Lukasz Michalek and Les Hall played for the under 100 County team at Leicester on Saturday. In view of the new grades, Lukasz got promoted up the board order to no 5 and I was demoted to board 7. After 6 boards staffs were 5_1 up, with both of us Crewe boys winning
For full results U100 results
Wednesday saw the E team play Newcastle and ultimately our stronger
grades came through although it was a battle on some of the boards.
Newcastle had chosen to play a weaker team than they could have to
give people games and this gave an unbalanced appearance to the
match. Within a relatively short time Crewe had won on the even boards
as white with Dave Price and Lukasz gaining welcome wins. The remaining two games were much more protracted but eventually Julian wore down his opponent, gained an advantage and gradually tightened the screw to ensure a win in the match and a pleasing return to winning ways for him. That left Simon fighting a gritty battle on board 1 that could have gone either way but with the cleaners beginning to sweep the floor around them an honourable draw was agreed and a very solid win for the team was recorded at 3.5 – 0.5.
Friday saw an altogether different scenario with our F team travelling to
the table topping Cheddleton H. The team had been strengthened
somewhat by the inclusion of Harry on board 1 but we still expected to
be outgraded with a team total of 358. Indeed we were as Cheddleton
had significantly revised their team which totalled 398 on the night but if
it had been Monday would have weighed in at 410!
However, our mid-rating players are definitely improving and there was
a degree of confidence in our ranks as battle was joined. After a few
challenges Kobus managed to drive through his incrementing advantage
to a win on board 4 and first blood to the underdogs! On all boards 1 –
3 we were up at various occasions either in material or in Harry’s case,
in a very strong attack.
I had managed to gain a 2 pawn advantage through a series of
interesting puzzle like positions, which I am beginning to enjoy, but as
the board became more open my opponent’s greater experience was
beginning to threaten and I was possibly going to lose a pawn and was
on the defensive. I chickened out (no disrespect to any feathered
minorities intended) and offered a draw which was gratefully accepted.
This put us in a strong position at 1.5 – 0.5 with Adam up at least a
pawn and his opponent starting to get into time trouble. Things were
looking good! Unfortunately, a huge sigh was to be heard from board 1 where Harry’s strong attack had caused him to miscalculate and his opponent broke to gain a couple of pawns advantage which he continued to drive home and parity had been restored across the match. Harry had played really well and had even been declined the offer of a draw early on sensing he had a winning attack.
All eyes then switched to Adam who was now a rook to two pawns to
the good and an opponent who had less than 2 minutes on the clock.
Unfortunately the pawns were rapidly advancing and this caused a
degree of panic for Adam who was also now getting into time trouble.
To stop a promotion a rook was lost and whilst there was still moves
being made Adam was fighting a rearguard action and eventually his
clock ran out whilst he tried to avoid making a fatal mistake.
He can take a significant amount of solace from the game he played
where I’m sure on analysis he had a number of positions where he could
have forced a win in the end game but time was his opponent’s ally on
this occasion.
So overall, a narrow defeat against a much stronger team on paper but
it could have been 4 – 0 to us!!!!
Could have; should have; would have; ……..didn’t.
As most will know by now, the ECF has published its latest set of grades. From our club’s point of view it has seen the first published grade for Bart Fajfer our leading player at 170. Our juniors have all impressed with improved ratings. 16 y/o Amy Lovatt has jumped over the 150 mark to 152 with same aged Lukasz Michalek making big steps from 65 to 88, and 15 yr old Harry Gardiner rising 20 pts to 124. A number of our newer members have had a significant boost to their ratings with Adam Fields, Kobus Nienaber and Reinhard Haack all prominent.
The new grades may cause some changes to teams to accommodate the various team grade limits accross the NSDCA, while the Wirral team have no restrictions on eligibility.
The new grades can be seen from our player list on the RH side of our website.
Three players from Crewe travelled to Nottingham Rapid play congress over the weekend. Les had a tough day in the intermediate section. Doug had some tough games and ended with 2.5 out of 6. Neville ended with an impressive 3.5 out of 6
Three matches to report on this week, started with the Bees traveling to Alsager “A” in division 3. With our B team outgrading the hosts by nearly 80 points the form book was not upset as we ran out winners 3.5-0.5 to overtake our “C” team at the top of the table. Wins by captain Rick Renegade on bd 1, Chris Rhodes on bd 3 and Simon Layhe on bd 4, were supplemented with a draw from Neville Layhe. The Bees and C team have opened quite a gap at the top of the table now, with the Bees leading on 13 pts from 8 matches, the C team in 2nd with a game in hand trailing by one point, and Meir “A” in 3rd on 6 pts from 6 matches.
