Ireland narrowly failed to match their Stokes Cup triumph of twelve months ago, while the other three teams all came home third.
The main event, the Glorney Cup, was the only tournament without Benildus representation. A penultimate-round 4½-½ defeat against England and a final round draw against Scotland allowed the Scottish hosts to pip Ireland for second place.
In the Robinson, Mihailo and Ross both scored 3½/6 on boards 4 and 5 respectively; not only that, but both picked up the exact same results as each other in every round! We needed 4½ in the final round against Scotland to come joint second, but fell just short, picking up 3½ to end up, like the Glorney, third behind hosts Scotland and winners England.
Alex Byrne led the Stokes on board 1. This was a two-way battle for the title, with Scotland failing to pick up even a half point in 24 games against Ireland and England. We started off with an excellent 4½-1½ win against England, giving high hopes of retaining the title, but were brought down to earth when dropping two points against Wales in the second round; Alex lost on time when in a clearly won position. When England beat Ireland 4½-1½ in the penultimate round, our second place finish was more or less confirmed – England’s board 4 draw was the only slip up by either team in the final round. Alex ended with 2½/6, which didn’t really reflect his play over the three days.
In the Gilbert, we were third again. Anastasija’s great win against England led us to an opening-round win, but again, England rallied in the return, this time picking up a 3-0 win. Wales then did the double against Ireland to help them to second spot. Anastasija ended up on 2/6 with a performance rating of 1533.
Full results are on the Chess Scotland website –
Glorney
Robinson
Stokes
Gilbert
Next year’s tournament is in Ireland, which will make competition for places all the more interesting!