News

George carries the flag for club at Congress

This weekend has seen another sucessful congress orgainsed by the team of Neville Layhe, Les Hall, Dave Price and Simon Layhe together with the Arbiter, Matthew Carr (IA).

There were 142 competitors spread pretty evenly over the four sections (Open, U 165, U135, U105) including a star studded cast for the FIDE-rated Open which had 4 FMs and one IM.

The only prize winner from the club was George Jellis who gained the grading prize in the Minor section (U105) with a superb score of 3.5 pts. George had the lowest grade in the whole tournament, excluding two ungraded players, so this is an excellent achievement.

More details will follow, including mention of Bart Fajfer’s great effort to score 3 pts in the tough Open Section and Rick Renegade’s fall at the last hurdle from leading the Intermediate section.

Full results are shown on “Congress Results” tab separately.

New Season under way

No sooner had the Summer Shield finished on the Friday, then the new season got under way on Wednesday. The Mals Club hosted our first “derby” of the North Staffs season bringing forward a match originally scheduled for November as our E team faced the F team in division 5. The “F” team had small grading advantages on each board and completed a 4-0 win thanks to Adam Fields, Julian Bulbeck, Phil Wright and George Jelliss. A special mention should be made for our latest league debutant as Russell Smithers played on board 4 for the “E” team.

The Wirral team started their division 2 campaign with the long haul to Buckley/Mold. Unfortunately the Drovers Arms had a very noisy atmosphere which was not conducive to playing league chess. Somehow we managed to win 4-1 as the three white odd boards were all successful as David Hulme, Harry Gardiner and Lukasz Michalek beat the opposition while the two black board games were held to draws by Simon Layhe and Dave Price. There was some excellent attacking play by our two youngest players as Harry chased the opposition King from a castled king-side to be mated in the centre of the board, and Lukasz pierced through another castled king-side before his opponent failed to reach the first time control at 35 moves under immense pressure.

So it’s time to look forward to this weekend’s Crewe Congress at The Ibis Hotel where we currently have approx 135 players expected.

Alsager win SCS Shield and Newcastle win the pre-season friendly

The South Cheshire Shield came to its conclusion this week as Alsager earned the necessary draw against our “A” team to win the South Cheshire Summer Shield with an unbeaten record. For the 2nd year running the “A” team have been pipped at the post. Lukasz Michalek had given our “A” team a great chance by winning on board 4 as our top two boards Simon Layhe and Harry Gardiner could only draw and the board 3 game went in favour of the visitors to secure their title.

The final games of the SCS season were played on Friday night as Newcastle hosted our B team. Skipper Les Hall got the ball rolling with an early win on board 4 before Newcastle levelled matters on board 3. The star performance came from our board 2 with Adam Fields beating the opposition skipper who was graded some 24 points higher. On board 1 David Hulme hung on for a draw against Newcastle youngster Joe Hirst to make sure the B team finished on the same match points as the “A” team and just 1 behind the winners – Alsager. Congratulations to them on winning the competition.

Alongside the B team match, Newcastle also hosted the annual pre-season challenge against us. With so many players unavailable from both clubs it was a credit to both that a 7 board match took place although Crewe contributed 8 of the 14 and left Dave Price on the bench to coach some of the younger Newcastle members who are not quite “match-ready”. Newcastle fielded a much stronger squad than we did and ran out comfortable winners with the assistance of our own Phil Wright. There was a notable win for  Simon Layhe on board 2, while Mike Keenan won against a Newcastle newcomer on board 6 and our only other score came from Doug Barnett with a top board draw, when he might have gone on to win with a bit more time on the clock. As always an enjoyable encounter which leaves the annual challenge score at 2-2. We look forward to the 2020 challenge which will be Crewe’s turn to host.

South Cheshire Shield – The title decider

This week sees the conclusion of the Summer Shield competition with Wednesday (18th Sept) being the big night of the “decider” as Crewe “A” host the unbeaten leaders Alsager at The Mals Club. Alsager only need a draw to secure the trophy against 2nd placed Crewe “A” whereas the “A” team have to win to secure the title. Meanwhile reigning champions Newcastle host Crewe B on Friday (20th) at The Bridge Club alongside the annual pre-season challenge between the two clubs which is the 4th such challenge with Crewe currently leading 2-1.

Last Wednesday saw the SCS “A” team defeat the B team 3-1 with wins by Harry Gardiner (Bd 2), Dave Price (bd 3) and Lukasz Michalek (bd 4) while Rick Renegade picked up the B’s sole win to avoid a whitewash.

If any member wishes to play in the pre-season challenge on Friday at Newcastle please let David Hulme or Dave Price know as soon as possible.

Also please note our Congress takes place in a fortnight at The Ibis Hotel, where we currently have just over 70 entrants so far. The entry form is on the site and if you have any issues with completing it please let Les Hall or Dave Price know.

South Cheshire Shield Update

We have played three matches so far this month, with the first derby ending all square on 7th August, before the “A” team came unstuck vs Newcastle last week and the B team holding leaders Alsager to a 2-2 draw last night.

In the derby, Simon Layhe and Chris Rhodes earned wins for the “A” team while Kobus Nienaber and Phil Wright did the trick for the B team. Only Nigel Gardner’s win against Newcastle avoided the whitewash for the “A” team. Rick Renegade and Kobus managed the two wins last night for the B team.

There is a 3 week break before the 2nd derby on 11th September and the competition concludes the following week with the league deciders as leader’s Alsager visit the The Mals to play the “A” team and the B team go to Newcastle on Friday 20th as we play the 4th pre-season challenge at The Bridge Club.