The Mals Club saw two matches, starting with the division 2 “top of the table clash” between our “A” team and Cheddleton “B”. Both of these teams went into the match unbeaten alongside Newcastle B. On paper the match was too close to call with just a hand-full of grade points separating the two teams, with Crewe edging four of the games, while Cheddleton had the biggest advantage on bd 1. By the time our reporter had arrived, Crewe had the upper hand following a win by Amy Lovatt on bd 3, with winning advantages on bds 4 & 5, trailing on bd 1 and looking tough on bd 2. Board 1 went to the visitors, soon followed by Karl Lockett holding out for a draw on bd 2. Our advantage evaporated on bd 4, as the opposition’s junior Sam Parry played a very mature endgame to pick up a win despite having just seconds on his clock at various stages to put Cheddleton in command at 2.5-1.5 before Chris Rhodes converted his advantage in the final game to level the score for the hosts. So both teams emerge with unbeaten records, which leaves the title wide open as a 4-team battle with Macclesfield very much in the mix alongside the unbeaten trio of Crewe “A”, Chedd “B” and Newcastle “B”.
The remaining match was a division 5 “derby” between our “E” and “F” teams with captain Nigel Gardner ensuring both teams were evenly matched. Ben Harrison in his debut game for Crewe ensured a tough battle developed after putting the F-team in the lead with an early win. Bd 1 saw the E team’s Les Hall held to a draw by Nigel. Mike Keenan then secured the match for the F team with a good win on bd 3. The final game did not finish until well after the division 2 match ended, with Adam Fields slugging it out against Lukasz Michalek. Both players acquitted themselves superbly as the game went well into increment time, before Adam found a way to force the win against Lukasz’s resourceful efforts as the match concluded 2.5 – 1.5 for the F team and prevent the “E” team from overtaking leaders Cheddleton H.
Thanks to secretary Les Hall for letting us know about exploits in the Midland’s County Championship U100 today. Staffordshire were playing Nottinghamshire and narrowly lost out in the 12 board match by the closest margin possible of 5.5 – 6.5. The positive news from Les was that 16 year old Lukasz Michalek made his county debut and managed a win, while Les himself managed a good result with a draw against an opponent grade 98.
Thanks to Nigel for providing the following report:
Monday Mayhem Makes Meir Mournful whilst Cheery Crewe Continue Championship Challenge
Monday evening at Meir for our E team was a chance to rebound from their first narrow defeat of the season at Cheddleton, just before Christmas. It was never going to be easy as Meir C have generally put out a strong competitive team and Monday proved to be an extreme example of this!
From the normal E team line up Julian was missing as he inexplicably prioritised his wife’s birthday over Chess!? Adam and myself were added to the normal Simon and Dave on the top two boards to make a team total grade of 393 against a maximum of 400; however we were significantly out graded by Meir!
After a cagey start on board 4, there was sudden flurry of activity with pieces being exchanged to leave virtual parity but little opportunity and a draw was soon agreed. Now having the opportunity to observe matters more closely it was close on all 3 boards with Adam marginally up and Simon and Dave slightly behind. However, by this stage I had realised that Meir had miscalculated when composing their team and the reason it appeared strong was it actually exceeded the grading limit with a total of 408. Unfortunately for Meir this means that they actually lost board 4 and would also be penalised a point but at this stage they were blissfully unaware of the reality, as were our team.
Simon was battling hard on top board but his exertions of the 3 previous days were beginning to take their toll and he was starting to struggle against a very strong opponent. Adam was now in command but in significant time trouble and Dave was under massive pressure but under even greater time pressure. It was not looking good………With around a minute on his clock and his King under attack Dave used attack as defence which progressed to his knight forking the king and rook some very rapid piece exchanges and his opponent resigning in the space of around 30 seconds.
This proved inspirational to Adam who was also into the last minute or so but he continued to press home his advantage and forced a resignation. This put us 2 clear points up on the night with one game to play which despite Simon nearly managing to promote a pawn eventually went the way of Meir. On the night therefore the score was 2.5 – 1.5 to us but after the adjustments were subsequently made this has been altered to 3 – 0 which is a strange result for a 4 board match!
