Sheffield Woodseats Chess Club

This weekend the A team went on tour!  First stop was Rotherham (more particularly Rotherham Juniors).  We avoided Rotherham's opening gambits.  The team was practically up to full strength, bearing in mind it was a Friday night, and we managed to get everybody there more or less on time.  Nobody got lost.  
John Fletcher was the first out of the blocks, with a very quick win with his beloved Backmar-Diemer Gambit.  How many games has he won with it?  Alan Coupe, his victim, obviously doesn't frequent Youtube enough: see this  http://youtu.be/srGcegnDqz0.  Shane soon followed with a good win against a young dangerous opponent.  He told me that the opening played was the result of deep, Bulgarian analysis!  Paul Blackman brought out the antique and raely seen Evans' Gambit against John Trafford.  John remained calm as always, worked it out over the board and a draw was agreed when the play was balanced.
I was playing an opponent who had a cold and who, as far as I could see, wanted a draw.  I got to a position in which he had an isolated Queen's pawn but I didn't have enough pieces left to exploit it.  At least that's my story!
Everything seemed very comfortable at this stage.  George Harriott, playing very well against Claes Hackner had an overwhelming position and seemed to be winning comfortably.  However it was here that the Friday Night Gambit finally kicked in.  George was obviously tired, made a mistake and his Queen was gone.  George resigned soon after in his usual gentlemanly fashion.  I think if he had played on, he would have still given his opponent a scare!
Roundabout this time, Chern won a fine attacking game.  He had played aggressively, in something that ressembled the anti-Moscow Gambit.   Eventually he won on time in a good position and there were a lot of Woodseats thought waves floating around the room, willing him to look at his opponent's clock!  
So it was down to Paul and Andrew on boards 1 and 2.  Paul was playing one of the raising stars of Sheffield Chess, Oskar Hackner.  See Oskar's recent, spectacular win on the Sheffield Asssociation website: http://www.sheffieldanddistrictchess.org.uk/.   Much to his credit, Paul attacked vigorously.  However in the process, he dropped a pawn and then the exchange.  Oskar didn't let him off the hook.  On Board One, Andrew was playing Peter Shaw.  The opening was a semi-slav and according to Andrew in the car on the way back home, he didn't play it quite right.  Well, it looked OK from where we were standing and towards the end of the game his opponent seemed a bit like a rabbit in the headlights.  I think a lot of Andrew's opponents have that feeling.  
Then it was on to Worksop on Monday.  The team was different but still strong.  Allan was on board one against Jonathan Tait and Mark Allison and Bill were welcome additions.  Cunningly, Worksop had changed venue but we found them in the end and play eventually commenced.  My opponent was very worried that the lighting on our board wasn't good enough.  Was he pretending to be Bobby Fischer?

I said to Bill, just before George finally caved in cementing a 6-0 scoreline, that I felt this had been our best performance of the whole cup run.  Even Shane who was a piece down quite early made them battle while Bob, George and I had very competitive positions which, for one biref moment at about 9 O'clock may have been slightly superior.  Dan and Bill put up fantastic defensive shows which could have drawn against anyone slightly weaker and for a few minutes it seemed just possible that....

But no, I dont know if Chesterfield made a single blunder between them all night.  We didn't make many.  I made one (rather a big one as you will see),

Shane must have, but on the other boards we were ground down slowly or by the clock.

Great effort all - I enjoyed it all the way to the end.

Jon

We had a meeting of the Woodseats 'Cobra' on the morning of New Year's Eve.  It took place in Bill's front parlour.  Present were Bill, Shane Frith, Peter Hulse and at least one of Bill's cats.  There were apologies for absence from Andy Lee and Jon Sparkes.  Everybody else was absent.  Bill proposed several items and the following is the basis of what was said about them:
Finances:  we've spent all of our money on sets and clocks and various items of equipment, so any match fees that are owed need to go to Andy perhaps a little sooner than usual.  Spontaneous payment of fees on match nights would be appreciated.  It's currently £1 for both home and away matches.
Equipment and Club library:  Shane generously agreed to be our Librarian and eqipment secretary.  I'm sure that he would appreciate any help that anyone might offer.  We hope to publish a list of the books that we possess fairly soon.  The library is worth investigation.  There are volumes dating back to the time when Raymond Keene wrote good books! (hope I don't get sued for that!)
Competitions:   We hoped that more non-league matches competitions might be organised.  Knockouts?  Time-handicapped competitions?  The idea would be to involve members not playing a match on club nights.
Website: Contributions are always welcome.  In fact this item has already born fruit!  Shane has posted one of his chess.com games with Chern.  He needs people to follow in his footsteps.  Be brave!  It's not hard.
B Team:   The B team are currently in the Second Division and fighting bravely.  We felt sure that Stan would appreciate offers from strong players able to play for the team.  So if you are eligible, please don't be shy!  We need you!  Mick Joyce are you reading this?

Any other business:  Nothing in particular apart from, it was discovered that Peter Hulse thought Stan Cooke and Dave Cook were brothers, in spite of the fact that they spell their names differently.  He was subjected to much derision by Bill.  Please leave a comment at the end of the article.

Peter Hulse