Month: October 2021

October 15, 2021

First, a reminder of what the Friends Bowl competition is. The Friends Bowl is a large silver cup which has been in the club since 1947 when it was donated to the club by the then president of the club, Arnold Friends. The annual competition for the cup is a knock out handicap based on grading. This year the rules are being tweaked slightly to accommodate the changes in the ECF rating system.

For each game the players are given a material handicap according to the difference in their rating. The ratings used will be the ratings on the ECF website for the players at the time (ratings updated monthly). Where a player doesn’t have an over the board standard rating, for instance because they haven’t played enough rated games, then in the first instance a provisional rating will be used if one exists for the player. Failing that an OTB rapid rating will be used and finally online ratings will be used.

The handicaps are as follows for different rating differences:

0-99 – no handicap, first named player in the draw has white
100-199 – colour, lower rated player has white
200-299 – 2 moves, lower rated player has white and makes two moves instead of one to start the game
300-399 – f pawn and move, lower rated player has white, remove f7 pawn
400-499 – f pawn and 2 moves, remove f7 pawn, lower has white and makes two moves instead of one to start the game
500-599 – knight, remove b1 knight, higher rated player has white
600-699 – rook, remove a1 rook, higher rated player has white
700-799 – queen, remove d1 queen, higher rated player has white
800-899 – queen and knight, remove b1 knight, remove d1 queen, higher rated player has white
>=900 – queen and rook, remove a1 rook, remove d1 queen, higher rated player has white

Time control: all moves in 60 minutes with a 10 second increment.

Games are not gradeable. Recording is not required.

FIDE laws apply apart from handicap related (i.e. initial position and possible double first moves). In cases 600+ and 900+ white may castle queenside provided the king has not moved, none of c1, d1, e1 are under attack and a1 through d1 are vacant.

This is a knockout competition. Players not completing their matches before the deadline are eliminated. In the case of a draw a rematch with the same handicap is played with 30 minutes for the game with no increment. In the case of 0-99 handicap colour alternates.

Entries to Brian Towers by 28th October, please.

October 14, 2021

Congratulations to the B team players, Dave Patterson, Lewis Self, Stan Johnson, Jay Steel and Michael Allen for winning the summer knock out. The competition is a handicap knock out where weaker teams receive a point start which depends on the the difference in strength between them and the stronger team. Hence with a large strength difference the weaker team can win the match by scoring just one draw.

Here are the results the B team achieved on their way to overall victory with handicap points in brackets.

South Shields B 3.5 (2.5) – 3 (0) Forest Hall A
Dave Patterson (1705) 0 – 1 Tim P Wall (2260)
Lewis Self (1660) 1 – 0 Stuart Skelsey (1893)
Jay Steel (1495) 0 – 1 John (jnr) Wall (1780)
Stanley Johnson (1458) 0 – 1 Rose Wabuti (1705)

Tynemouth 3 (0) – 4.5 (3.5) South Shields B
David Henderson (2118) 1 – 0 Dave Patterson (1705)
Paul AG Dargan (2110) 1 – 0 Jay Steel (1495)
John S Clarke (1780) 0.5 – 0.5 Stanley Johnson (1458)
Simon Matthews (1758) 0.5 – 0.5 Michael EI Allen (1405)

Semi-final
Gosforth B 2.5 (0) – 3 (1.5) South Shields B
Mark McKay (1750) 1 – 0 Dave Patterson (1705)
James McKay (1630) 0 – 1 Jay Steel (1495)
Ian B Chester (1660) 1 – 0 Stanley Johnson (1458)
Luke Fletcher (1458) 0.5 – 0.5 Michael EI Allen (1405)

Final
Gosforth A 3.5 (0) – 4 (3.5) South Shields B
David Armbruster (2132) 1 – 0 Dave Patterson (1705)
Michael J McBeth (1953) 1 – 0 Jay Steel (1495)
Mick D Riding (1960) 1 – 0 Stanley Johnson (1458)
John Liddle (1818) 0.5 – 0.5 Michael EI Allen (1405)

Top scorer for the team and scorer of the crucial draw which won them the final was Michael Allen. Here is his game from the final. It’s worth first noting that one of the chess ideas which may have come from the apocryphal “Soviet School of Chess” is that of “playing for two results”. It basically means making error free chess the priority so as to always keep the possibility of drawing or winning the game.

Michael refined this in this game to “playing for one result”. Perfectly understandable since drawing the game meant winning the match. What was rather more surprising was that his opponent copied him! Michael, feeling perhaps that the game spoke for itself, left it to the post author to add comments.

