A message from our friends over at Witney Chess Club:
I’m delighted to be able to confirm that the Ninth Witney Congress will take place on 5th and 6th November 2022 at our usual venue Cokethorpe School, Witney OX29 7PU.
You can find all the details you need here: http://www.witneychess.co.uk/9thwitney_information.htm
and the entry form is here: https://form.jotform.com/221761196679367
Well it’s the start of a new season, the (almost) final fixture list is out, and at least two of us (Gareth and I) have already played our first competitive game, for the county away at Buckinghamshire last weekend. And it’s reflected at the club which has been very busy since the return from the summer break; yesterday evening saw almost 20 people playing. In fact we were so busy Steve was pondering which second room we should commandeer, our usual venue being so packed.
It was a mixture of club tournament games and more casual ones. In the Player’s Cup, for members of the first team squad, Nigel played Liam and I (Ian) played Gareth. In both white won, though in both games it wasn’t easy. Against Nigel Liam established early on a queen side majority with pawns on a6, b5 and c4 against a2 and b2, but could never quite get them rolling and eventually succumbed to Nigel’s king side attack. My win was a much longer grind, I won a pawn in the middle game and simplified to an ending where we both had a rook and bishop, and I thought I had good winning chances, but had underestimated Gareth’s idea of swapping off rooks to leave a drawn opposite coloured bishop position. Anyway Nigel’s win all but guarantees him the Player’s Cup this year, he is mathematically catchable but even if one of us does on any sensible tiebreak he will win. Here is the top of the table which you can find on the ECF LMS web site:
The Bill Laar Trophy, locally known as the BLT, is for all other members of the club. Unlike the Player’s cup this year it is incredibly tight with maybe half a dozen players in with a chance of winning it, and Jeff beating Andrey, one of the 4 matches last night, has made it even closer. In fact it was a good night for the Bryant family with Otto getting his first win in the competition against Allan, a great result. In the other games Steven beat Pedro to go top, and the defending holder Robin beat Richard to go into a tie for second. Anyway the top of the table, again from the ECF LMS, now looks like
All incredibly close, I can’t call it!
But it wasn’t just cup matches, casual games were going on – and the game of the evening was between two promising new comers, Alex and Rio. Unfortunately I don’t have the score, but whenever I went over to have a look Alex was throwing the kitchen sink at Rio, who was calmly holding on and just grabbing the material Alex offered despite the attack looking very dangerous. I don’t even know the final result! I was tied down in time pressure in my game against Gareth. Anybody? In the comments maybe?
So busy and interesting times at the club with a lot of fun chess being played. All welcome!
The Fixture List for the 2022-23 has been released!
Cumnor 1 will again be playing in the First Division (being in the division since the 2019 season) and will start with an Away match against the newly promoted Oxford University 2 team on Thursday 27th October before playing the Oxford University 1 team Away on the following Monday.
Cumnor 2 will be playing in the Third Division (which is again the bottom division) and will start in two weeks with a Home match against Wantage 2 on Thursday the 13th October. The fixtures are very much subject to change so keep an eye out just in case.
All the information for all the clubs can be found on the Oxfordshire Chess League website which can be found here.
The fixtures can be found here.
Since we opened up after our Summer Break we have seen an influx of new members which is great to see. The new season will be starting in about a months time so there has never been a better time to join the club.
New members of any ability are always welcome to join the Club. We offer a stimulating evening in a friendly atmosphere, with the opportunity to learn from some highly experienced players.
We are open from 7pm every Thursday until Christmas.
More information can be found on our New Member Page.
The first county match of the season is away at Buckinghamshire on Saturday 24 September at 2pm.
Could all of you who are interested in playing please get back to me and let Nigel know ASAP?
The other dates for your diary (subject to change) are:
Hants – Oxon 29 October 22
Oxon – Berks 3 December 22
Oxon – Bucks 21 January 23
Oxon – Hants 18 February 23
Berks – Oxon 4 March 23
Matches start at 2pm and last 4 hours as you get 2 hours on the clock each.
If you know anyone who may be interested and you think I may not know about, please forward this message to them.
Best wishes
Nigel
Nigel Moyse, acting Oxon Captain
We’re up and running again from this Thursday (1st September).
Please take advantage of the few remaining weeks that we have left before the OCA 22/23 league commences at the end of September, early October. Once the season starts you will find there are fewer Thursdays available to play any outstanding in-house matches that you may have for the remainder of the year.
The last club night for matches to be played in The Players Cup and The Bill Laar Trophy, will be on Thursday 15th December.
The club will close for the last two weeks in December after this date.
Current positions:
1. Nigel, 7 points
2. Mark, 4 points
3. Ian, 3 points
Bill Laar Trophy
1. Callum, 8 points
2. Robin, 7.5 points
3. Steven J, 7.5 points
In January we shall present trophies for the top three players in both tournaments.
I’ve asked Asif, (OCA fixtures composer/arranger), to make sure we have a free Thursday on either the 19th or 26th January for this to take place.
A reminder that the club will be closed over August, like every year and while we are closed the Cumnor Old School will be decorated.
We will re-open on Thursday 1st September after the August break.
There are still three Thursdays left so a chance to play some cup matches.
Entry is now open to the Oxfordshire Girls Chess Championship at
Blenheim Palace on 2 to 3 August. See link below for online entry form
and further details.
Championship (2 and 3 August)
Eligibility: Any under 18* Oxfordshire girl with ECF Bronze membership
or above.
Prizes: Trophy, title and prizes for winner plus additional age-group
trophies and prizes TBC.
