CASTLEHILL CLUB NIGHT REPORT – Thurs 2nd Feb 23
CLUB NIGHT REPORTS
Thurs 2nd Feb 23
Another busy night at Castlehill Chess Club Dundee, with more possible new members present! It seems chess is having a mini revival with both chess clubs in Dundee gaining new members, which can only be a good thing for the chess clubs, chess and the City of Dundee! Not only that, our juniors were playing earlier on in the Junior 4NCL under the Dundee City Juniors banner. We also had some club online competitions as well being played with our new venture of a Castlehill World Wide Online Chess Club!
CASTLEHILL RANDOM KNOCKOUT
Round 1 – Result – Time-Control: 75 minutes all moves
Ramit Kanodia J15 (988) 0 – 1 (1531) Alisdair McLeod
Last year Ramit reached the final of this competition, this year he faced a mountain to climb against Alisdair, and got crushed in an avalanche of good moves! Well played Alisdair!
TAFCA
LEAGUE DIV 1
Results
Castlehill D (9999) 0 – 4 (2000) Dundee A
Well we can but dream, but the dream was over before you knew it for Colin Young and his team! Out graded, out gunned, out manoeuvred and out played! When you have no idea what your opponent is up to, how can you defended against the Grandmasters of the dark arts of chess! Told them to bring the garlic and a sharp steak!
Castlehill B (9999) 1½ – 2½ (2000) St.Andrews Uni A
Normally I would say the match was a lot closer than the score line suggests, but in truth that would be a lie! Castlehill B punched above their weight to get 1½ points.
On board one, the St.Andrew`s player with the longest name I have ever seen, Pisut Prayoonthamrongthiti, was just too strong for young Vladislav Drabych this time. Vladislav is young and still learning, and this is a curve he will master if he keeps playing at this level.
Kit McEvoy Gould on board two had a long wait for his opponent as he had missed his bus from St.Andrews! With the clock ticking down, in walks Elliot Cocks like a gun slinger from the western movie, High Noon, and about 10-15 minutes later the match was over with St.Andrews A taking the points (Just like in the films)!
Castlehill B 0 – 2 St.Andrews Uni A
The writing was on the wall but the two Castlehill players still playing were very experienced and fighters!
On board 3, Ray Noble with black was having a right old tussle with Alexandre Kings! At one point it looked like Ray might have a possibility of a strong attack with his rooks down the Kingside against whites castled king position if he had continued with that plan. But Alexandre countered with an attack down the centre which took all of Ray’s attention. It was nip and tuck for a while, and then Alexandre managed to get the edge and win a pawn due to Ray’s king being in the middle of the board! There was still play in the game, but given the pawn up and Ray’s king in the centre of the board, it was not looking good for Ray.
In desperation and of course upholding Ray’s reputation as a cheapo/hacker merchant, Ray moved his queenside rook on to g8 with the possibility of not only attacking white’s kings defences, but maybe harassing whites queen. That is what must have been on Alexandre`s mind as he moved his queen into a safer but more attacking position. The only problem was, Ray’s Queen was hiding on c6 and after a look of disbelief, Ray picked up the queen and delivered checkmate on g2! Under pressure it was a simple error we have all made and will make again, Alexandre after all his hard work was gutted, but as ever a gentleman to the end! Should have seen the look on Ray’s face!
Castlehill B 1 – 2 St.Andrews Uni A
A glimmer of hope!
The last game to finish was on board 4 and featured Fergus Milne (Castlehill) and Jan Thiel (St.Andrews). Fergus was playing up for the “B” team, and had reached the end game with both sides having equal material with just pawns and Kings. To be honest it was looking like a draw, but end games can be tricky to play and one wrong move and bang, bang… it’s all over!
Both players were under their 5 minutes, with Jan the worse off, relying on his 10 seconds increments to stay in the game. At the end both players had promoted to a queen with advantage to Jan, who still had one pawn left with his king in front of it ready to help it promote! Fergus offered the draw, but Jan knocked it back. Somehow Fergus managed to avoid the queen swap, check Jan’s king a lot so it could not give room for his pawn to move and also force Jan to less than 20 seconds on his clock. In the end Jan was forced due to time to accept the draw! What an epic ending by both players, with Fergus defending like a man possessed!
Castlehill B 1½ – 2½ St.Andrews Uni A
Congratulations to St.Andrews Uni A on a very good win, one that could have been better, but a win is a win and could prove vital in the title race.
For all the TAFCA results and standings, visit the TAFCA website (link below). For all Castlehill competitions, checkout our website!