Bacchus: Southbourne 2 – 2 Poole

With various GPS tools, a group of us managed to find a destination far to the east, the prevalence of chess boards indicating their was a good chance it was the right place.

The place was filled with budding young…what’s the term for a young chess students? Aspirants? Saplings? They filed out as we arrived. I don’t know which of us triggered the exodus, I’m guessing it was the combined Reservoir Dogs strut that was walked in with. But the buzz was a sure sign that Southbourne are doing good things to further junior chess.

Harry had joined us to lead the way and show us how it should be done. He had a strong attack with the white pieces with his opponent castled and a pawn attacking the advanced g6 pawn on h5. This had some good tension with a lot of good attacking ideas down the diagonal, unfortunately the black pieces had a queen patrolling that diagonal and also a pawn all the way down on f2 having a pleasant chat with the opposing king on f1. We thought the position had fizzled out for white after he pushed the white pawn to h6, but black stepped away from the diagonal for one moment and the queen was ready to pop in on f6 and an unavoidable checkmate on g7.

A nice game to start with strong attacking options on both sides but the win to Poole.

Sev was playing with the black pieces on board 4. He tried to create a defensive structure but his opponent wasn’t going to be waiting and fired forward with e4, f4 for his first 2 moves and kept at that speed. With his position getting cramped a combination was done in the wrong order left a nasty fork (and not a pre/post game meal deal type of fork – that was a different player!). With a bishop down his opponent was able to keep control, limit opportunities and exchange down to a victory. 1-1.

Dragos was playing on board 3, and in a nod to Harry’s position, his opponent with the black pieces was castled king side with the g pawn pushed one. This time it was the attacking f pawn that was having a stand off with the g6 pawn. His opponent could take with the g pawn and undermine his kings protection, or take with the queen. However, Dragos has a knight sitting there waiting to jump to h6 forking the king and any queen foolish enough to take the attacking pawn! Again the long diagonal played a large part, but it was Dragos that controlled it and was able to create a strong attack and get a material advantage. A secure performance from then to secure the win.

Angus was taking the position of last game to finish, full of drama with 9 people gathered round watching. In the middle game I believe Angus lost the exchange but came out with pawn power. But in the endgame his opponent took away his phone rooks only protection and lost it for nowt. This left Angus a full bishop up. With the queens swapped off he managed to take control with the lone king powerless to stop pawns on opposite sides of the boards from promoting. Unfortunately the Bacchus is the only division with a guillotine finish and 1 second wasn’t long enough to find the checkmate.

A dramatic finish that gives a fair 2-2 draw.

Well done all, some fantastic, and a good advertisement for the benefits of increments!

Tarik
March 11, 2023