo held Mark Randell to a draw.
On Friday (24th) our H team made the journey to Cheddleton to play their E team in div 4. Chedd’s youngsters got the upper hand with wins on 3 & 4, before Tim Weston chalked up a win for us on board 2. This left new member Malcolm Green in play on top board, who fought valliantly to get the win but was denied at the last gasp and could only draw. Final score 1.5 – 2.5. With thanks to Dave Price for taking 3 of our players to the match, who enjoyed a (drawn) rated game with one of the members from Cheddleton.