Bath don't always travel well and this was another occasion like that. They turned up to play the A team without at least four of their top players and we were certainly favourites on paper. But it is worth mentioning that sometimes in similar circumstances other clubs would have suggested a postponement or cried off altogether. It is to Bath's great credit that they soldier on regardless.

But, as always with Bath, the first job is to try not to let David Buckley give them a point start and Steve had it all under control! They shook hands after just 19 moves when neither side could see much likelihood of exploiting any weaknesses.

Going in ascending order of moves played, the next to finish was Peter. He judged it was safe to mix things up a bit and rely on his "Chess for Tigers" skill. He cracked open Antony's King-side while White's Queen and Rooks were having a private conversation on the other side of the board. The attack turned out to be pretty much unstoppable and when White resigned on move 26 it was mate in three moves.

Martin decided this was not an occasion to try to scare the horses and once a number of pieces were exchanged it came down to a dead level ending so he and Andreas agreed to share the spoils.

After a dozen moves Nigel had conjured up a small plus as Black against Barry. His minor pieces had more activity and his Queen was dominating the board when an inaccuracy allowed him to win the exchange. After that it was pretty much a mopping up exercise to secure the point.

After 26 moves Aron was level according to the engine but Mauro was bravely storming Aron's King and his f and g pawns (three of them by now!) had reached f5, f4 and g4. The game stayed tense and the two f pawns both moved forward a notch, while Aron's King sought safety on h2. A critical position arose when Aron pushed one of his g pawns to the fifth and Mauro made an error in capturing it, allowing Aron's Queen into the game with check. A sequence of attacking moves led to checkmate in the middle of the board. It had been yet another example of Aron's resourcefulness in attack.

Which leaves us with Oscar. By his own account he felt under pressure against Patrick although the engine suggests it was not as bad as all that. There is a school of thought that says that if you play that particular opening as Black, you are asking to be put under pressure. But there are plenty of others who swear by it! Anyway, Oscar exchanged Queens on d1, castled and reached a pleasant, if small, advantage himself. When it came down to opposite coloured bishops the writing was possibly on the wall but they carried on, partly for the pure joy of playing chess. Nobody is quite certain when they finally agreed the draw, since the scoresheet was incomplete, but Dave' estimate that it went on to around move 60 is probably accurate.

So the match was won and the A team moved into a top three position equal on points with University and Horfield. The latter surprisingly only narrowly scraped home last night against Grendel so let' s hope that augurs well for our visit there next week.