Bedford B faced Milton Keynes A looking to see if they could improve on their draw in the home fixture.
Unfortunately the team soon found themselves behind after an abject loss by the captain against Graham Smith. Once again Alex failed to appreciate the strength of a pin and his position collapsed very quickly.
The rest of the team were faring better. Chris came out of a Caro-Kann opening with his opponent (Robert Whiteside) seemingly holding all the aces – a bishop pair, control of the open d file and much more space. However, Chris was able to exchange both pairs of rooks and was able to hold comfortably for a draw.
On board 2, Steve was suffering against Adrian Elwin. After an early exchange of queens, Adrian had built up a huge amount of pressure on the queenside and had cramped black’s position up. After an exchange sacrifice (aka “blunder” – Ed), Steve’s position looked marginally better (than it had previously, sadly not better than his opponent’s – Ed) with his two knights holding good outposts. Once these had been driven back the position rather collapsed.
Marc was playing a patient game against Peter Rawcliffe on board 5. He managed to build up a huge amount of pressure and cramp black’s position. Rather than launching an outright attack, patient manoeuvring and probing of black’s position eventually led to Peter blundering his queen, but the position was essentially lost anyway.
This left Nick needing to win on board one against Graham Borrowdale to tie the match score. From the opening he had managed to build up a good position, with Graham having a cramped defensive position and white having chances on the queenside. This pressure allowed Nick to create a passed c pawn on the sixth rank. It was not clear, however, that this would be enough to convert to a win. In the mutual time scramble at the end of the game Graham was able to break through in a rook and pawn ending to win the game.
Overall the score was 3.5-1.5 to Milton Keynes A.
Alex Taylor (27/03/2016)