It was all in another enjoyable evening for all but the Meir captain, Ray, who had to take some stick from all present for his inability to add up!! The upshot of this is that Crewe E have gone back to the top of the table although this is likely to be short-lived as Cheddleton H have a number of fixtures over the next 2 weeks, one against our F team. Next Wednesday sees the Es play the Fs at The Mals Club in what should prove a very interesting evening.
After just 10 days of the new year the club has already played six matches in the NSDCA.
In division 2, the “A” team retained their position at the top of the table after a 3-2 win at Fenton B on Monday. Bart Fajfer demolished his 184 grade opponent on board 1, before Doug Barnett smashed his way to another win on board 5. Draws by Karl Lockett (bd 3) and Chris Rhodes (bd 4) were enough to spare captain David Hulme’s blushes after he lost on bd 2.
Division 3 has seen both B & C teams play two matches. The C team first played Cheddleton C on 2nd January, and won the match with 2.5-1.5 scoreline thanks to Karl Lockett and Martin Frisher (making his season debut) with wins and Julian Bulbeck gained the necessary draw.
Friday night (4th January), saw the B team visit Cheddleton D without skipper Rick Renegade and regular Chris Rhodes. Thanks to Doug Barnett (with a win) and Harry Gardiner (a draw) for deputising for the team to allow Simon Layhe to play board 3 and gain another win which gave the team an unexpected win 2.5-1.5 and take the Bees to the top of the table.
Last night saw a fiercely contested derby between the top of the table Bees and 2nd-placed C team. The result was not in much doubt as Karl Lockett and Dave Price won convincingly with white pieces for the C team before David Hulme fluked a further win for the Cees and Julian Bulbeck followed captains orders to not lose in the other game. An unexpected win for the C team by 3.5-0.5 meant they leap-frog the Bees to go top of division 3 for now.
The “D” team playing in division 4 had to travel to Stafford on the 2nd day of the new year and came away with a useful draw as both teams tipped the scales at 459 pts, just 1 below the maximum permitted. Doug Barnett and Harry Gardiner were the successful players in this match.
The last match to report on was the division 5 clash played on Monday 7th, as our “E” team went to face Meir C. A solid team effort saw a win by 2.5-1.5, as captain Nigel Gardner clawed out a draw before Dave Price was fortunate to win on board 2, and Adam Fields played a superb endgame when down to just one minute remaining to pick up a further win. After the match it was noted that Meir had exceeded the permitted grade totals and the final score was adjusted to 3-0 for our “E team, who went back to the top of the table, leading Cheddleton H by just one point, who have one match in hand on Nigel’s team
Don’t panic folks this is not about any illustrious gang of crooks, but a brief report on exploitsat the Shropshire Chess Congress for six of our regular congressers.Bart Fajfer took on the challenge of playing in the Open Section which included several GMsand IMs in the field 30. Bart chalked up a very useful 2pts from 5 games, to exceed his FIDE rating for the tournament and by my reckoning missed an extra half-point in round 4 when last to finish after a superb endgame fightback.Neville Layhe played in the Major section (U170) and was seeded near the bottom of the section. Final scores are unavailable at the time of writing and had scored a very decent 1.5/4 going into the final round, playing the ubiquitous Huddersfield based Bob Clegg (grade 163).Our best performers were Doug Barnett and Simon Layhe both scoring 3/5 in the Intermediate section. Chris Rhodes had a super Sunday to claw his way to 50% with two wins, and Les Hall mustered a half point with all of his opponents being 25-40 grade points higher.
Congratulations to newcomer Bart Fajfer on taking the division one RP title, and to 16 year-old Lukasz Michalek for his success with the division two title.
Bart took the 1st division award after an outstanding performance scoring 15.5/17 with just one defeat against Karl Lockett and one further draw denting what would have been a 100% record. Bart finished streets ahead of 2nd placed David Hulme scoring 11/21, with 15 year-old Harry Gardiner finishing a creditable 3rd place with 9/17.
Lukasz won the 2nd division title by a hair’s width scoring 11/16, just pipping Nigel Gardner’s score of 11/17, reflected in their head-to-head score of 1-1. Club secretary Les Hall came with a late flurry to finish 3rd with a score of 8.5/14.
Full details of all Rapid-play results can be found from the links on the right side of the website under Internal competitions.
With the conclusion of the 2018 Rapid-play, all members are encouraged to take part in the club’s long-play tourneys that will continue until 31st May.