attached is the result of our recent 1st team match.

Bogdan played an exemplary game where, despite no obvious mistake by his opponent, his advantage increased incrementally throughout the game. Francis had a double edged position but outplayed his opponent to pick up a piece. John stood much better and avoided his opponents counter-play to record the win. My opponent overlooked that in his intended line of play I could deliver a back rank mate so instead had to go into a lost R + P endgame. Jim had a fluctuating game and eventually entered an opposite coloured bishop ending a pawn down. However he outplayed his opponent so that in the final position he was actually a pawn up despite it still being drawn. So a good win in a match were we were obviously the favourites although, as we know from past experience, they still need to be won.

Our next match is at home against Eastbourne 1 on Thursday 21st February.

I was trying to arrange our postponed match against Horsham 1 for Tuesday 26th February but it has now been agreed that the match will take place on Tuesday 9th April … a shame as we had our best team available for the 26th.

Finally, to let you all know that I have not been feeling at my best lately and a result will not be playing again after tomorrow’s 2nd team match except to honour my club championship commitments. Marc has very kindly agreed to take over the 1st team captaincy on top of his numerous other duties.

Division 1 Results