English Chess Forum

I know the England teams on the top tables in the Open for Round 1 (Blackthorne and Sharks) were massively outrated, and it was 12 non-GMs against 12 GMs, but it was still a bit of a shock to open the Lichess broadcast and see a 12-0 wipeout. :shock: Things going a bit better for England players in...

Board pairings for round 1 Open and Women How are the teams representing ENG selected? They are drawn from 4NCL squads, but there's a couple of second division teams in there. At one time I thought teams had to finish in the top half of the top division to "qualify for Europe". I believe they chang...

Bo. 84 Breidablik Chess Club B-team Rtg - 30 Breidablik Chess Club A-team Rtg 0 : 0 30/1 Briem, Stephan (w) 2154 - GM Stefansson, Vignir Vatnar (b) 2534 30/2 Heidarsson, Arnar Milutin (b) 2104 - IM Heimisson, Hilmir Freyr (w) 2365 30/3 Kolka, David (w) 2043 - FM Johannsson, Birkir Isak (b) 2306 30/4...

Mick Norris wrote: ↑

Fri Oct 02, 2026 10:47 pm

Is the seeding based on the Registration List or last year's placing?

Top 4 are those relegated from Div 3 last season

It looks like the Alphachess' registration list has made them seeded (a bit like 3Cs last season), the others finished just outside promotion

EDIT: I have given up trying to understand the swings in computer evaluation in Lan Yao's game. I have to admit I was always told put your rook behind the pawn when she had the option to play Rg8; thereafter the trick was to give the g pawn up and then stop the white king doing anything diverting i...

For some historical information, when Bradford won the Woodhouse in 2014, breaking the York / Sheffield dominance; these are the key matches that year Bradford 5-3 York 1 Matthias Gantner (c220) 0-1 Richard Palliser (229) 2 Alan Walton (199) 1-0 Paul Townsend (213) 3 Matthew Webb (181) 1-0 Chris Ros...

When will the rules be published? One might conjecture that the demand by a promoted team for a rule change is a reason for the delay. If granted, it could have an impact on team selection for division 1 teams. However, one would be completely wrong. I suspect it is more likely they are deciding wh...

Personally if we go down the selection committee route (like present) it is best to be confidential; players missing out just have to accept the decision Just look at selection for the England football for the World Cup, this was Tuchel's squad and his choices, he technically doesn't need to explain...

With England's second-greatest generation becoming slowly but remorselessly older, less active and weaker, consideration should be given to priority for players who have ambition to make their living through playing chess. If that reduces our expected outcome from 15th to 22nd, then so be it. When ...

Nice perpetual in the main line, but even good players can miss that OTB (edit : even more so with 30 seconds left)

I checked the results from the 2006/2007 season when I reemebered that both Ste Gordon and Stuart Haslinger got GM norms playing for 3Cs; easy to remember since we got relegated and dropped out of the league due to a predominant switch to southern venues at that time (Sunningdale and Wokefield) Step...

Am I the only one who had no idea who Ryan Fox and Ben Curtis are?! Well considering Ryan Fox has been in the top 30 in the world rankings since 2022 feels like you don't really follow golf that much; but Ben Curtis was a total one-off considering he won the Open in his first ever attempt (since To...

Jonathan Rogers wrote: ↑

Sat Aug 08, 2026 3:38 pm

Then a jump until 1993 (Hennigan and Kumaran), also played after the event

From memory this playoff was supposed to be played in Dundee, but supposedly one of them was ill (possibly Kumeran) therefore it was postponed for a few weeks

Thanks, Alan. The calculations make my head hurt (and I need to be at a laptop to do them properly). Any chance you or someone can do this for the WGM norm? I won't ask about GM norms as I suspect that both Waldhausen Gordon and Bazakutsa will not play enough non-ENG players (and I see no sign of a...

Two paragraphs on Bodhana but nothing on norm chances (not really possible to calculate). Hopefully that will be a part of the report for next week! Relatively easy to come up with a rough idea for the IM norm (that's if my maths/calcs are correct) Current performance c2450 Play Freddie at 2455, so...