Five of the club’s eight teams have gotten their league season underway so far…and so far, the only team they’ve managed to beat has been St Benildus!
The Armstrong were first up last Monday with what, on paper, was a relatively straightforward game against Heidenfeld champions Blanchardstown. The Armstrong is going to be quite competitive this year as the promoted sides – Blanch and Gonzaga B – will surely be far stronger than the two relegated teams, Curragh and our own Bs. But still, we had 150 points or so across the 8 boards, and the expected score was around 5½-2½.
But things didn’t go that way at all at all. And while two of our Greece-bound players picked up points – Kevin with a draw and Brendan with a win – Mihailo, Gerry and John lost in quick succession, while Zdravko, 8 draws last year, drew again as we slumped to a 2-4 deficit with just Tim and Stephen left. And within that, Mihailo and John had been just winning; John threw away a +5 position against a 1690.
And things weren’t looking great on the other two boards either; Tim had B+4 v R+2, while Stephen was a pawn down, and had two knights up against two bishops. Tim did hold the draw, while Stephen somehow held the draw against John Delaney from a N+1 v B+3 position after building a fortress. So a 3-5 defeat to start a season where there won’t be much margin for error; we host Balbriggan next.
Wednesday night saw the BEA South A v B derby. It’s not entirely clear which team is stronger as recent weekenders have seen various ratings gains, but in the event the As – missing Des – came through 3-2. Cal saw off Yubo having been behind on material at one stage, while sub Robbie beat Lorcan in a fairly topsy-turvy game. But the Bs hit back through Zhengjun and Eric, who beat Danny and Nicky respectively, and it was down to the final match, Ben v Thomas. Ben was a pawn up, and ultimately that was enough to take the win. The As travel to Rathmines next; the Bs host Curragh.
On Saturday, it was a double-header against Drogheda in the Ennis and the O’Hanlon. Drogheda are one of the title favourites in the Ennis, while they finished comfortably ahead of us in the O’Hanlon too, so this was certainly a tough way to open the season. Alas, things didn’t go well on the top board in either match, with a timetable clash depriving the O’Hanlon of Felix, while Leon played the Poisoned Pawn Winawer without Ne7, which just lost his rook after Qxg7. But things steadily got quite a bit worse – in fact, we lost all of the first seven matches! For the Ennis, Slavko got to a pawn ending a pawn down but which was completely lost and Danny was a rook for two pieces and two pawns down against Dayna, while for the O’Hanlon, Eddie had made one disastrous error to lose what been a reasonable position, Desmond lost quickly after a strong attack on f7 and Venkat’s back rank was exposed with fatal, queen-losing, consequences. Even on board 6, which we had scratched and where I was playing a friendly instead, I got my queen trapped, but found a way out of it, after which my opponent immediately hung a piece and resigned.
Things couldn’t get much worse than that, and didn’t. Lara won on 5 to get the Ennis off the mark, while Finn did the same on 2 for the O’Hanlon. Kavin lost a pawn to a tactic and then sacced a piece for nothing to lose, and while Zhengjun lost an exchange against a 1400 in the O’Hanlon, his opponent kindly hung it straight back and then lost the resulting rook and pawn ending, where Zhengjun had a central passed pawn advantage to tie his opponent down.
The last game to finish was a fairly wild one; William had been in all sorts of trouble against Rick Goetzee, but with nothing to lose, he sacced a rook and a piece for an attack, which worked, even though it shouldn’t have. But having won the piece back and then forced his opponent into saccing a rook, William neglected to deal with his opponent’s pawn on b2 – and so as he, in time trouble, offered a draw, his opponent, in worse time trouble, declined and played his rook down to c1, bringing pretty much near immediate resignation; had William rounded up the b-pawn first, there were potential winning chances.
So 1-5 and 2-4 to start the season for the Ennis and O’Hanlon respectively – not a great start, but not a huge disaster either as the aggregate 9-3 defeat is the same as we started last season with. The Ennis visit Elm Mount next, while the O’Hanlon face a very strong UCD side.
Our other three teams all start their campaigns this week; the Heidenfeld visit Rathmines on Monday, while the Bodley A face the Bodley B on Wednesday.