Playing Schedule: Six round Swiss. All moves in 50 minutes plus 10
seconds increment per move.
Round times:
Tue 2 August: 10:30 13:30 16:00
Wed 3 August: 10:00 13:00 15:30 prize giving 18:00
* Date of Birth on or after 1st September 2003
Rapid Play Major (2 August)
Eligibility: Any under 18* Oxfordshire girl with ECF Bronze membership
or above.
Prizes: Trophies plus additional prizes TBC.
Playing Schedule: Six round Swiss. All moves in 15 minutes plus 10
seconds increment per move.
Round times:
10:30 11:30 12:30 13:30 14:30 15:30 Prize Giving 16:30
* Date of Birth on or after 1st September 2003
Cowley Chess club has announced that the regular Cowley Blitz tournament will be held online at Lichess on Monday 4th July. Details are below, and also on the OCA web site :
This year’s Cowley Summer Blitz will be played online on Lichess on Monday 4th July at 7:30 p.m. It will consist of as many blitz games as you want to play between 7:30 and 9:30 p.m. To play, you must have a Lichess account. You must also be a member of the Cowley Blitz Lichess team. If you aren’t already a member, you can visit lichess.org/team/cowley-blitz and click the “Join” meeting. When the admins notice, they can then admit you. Please also email David.W.Robson@gmail.com and tell me the name of your Lichess account, and also your real name, so I know who is playing. Also if you would like to be considered for an age or gender related prize, please send me the details. As there are no admission fees, the awards are for the prestige only. Finally, if you are signed up, all you have to do is to visit the tournament link on the night at lichess.org/tournament/9CJSrxxc
Oxfordshire is blessed at the moment with a rich crop of talented juniors. Many of you will know that two of them, Jan Murawski and Kenneth Hobson, won their respective sections in the British Junior Chess Championships, and Kenneth was in action again recently at the Frome Congress, held at Selwood Academy. He was joined by Dimitrios Zakarian and Alex Hertog, all playing in the highest rated Open section, an excellent illustration of the strength of junior chess in the county at the moment
All had good individual results, Kenneth and Dimitrios both finishing on 3.5/5 and winning grading prizes , and Alex playing well above his rating to finish on 1.5. Further it was proposed that a team to represent Oxfordshire was formed, but more about that later … First all three have been kind enough to send me what they think is their best game, so let’s have a look:
Kenneth chose his second round victory against Allan Pleasants
Kenneth nowadays is a much better player than I, so I’ll leave you with his comments, save to say that as a Pirc/Modern player I agree 8… c6 is not a good decision, 8… c5 screams out to be played, and that the tactics at the end are very pretty; sacrifices on empty squares are often difficult to see, and line closing ideas doubly so.
Dimitirios also provided some analysis for his round 4 game against John Waterfield, and talking of tactics move 27 is a stunner!
Obviously the son has inherited something from the father … The sacrifice leaves white’s minor pieces miserably bottled up in the corner and the lone rook is totally ineffective against Black’s Queen and Knight. The computer confirms it all as sound, one pretty line with distant echoes of Kenneth’s idea above:
Superb stuff! It’s one thing to see these things, but it it takes confidence (of youth?) to play them.
Alex chose his 2nd round draw against George Hollands as his best game. Outrated by around 150 points Alex nevertheless almost grinds out a long positional win in a very mature game:
I’m usually on the white side of these structures, and if I can get a knight into d6 I am normally very happy. However Alex nicely defuses it here, and in the process wins a pawn to go into a Rook + 3 pawn against R + 2 ending. Now to me this looks very difficult to win, but on the plus side there are only 2 possible results; white is in for a long and miserable defence. The key to winning is to somehow eventually get the king in front of the pawns aiming for the Lucena position, while avoiding black’s main drawing possibility, the Philidor position. Easily said, very difficult to achieve here with the white pawns connected and on the same files as Blacks, and a well placed White king. Alex slowly and patiently makes progress but in the end white manages to set up essentially the Philidor drawing method – to be honest I suspect with best play the ending was drawn from the start, but Alex made a fine stab at it.
So three juniors in the Open, all doing pretty well. As a result after round 3 it was suggested that an Oxfordshire team was put together, which required a fourth player. So which shining star of Oxford youth chess could they chose?
Yes, weighing in at over 55 years and more than 50% the age of the other 3 players combined it was me! I was playing in the Major, restricted to players rated under 1950, and was doing pretty well. I ended on 3.5/5, enough for a share of third.
My best game was probably round 1, but that was a Benoni and I’ve shown a lot of them recently. So here is my round 4 effort:
Pretty, but my opponent was the architect of his own (k)nightmare with 15… Qe7. That said I was pleased with getting the tactics around 13 exd6 right (threat dxe7), and Kb1 to kill off counter play is the kind of move I easily miss.
So the weekend resulted in good performances all round, and prizes for 3 of us, not a bad haul at all! So what did that mean for the team? Well … unfortunately it was decided we tried to enter the team too late, so my career as an Oxfordshire Junior was cut cruelly short :( To add insult to injury part of the reason for the rejection was that we were doing too well individually to enter a team that late!
Thus a good weekend for Oxfordshire chess at an enjoyable and well run congress – if you can get to Frome next year I strongly recommend it. I’ve been going since 2018, and I really feel I ought to mention in previous years I went with Ian Brooke, a stalwart of Oxford Chess that we sadly lost earlier this year. I am sure he would be overjoyed to see such young talents doing so well in such a tough competition.
Many thanks to Brendan O’Gorman and Chris Lamming for permission to use their photographs; follow the links for more of their excellent photos of the congress.
