Tag: Sax B

19/01/23

	Bury D		2 – 2	Saxmundham B
1	Daniel Pugh	1616	1/2 – 1/2	Mike Usher	1784
2	Anthony Taylor	1603	1/2 – 1/2	Dominic Carter	1659
3	Amy John	1582	0 – 1	Matthew Lawes-Wickwar	1650
4	Raf Calumpiano	1328	1 – 0	Lee Osmon	1364

A visit to Bury on a chilly winter’s evening saw the B team come away with a rather disappointing 2-2 draw (given our advantage on paper) although those two points were enough to take Sax to the top of the table. Lee had the early bath after messing up a K+P ending, but Matthew made up for this by exploiting his young opponents mistakes before breaking through decisively on the K side, winning material and forcing resignation. Dominic and I drew our games in the face of solid play by our slightly lower-rated opponents.

06/12/22

	Saxmundham B		3 – 1	Bury St Edmunds C
1	Mike Usher	1777	1 – 0	Robert Jones	1692
2	Dominic Carter	1651	1 – 0	Rowan Kent	1590
3	Matthew Lawes-Wickwar	1300	1 – 0	Hugo Smith	1459
4	Lee Osmon	1372	0 – 1	Craig Bradshaw	1442

Sax B continued their winning ways by beating Bury C in a top-of-the-table clash at Benhall last night. Dominic, Matthew and Mike all won in good fashion to make up for Lee’s early loss.

Matthew is having a great run of games at the moment, and won in style. In the diagramed position, playing Black, he found the excellent 31…Ng4! The game finished 33. Rxe2 Rxe2 34. Nh4 Bf6 35. Nxg4 Bxh4 36. Rf2 Bxf2+ 37. Nxf2 Qf3 38. Qf1 Qe3 39. Kg2 Re1 40. Nd1 Qd2+ 0-1

	Felixstowe B		1 – 3	Saxmundham B
1	Gary Hemsworth (B)	1635	0 – 1	Mike Usher	1712
2	David Robertson	1394	0 – 1	Dominic Carter	1653
3	Trevor Wright	1324	1 – 0	Lee Osmon (DEF)	1383
4	John Harvey	1250	0 – 1	Hugo Brown	1317

The B Team continued their winning ways on Tuesday with a 3-1 win at Felixstowe B. The team had the worst of starts when Lee became unwell and had to pull out at the last minute and no replacement could be found, leading to a default on Board 3. However, the rest of the team delivered three wins to take the match comfortably.

Hugo refuted his opponent’s early piece sacrifice and later increased his material advantage to bring home the point. Dominic met the King’s Gambit with the Falkbeer Counter Gambit which appeared to flummox his opponent, who didn’t handle it well, shed a piece, and after much wriggling Dominic closed out a simple win.

Mike had his opponent under sustained pressure from early on, but couldn’t find a decisive continuation. Eventually he managed to turn the pressure into a material advantage, gaining a vital passed a-pawn, and entering an advantageous R+P ending. At this point, just as Mike was knuckling down for a long grind, his opponent overlooked a well-known endgame tactic:

This position is winning for White, but Black blundered the point straight away by playing 43…Kf7?? allowing a well known tactic – 44.Rh8 and Black resigned. If Black takes the pawn then Rh7+ wins the Rook, otherwise White queens the pawn with an easy win. The King must remain on g7/h7 to guard against the tactic, leaving white’s win needing a bit more work.

If instead, Black plays 43…Ra1, intending to shuffle his King between g7/h7, then White needs to play 44.f4! to ensure his King can then be free to wander up the board, whilst Black’s pieces are tied down to preventing the a-pawn fulfilling its destiny. Note that 43.f3? would not achieve the win, as Black can play 43…Ra2+ followed by exf3 and he has a good counter-threat. By playing f4 White avoids this as Black has to take en-passant straight away, with no time for the vital Rook check, and White’s King is again free to roam.