After last weekend’s busy and successful congress with over 30 of our members in action, it was a relatively quiet night at St. Mary’s on Tuesday with 29 members attending plus our visitors from Kidsgrove as the majority had a little break from chess.
Despite the lower numbers, there was much to enjoy. The main event was our “A” team hosting Kidsgrove in the South Cheshire Shield, while the last game was played in the club championship 23/24 competition and the first game was played in the Summer knockout.
The “A” team had a narrow win 2.5-1.5, with Pawel and Phil winning on boards 2 and 4 with the white pieces and George Bulbeck getting the only points with black in the match with a draw on board 1.
Wednesday we had both our teams in action with the “A” team at Meir’s new venue and the “B” team at Newcastle.
The “A” team had a comfortable win 3.5-0.5 with wins from Julian Hawthorne (bd 1), Pawel (bd 2) and Jamie (bd 3), while captain Steve settled for the draw. Having played 3 matches in 8 days, the “A” team have made a 100% start and lead the table by 2pts at this early stage of the summer season.
The “B” team came away from The Bridge Club in Newcastle with the match secured after a 3-1 success. Nigel captained the team (as Dave Price had a rare night off) and led the way with a win on bd 2. George Bowkett and Kobus also did the business in the 3-1 win.