It was a busy start to the new league season last night as we had 8 teams in action all playing derbies as their first matches for 26/27.
Before the league matches got underway we had the play-offs for the Time & Point Handicap deferred from last week. In the semi-finals James managed to beat Steve K, and Tommy edged his way to overcome Nathan (he who could have won the trophy but for his superb sportsmanship last week).
So we had the “youthful showdown” as two 14 year-olds slugged it out to become winner of the coveted Les Hall Memorial Trophy. Tommy won the toss for choice of colours and interestingly chose black, allowing James an extra minute on the clock which reduced the time difference to 3 mins (6 vs 9), with Tommy hoping the black odds would do the trick.
James was always in the ascendancy and was a piece up with a couple of minutes remaining on his clock vs Tommy’s 4 mins. The black king advanced into danger and effectively became trapped and allowed James to finish with a very neat mate in the middle of the board with a Rook and bishop as black tried to activate his King, hoping to play for time, leaving James as the worthy winner !
I was not able to watch the Major KO final between Julian and Mario, so can only report on Julian’s success adding another trophy to his collection.
Congratulations to James and Julian who will be awarded their trophies at next year’s AGM.
In the league division one matches Crewe A won 4-0 against the B team, while a weakened C team held the D team to a 2-2 draw, but could have easily won.
Crewe G narrowly won 2.5-1.5 vs Crewe H in NSDCA division 3 and the K team beat the L team 3-1 in division 5.