London League Mega Clash

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John Hodgson
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Re: London League Mega Clash

Post by John Hodgson » Wed May 14, 2014 10:53 pm

J T Melsom wrote: I think that if I ran a London league club with a reasonably strong team that had grown 'organically' and then found we were always only aiming for second place each year I'd get bored, however often I got to play a GM.
It may be boring to be competing for second or third place every year, but the real excitement - in my opinion - in the London League 1st division is not the Drunken Knights v Wood Green match, but the fight to avoid relegation. Ilford, who I captain, is one of the weaker teams, but we've managed to stay up in all but one of the last ten years.

Being relegated is quite a blow for most individuals in the team (those who want to play equal or stronger opposition that is) as there is a significant drop in playing strength between the two divisions (when Ilford went down we easily won all 11 matches in division 2).

Last year the relegation battle was very competitive and was not decided until the final match (Ilford's player saved a very bad adjourned position against Streatham, who went down instead). This year it seems two relatively weak teams will go down. Next year it will be much harder to stay up as the promoted teams will be stronger than the relegated ones.

The advantage of playing for a 'weak' 1st division club is that you do normally play against higher-graded opposition ... always looking for new players to join us!

Finally, Nevil Chan has always behaved perfectly as a captain and I certainly believe what he posted above.

AustinElliott
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Re: London League Mega Clash

Post by AustinElliott » Wed May 14, 2014 11:46 pm

Seems self-evident to me that pretty much all team captains in an inter-club clash would do exactly what Nevil Chan said, and try and work out how to give everybody a game. The point of amateur (or mainly amateur) chess leagues, after all, is presumably for the maximum number of chess players actually to play chess.

Oop 'ere in Manchester, a bigger bugbear this season seems to have been complete match defaults when a club can't raise a team for a fixture. There have been several of these across different Divisions, even with teams only being seven players, or five in the lower two Divisions. Since they go on the system as 7-0 or 5-0 such defaults also make a major difference to 'goal difference' game points. I blame the weather.

Roger de Coverly
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Re: London League Mega Clash

Post by Roger de Coverly » Thu May 15, 2014 12:06 am

AustinElliott wrote: Since they go on the system as 7-0 or 5-0 such defaults also make a major difference to 'goal difference' game points. I blame the weather.
Some leagues, the SCCU county championships being a case in point, will handle tie-breaks by the matches between individual teams.

The Berks League has a clause that permits short notice no fault postponements. This was invoked once a few years back by the Met Office, when they had a team, on the grounds that it was snowing. Who could argue? This season a match between Maidenhead teams and Eton College was allowed to be postponed as the Thames had flooded various areas around Eton and would also possibly restrict the Maidenhead players ability to travel.

With one player the wrong side of the Thames, as Bourne End match captain I also needed to take emergency action for several matches to ensure a full team.

Nevil Chan
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Re: London League Mega Clash

Post by Nevil Chan » Thu May 15, 2014 5:35 am

Jonathan Bryant wrote: If you say this wasn’t done deliberately for DK3’s benefit I’m happy to accept that.
Draw agreed!

Incidentally, if there were inner workings designed to help DK3 avoid relegation then DK1 clearly didn't understand. :mrgreen:

http://www.londonchess.org.uk/match_car ... n=20122013
"Some people are good enough at chess to take it seriously; you are not one of them."

Graham Borrowdale

Re: London League Mega Clash

Post by Graham Borrowdale » Thu May 15, 2014 1:13 pm

Roger de Coverly wrote: With one player the wrong side of the Thames, as Bourne End match captain I also needed to take emergency action for several matches to ensure a full team.
Did you walk on water Roger?

Martin Crichton
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Re: London League Mega Clash

Post by Martin Crichton » Thu May 15, 2014 2:22 pm

Yes agree it's a case of Brian Smith buying the titles every year :) but fair dues to the guy... It is always a good thing having strong players playing in the league

by the way Brian if you are reading.... apologies for 2007 where we (Cavendish) registered a few strong players Kelly, Watson and Daly from memory that didn't actually play that year....:)

Kelly emigrated to HK, Daly only made 2 appearances in 2006...

but then again as league secretary you had privilaged info and were aware of all the other teams players so not too much sympathy that you forked out an unneccessary £5k to field a Woodgreen superteam against Cavendish in 2007 when our team average was about 175 lol (I think a few players were sick)... What was the final score? 11.5 - 0.5? ;)
Member of "the strongest amateur chess club in London" (Cavendish)

my views are not representative of any clubs or organisations.

