BCL Division 1 Tue 10th Jan 2023
| Board | Home | Leighton Buzzard A | Bedford B | Away | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 (B) | 2169 | G Kenworthy, Gary | 1 – 0 | B Taylor, Alex | 1985 |
| 2 (W) | 2027 | B Sharp, John R | 1 – 0 | G Habershon, Paul F | 1971 |
| 3 (B) | 2055 | B Law, Stephen | ½ – ½ | B Bodily, Richard T | 1962 |
| 4 (W) | 2011 | S Hunt, Peter | ½ – ½ | G Obi, Okwose Marc | 1938 |
| 5 (B) | 1953 | G Williamson, Kevin J | 0 – 1 | S Karimi, Qais | 1924 |
| Total | 10215 | 3 – 2 | Total | 9780 |
The B Team travelled to Leighton Buzzard A on Tuesday for their first match of 2023.
The match proved to be closed fought with some interesting games taking place.
Paul played John Sharp on Board 2 and had one of those games we have all experienced at some point. John created a strong kingside attack against Paul’s king and was poised to move his rook from f1 to the h file via f3 with devastating consequences. Paul thought he had things covered as his bishop was covering the important h3 square, but John sidestepped this by deploying his rook to f4 heading to h4 with the desired result.
Marc and Peter were engaged in an interesting tussle on Board 4 with both sides castling on the queenside and both trying to attack their opponent’s kings. Pawns seemed to be scattered everywhere at my last look at the board, but the position was still relatively closed. It was a slight surprise when I discovered a draw had been agreed, but they obviously cancelled each other out.
Richard came out of his opening positionally worse with Steve having the possibility of an attack on the king. After managing to swap manged to swap queens into a 2 rook and 2 knights v 2 rooks and 2 bishops. Aided by mistakes and a couple of cheapos, Richard managed to win a pawn but snatched at the chance of a second in a double rook ending. This allowed Steve to obtain a passed pawn on e2 and Richard could not reorganise his pieces in time and by the time he had the position had simplified to R & 3 pawns each and they were coming off – so a draw was agreed.
Qais had an interesting game against Kevin. To the untrained eye, getting your bishop trapped on h1 is not a good place to be, but Qais assures me it was all planned (and to be fair his position did look solid!). He was able to break the shackles and create chances against the black king. The position boiled down to a R+P v R ending and Qais was able to convert this to a win, helped by Kevin’s time shortage.
This left the match score tied with only my game against Gary to finish. In the early middle game Gary thought he had an opportunity to win a pawn, but overlooked the fact that I would trap his bishop (although full disclosure so had I!). However, this allowed me to win Gary’s b pawn, and although I had to give the extra pawn back, with the bishop pair and Gary having a couple of isolated pawns, I thought I had good drawing chances. However, Gary spent the next 30 or so move gently probing (I thought I might get to the 50 move rule!) and I was very short of time. In the end I succumbed, which was a bit frustrating!
Another loss – albeit by the narrowest of margins, 3-2, leaves the B Team still pointless and playing the other pointless team, Leighton Buzzard B next – a relegation thriller is on the cards!
Alex Taylor, 12th January 2023