Amusing Pairings

[Neville Belinfante]

Regulars at West Country tournaments were Neat and Tidy.

There was once a game at a junior club between two boys called Deep and George. The scoresheet from one of the players just said Deep Gorge.

[David Sedgwick]

Norman - Conquest at Hastings for one.

Did that actually happen, though?

It certainly occurred in the Isle of Man, but I don't recall it at Hastings.

Is this perhaps an example of what I believe is known as a meme - something which ought to have happened?

[Richard James]

Norman - Conquest at Hastings for one.

Did that actually happen, though?

It certainly occurred in the Isle of Man, but I don't recall it at Hastings.

Is this perhaps an example of what I believe is known as a meme - something which ought to have happened?

I seem to recall Ken Norman told me it did happen - a long time ago. If he reads this he will no doubt confirm or otherwise.

[Ian Kingston]

At Spondon's summer tournament in 2010: Dunne-Kirk.

[Alex Holowczak]

Is this perhaps an example of what I believe is known as a meme - something which ought to have happened?

The modern usage of "meme" is a sort of recurring theme that goes around the Internet.

Probably the most famous such memes are things like:
(1) lolcats - pictures of cats with humourous captions, usually written in lolspeak. The food of choice for a lolcat is a "cheezburger".
(2) Rickrolling - where something is suddenly interupted by a YouTube video of Rick Astley singing "Never Gonna Give You Up". For example, I may be talking about a FIDE rule on this Forum, and then provide a link to what you would think is the FIDE Handbook hidden in some text. Upon clicking it, the unfortunate reader ends up seeing the aforementioned YouTube video. This is alleged to provide much hilarity.

[Chris Fewtrell]

Some years ago I paired a Mr. Sharp (misnomer)against a nameless opponent who withdrew from the event without nofifying anyone. A member of the public wandered in off the street, shook hands with Mr. Sharp and won. It took me a while to sort that one out.

[Alan Burke]

I assume the member of the public was making use of some Sharp practice ?

[Kevin Williamson]

Tonight in the Bedfordshire League:

A.Tinker - A.Taylor

(The colours were actually the other way round, but let's not let that small detail spoil a good pairing).

[Stewart Reuben]

I paired Cannon Ball in the Islington Open when we used to call out the pairings to have them written down by hand. It stopped the work for a couple of minutes. Ray Cannon told me years later that he had never noticed.
We often paired Morphy with Staunton in the 1970s. I am fairly sure it was Howard Morphy. They were about 170 strength.
I have often done the pairing Black v White. It has always been legitimate and was always that way round.

[Nick Thomas]

I noticed that a chap called David Murray from Ireland played in the recent London Chess Classic. I thought it a shame that the Oxford University player Murray David didn't also play for the possible pairing palindromes:

Murray David - David Murray
David Murray - Murray David

Room there for arbiter confusion.

[John Clarke]

I remember there were two players called Century and Fox, both pretty active during the late 60s - but I don't think they'd have played even 20 games in all together, let alone 20 with Century as White ....

[Gavin Strachan]

Alan Parsons was involved at some point -and for those of you who remember Alan!!

If you mean Alan who played for Southend I do, usually enjoyed copious amounts of strong lager. Do you know what happened to him John?

[Gavin Strachan]

are there any examples of first name surnames: David v Day for instance (surname David playing surname Day looks like David van Day) or Richard v James, David v Howell.

[IM Jack Rudd]

I once did the pairing Alan Christopher v Nigel Purry at a tournament where Christopher Purry was playing in another section.

[Malcolm Clarke]

In the Southampton Chess League we had a case of a player surnamed Lamb playing against a player surnamed Wolf.