Angus French
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Re: London League Mega Clash

Post by Angus French » Thu May 15, 2014 2:52 pm

Martin Crichton wrote:... forked out an unneccessary £5k to field a Woodgreen superteam against Cavendish in 2007...
Maybe £1K? I'm guessing £100 for a GM.
I don't mind the free chess lessons and have been pleased to score draws against two WG IMs.

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Christopher Kreuzer
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Re: London League Mega Clash

Post by Christopher Kreuzer » Mon Jun 09, 2014 10:38 pm

Final score tonight was 8-4 to Wood Green. Drunken Knights pulled it back to one down near the end, but then lost three in quick succession at the end. An exciting game on board 2 between Simon Williams and Nick Pert. Hopefully that will be published at some stage. Black had two pieces and four pawns for a queen.

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John Upham
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Re: London League Mega Clash

Post by John Upham » Tue Jun 10, 2014 9:36 am

Here is the match card:

http://www.londonchess.org.uk/match_car ... n=20132014

Photographs to follow... :D
British Chess News : britishchessnews.com
Twitter: @BritishChess
Facebook: facebook.com/groups/britishchess :D

Jonathan Rogers
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Re: London League Mega Clash

Post by Jonathan Rogers » Tue Jun 10, 2014 10:21 am

Karl Mah on board nine! Drunken Knights certainly made an effort :o

Chris Rice
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Re: London League Mega Clash

Post by Chris Rice » Tue Jun 10, 2014 10:27 am

John Upham wrote:Here is the match card:

http://www.londonchess.org.uk/match_car ... n=20132014

Photographs to follow... :D
Neville's report follows where you can feel the frustration:

The 9 dart check-out is a rare sporting achievement, often compared with snooker’s 147 maximum break. http://tinyurl.com/DK-darts

Last night, Wood Green produced an impressive 12 board cheque-out at Plough to win the London League championship for a twelfth consecutive season. Their 8-4 victory over DK1 was facilitated by captain Brian Smith enlisting the services of eight GMs. Knights line-up, which included one GM on beer retainer, was the highest rated in the club’s 44 year history.

The match went to the wire; DK trailed 1-2 going into final 30 minutes, after Eddie had held the current British champion on top board and John M had drawn with a former British champion on bottom board (!) Wood Green however proved just too strong on the knight, and pulled away with 4 wins in the quickplay stage; John R provided a consolation DK win.

Thus ends another season, with the hire team still the higher team. Drunken Knights finish runners-up for the fifth time, a position that might not change whilst Brian is in the black.




http://tinyurl.com/DK1-WoodGreen
http://tinyurl.com/LCL-Div1-2013-14

Simon Williams
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Re: London League Mega Clash

Post by Simon Williams » Tue Jun 10, 2014 3:28 pm

Last night was great fun. A pity about the result, but we put up a fight against our much higher rated opposition.

The combination of beer and chess can have some quite surprising results, as my game against Nick Pert clearly demonstrated...

There is a video and pgn of my game on my website here - http://www.gingergm.com. I also have a You Tube channel where I take a look at a number of my games, in case your interested - [email protected]. Not sure how to paste the game up here, but if anyone can, feel free. :D

I would like to thank Nevil Chan for being such a great team manager. Nevil has that great combination as a person of, 'getting things done', whilst retaining the ability of being someone whom you want to share a drink with after 'things have been done!'

Roger de Coverly
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Re: London League Mega Clash

Post by Roger de Coverly » Tue Jun 10, 2014 3:37 pm

Simon's game as per the pgn file on his website


Andrew Martin
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Re: London League Mega Clash

Post by Andrew Martin » Tue Jun 10, 2014 5:56 pm

I have to say that is one of the most incredible games I have ever seen!

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Christopher Kreuzer
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Re: London League Mega Clash

Post by Christopher Kreuzer » Tue Jun 10, 2014 5:58 pm

The tactic right at the end on move 55 that Black missed is nice. Converting to a position where Black has a piece and five(!) pawns for the queen and is presumably totally winning. The check that was played instead turned out to be a red herring. I liked how the pawn on e4 manages to save the day and play a crucial role in the perpetual that ended the game. I was convinced for most of the game that Black was winning - the fun bit was watching various passing IMs and GMs looking at the position and seeing them look a bit befuddled as they tried to work out what was going on...