Round 5 saw the D team host Bath C in another close affair, with Bath C coming out narrow victors 3½-2½. Many thanks to Bath C for making the journey and giving us a great match and many thanks to Nigel Wilcox as stand-in captain on the night.
On an impressive run, Dave Williams played a Sicilian Defence: Kan Variation on board 1 against Jared Kennedy. High accuracy starts from both ensured an equal opening 15 moves, with Jared pushing for a kingside attack and Dave replying with his own on the queenside. Jared made a key mistake with c4, losing control of important defensive squares and allowing Dave to activate his pieces more readily and start picking up pawns as a result. The game ended with a discovered check winning Jared's queen; relentless play at 95% accuracy from Dave to continue his strong form.
Ian Pickup, with white for the first time this season, featured on board 2 against Spencer Lawrence. Another close game, the two played a Four Knights Scotch with neither side gaining much of an advantage from the opening or middle game. The queen, rook and pawn endgame saw Spencer up a doubled pawn and the game still in the balance but Ian manoeuvred well to win back the pawn and create a passer of his own. Ian then capitalised on a key mistake on move 35, finding the best move and pushing Spencer's King to the edge and out of the game, enabling Ian to essentially force a trade of queens and win the pawn promotion race.
Nigel Wilcox played Bob Gore on board 3. An even affair for the most part, both played solid developing moves and played for the centre as the game ticked along. Move 31 proved a critical point with Nigel playing Qd6, unfortunately allowing a well spotted f4 from Bob and the loss of one of Nigel's minor pieces next move. However, an inaccuracy straight after gave Nigel some light and allowed him to rescue both of his minor pieces at the expense of a couple of pawns. Despite this, in such an open position and down two passed pawns, Nigel was in danger and sought perpetual checks as a way out. With more time it's likely that Bob would've found a safe space for his King and pressed home his advantage, but running increasingly low on time he offered a draw, which Nigel accepted.
We had Carolus Tang on board 4 playing with the white pieces against Mauro Farina. They played a Benoni with Carolus coming out of the opening with a small edge. As they entered the middle game Mauro traded his strong, outposted knight for Carolus' bishop on d3, a positive trade for Carolus had he taken back accurately. Unfortunately, he took back with his Queen and fell into a skewer, going down an exchange. This proved decisive as Mauro took control of the open file and began to hunt Carolus' King. With neither Carolus' queen nor Knight close enough to defend, Mauro pushed on and found a finishing checkmate combination.
The result on board 5 was a loss for our Dave Woodcock against Barry Raynes, commentary on which I can't provide as I wasn't there and I've no record of the moves that were made.
Greg Sumner sat down on board 6 and played the Colle System against Joe Raynes. An untimely knight jump from Greg allowed Joe to win a central pawn and retain a small advantage as the players entered a rook and pawn endgame on move 30. Greg started the endgame brilliantly and had already equalised two moves later. Unfortunately, a key mistake by Greg on move 42, which in fairness was missed by both players a few times, allowed Joe to push his passed pawn to an unstoppable position and force resignation. Post analysis, Greg realised that he had an opportunity to use his rook to counter the passed pawn, but these things are always much easier to spot with hindsight.
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