[pgn height=500 initialHalfmove=1 autoplayMode=none]
[Event “Summer Knockout”]
[Date “2021.09.20”]
[White “John Liddle”]
[Black “Michael Allen”]
[Result “1/2-1/2”]
[WhiteElo “1818”]
[BlackElo “1431”]

1.c4 c5 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.Nc3 Nc6 4.g3 g6 5.Bg2 Bg7 6.O-O O-O {all very symmetrical} 7.Nd5 {d4 would be more normal but the move played better fits the “one result” policy} d6 8.Rb1 Nxd5 9.cxd5 Ne5 {Nb5 would be better and in line with a “two results” policy} 10.b3 Nxf3+ 11.Bxf3 Qa5 12.Qc2 Bd7 {Probably slightly better objectively than Bh3 since black’s bishop is better than white’s. With the queen on a5 black wants to play on the queenside} 13.d3 Bh3 {Remembering that the plan is a draw} 14.Bd2 Qc7 15.Bg2 {If the pawn wasn’t on d5 blocking the bishop then Rfc1 would have been a bit better} Bxg2 16.Kxg2 Rac8 {Which rook where? Rfe8 might have been better eyeing up the e file after a planned e6 to try and also open up the diagonal to the king} 17.Rbc1 e6 18.Qc4 {“One result” policy in action} exd5 19.Qxd5 Qc6 {No second invitation needed} 20.Qxc6 Rxc6
21.Rc2 Re8 22.e3 {Putting another pawn on a dark square doesn’t seem clever. Bf4 putting the bishop on a more aggressive square and protecting the pawn via the c2 rook probably made more sense} d5 23.Rfc1 Rec8 24.Kf1 Kf8 25.Ke2 f5 26.b4 {Rxc5 has to be a bit better with Bb4 and d4 to follow and a passed pawn is likely} cxb4 27.Bxb4+ Ke8 28.Rxc6 Rxc6 29.Rxc6 bxc6 {Just bishops and pawns left. The goal is clearly in sight} 30.d4 Bf6 31.Kd3 Kd7 32.Bc5 a6 33.Kc3 Kc7 34.Kb4 h5 35.Ka5 Kb7 36.Bd6 Bd8+ 37.Kb4 g5 38.f3 a5+ 39.Kc3 Ka6 40.a4 g4
41.fxg4 hxg4 42.Kd3 Bg5 43.Ke2 Kb7 44.Kf2 Bh6 45.Ba3 Bg5 46.Bc1 Kb6 47.Bd2 Bd8 48.Kg2 c5 49.Kf2 c4 50.Ke2 Be7 51.Bc3 Bb4 52.Kd2 Bxc3+ 53.Kxc3 Kc6 1/2-1/2 [/pgn]

October 10, 2021

The Northumberland League is starting up this month. We are running 3 teams this year. Here are the fixtures up to Christmas. Please make a note in your diaries and let your captain know your availability. The full fixture list is available here.

19th October B Team vs Tynemouth B (away)

21st October A Team vs Gosforth (home)

26th October A Team vs Leam Lane (away)

4th November B Team vs Morpeth (home)

10th November A Team vs Morpeth (away)

18th November C Team vs Leam Lane (home)

26th November C Team vs Forest Hall (away)

9th December A Team vs Tynemouth (home)

October 1, 2021

Could all players who want to enter the 2021-22 South Shields club championships email Brian Towers before 14th October, please? If we have enough entries we will run two separate competitions, an open section for the Stanley Johnson trophy and a rating limited section with a cut-off depending on entries but likely to be in the region of 110 to 120 in old money. If your rating is likely to be below this level then please indicate on your entry if you want to enter the Open.

Hopefully by 14th October the Northumberland Chess Association league fixtures will have been published and we can pick dates for championship rounds. Games will be ECF rated (unless there are major objections) so please also make sure you renew / take out ECF membership at Bronze level or above.

October 1, 2021

Paul put in a request for the Siesta Gambit in the Ruy Lopez but I couldn’t find any decent YouTube videos (which I need otherwise I don’t know what to do in these highly tactical openings). So I’ve gone for something similar in the Italian Game which also involves black sacrificing a pawn with f5. Apparently the engine’s first reaction is that this is a blunder because of the reply Ng5 but this leads to some wild and wooly play.

Anyway, play will start with White to move after the moves 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bc4 Bc5 4. d3 f5!. I found two YouTube videos covering this opening, one where White declines the pawn and one where White accepts.