The Shield is a 3-way race for the trophy with Alsager in command on 7pts from 5 games knowing a win in their final match secures the Shield. If they slip up against our “A” team, it may be possible for one of our teams to catch them, with the B team on 5pts and the “A” team on 4pts and both have the (derby) game in hand with poorer board scores.

AGM Awards

 

The biggest item on the AGM (held Wednesday 31st July) Agenda was the presentation of Trophies which started with the Wirral League Player of the Year for Division 2 awarded to Bart Fajfer. This was followed by team trophies for the Intermediate Cup (U130), Major Cup (U150), Division 5, 3 and 2. Summer Rapid-play trophies were won by Bart for division 1  and Lukasz Michalek won division 2. The Long-play trophies went to Nigel Gardner and Lukasz for division 2 being tied and Bart (again) for division 1. Bart then collected the Time & Point Handicap trophy before receiving his 5th award for Club Player of the Year. The final award went to an excited Harry Gardiner who just pipped Lukasz for the “Junior Player of the Year”.

NSDCA U150, U130, Division 2, 3 and 5

South Cheshire Shield Progress

Apologies for the late update on the Summer Shield competition. Our two teams have been progressing quietly with the same record each of 3 pts from 2 games having both beaten defending champions Newcastle and drawn with Alsager. As things stand at almost half-way Alsager lead the table with 4 pts from 3 games (W1 D2) and our teams are joint 2nd with a game in hand and 1 point behind while Newcastle have failed to register any match points from 3 games.

Next week (Wed 7th August) is our first “head to head” as the “A” team host the “B” team and whatever happens we will be in contention leading to the second half of the fixture list.

Full results can be seen from our tab on the RH side of the site labelled “South Cheshire Shield 2019”.

There are no matches this week with the club’s AGM being held on Wednesday 31st July. Please note this is everyone’s chance to have a say in how your club is run and managed and to suggest ideas for improvement in the club’s activities.

 

Crewe beat Chester to win Centenary Congress Clock Prize

Back in April Chester hosted a Rapid-play Congress to celebrate their 100th anniversary as a chess club. Our club provided 7 or 8 of the 100 entries and tied for a bone-fide team prize with Chester’s top team (grades 217, 190, 175) while our team was much lower graded. It was agreed rather than split the clock in two the clubs would arrange some sort of challenge and we settled on a 2-round RP match being played at Chester’s Town Crier venue over 12 boards per team played last night.

The first round of games started with an early blast of results with 4 boards being shared. As your reporter knuckled down to play his game he was last to finish in the round and was pleasantly shocked to find Crewe had outplayed the much higher graded players from Chester to lead 9-3 ! It must be said that although there was a 160 point grade advantage over the 12 boards to Chester, they had not accounted for our much greater experience of Rapid-play conditions.

According to Chester’s president the match was decided early in the 2nd round as Crewe picked up 3.5 pts from the first 4 games to guarantee success. In cricketing terms he says “it was close to losing by an innings”. The remaining games saw Chester fight their way back and they managed to win the 2nd round narrowly by 6.5-5.5. Overall Crewe won convincingly by 14.5 – 9.5 and await the clock-prize which has recently been ordered with some new equipment at Chester.

See Chester’s website below and their news item headed “Crewe crush Chester in Rapid Match” :

http://chesterchess.co.uk/news/

Chester vs Crewe 2019 RP pairing and results

There were a number of outstanding performances from our members scoring 2 pts with George Jelliss, Nigel Gardner and Kobus Nienaber deserving special mention as they outplayed their higher grade opponents.

NEW GRADES ARE OUT !

The July 2019 grades have just been published.

The Player list (on RH side of our site) has been updated.

Please refer to the ECF Grading Database for full details.

http://ecfgrading.org.uk/new/menu.php#

 

 

Crewe edge victory in Annual Cheddleton Challenge

Last Friday saw the 3rd Annual Challenge between Crewe and Cheddleton, taking place at Cheddleton. This year the match was contested over 12 boards and without Crewe’s top players being available, Chedd arranged for the teams to be closely graded in the spirit of this fun and friendly contest. The crucial toss of the coin went in favour of Chedd so they had the unusual position of being white on odd boards at home !

Ben Harrison having just completed his “A” levels got the visiting Crewe team on the score board first with an early success on board 12. Harry Gardiner was elevated to board 4 and managed to put Crewe 2-0 in the lead before the first of several draws maintained Crewe’s lead. Dave Price (on board 7) had a predictable draw with Sandra Blackburn at a similar time to Neville Layhe on bd 5 with David Millington. Doug Barnett extended our lead with a further win on bd 6 before Chedd’s first success came on bd 9 for Dave Hallen. Crewe edged closer to the winning line when bds 1 (David Hulme & Jon Blackburn) and 3 were drawn between Simon Layhe and Roger Edwards. Next to finish was Crewe’s outstanding performer with Les Hall getting another draw on bd 8 facing the biggest grade deficit of the night as we got even closer to victory. Mike Keenan on bd 11 ensured Crewe’s victory to put us on 6.5 pts before Cheddleton stormed back with late victories in the remaining games for Bill Armstrong on bd 2 and last to finish Harvey Murray-Smith on bd 9 to conclude the event.

Crewe emerged narrowly victorious by score of 6.5-5.5 and invited Cheddleton to the 4th challenge to played next year at Crewe, with a buffet to be provided. This is Crewe’s first win in the event at the 3rd attempt, with Chedd having won both previous encounters by the score of 8-5.

Thanks go to Caroline Mountford who did not play for Cheddleton, but very kindly ensured the two teams were closely graded.

Full score card on the LMS at

http://ecflms.org.uk/lms/node/40772