International Round Up 23/02/10

[LozCooper]

4NCL 20-21 February 2010
www.4ncl.co.uk

Wood Green and Pride and Prejudice consolidated their position at the head of Division 1A and ended the weekend tied on 11 match points and 36 game points! The only real blemish on their weekend were Peter Poobalasingam beating Craig Hanley and Simon Williams defeating Jonathan Rowson, ironically both with black.

Cambridge also qualified for the championship pool courtesy of a 4.5-3.5 victory over Barbican 2 which included a win for Sabrina Chevannes against Natasha Regan on board 8. The remaining place is still wide open with Barbican 2 & The ADs on 5 match points and Oxford on 4.

Barbican and White Rose have both qualified from Division 1B. White Rose won two hard fought matches; 4.5-3.5 against Betsson and 5-3 against Guildford whilst Barbican eased past Poisoned Pawns and Wood Green 2 to head the table. Guildford 1 and Wood Green 2 are on 8 match points and Betsson are on 6 so realistically, a big win is needed for Betsson in round 7 to overtake Wood Green 2 for 4th place.

In Division 2A Barbican Youth, Sambuca Sharks and AMCA Dragons all qualified for the promotion pool whilst White Rose 2 need a big win against Kings Head to take the 4th qualifying place.

In Division 2B Warwickshire Select are the only confirmed qualifiers for the promotion pool. Cheddleton, Celtic Tigers and e2e4.org.uk are all on 8 points whilst Poisoned Pawns 2 are on 7. The round 7 pairings seem to favour Poisoned Pawns 2 though who play Guildford 3 whilst the top four all play each other. One would expect the very strong Cheddleton team to claim one of the promotion places albeit they’ve suffered two surprise defeats already this season. They play Celtic Tigers whilst e2e4.org.uk play Warwickshire Select. It is likely that e2e4.org.uk will need at least a drawn match to progress to the promotion pool.

Division 3 is still wide open. The event is a big 11 round swiss and after six rounds the leaders are 3CS on game points from RHYFELWYR ESSYLLWG on 10 match points whilst Sussex Smart Controls, Warwickshire Select 2, e2e4.org.uk 2 and KJCA Kings are all on 9 match points. The top four are promoted.

World Blitz Championship-Preliminaries, Moscow, February 18, 2010
http://www.aeroflotchess.com/blitz/2010 ... laces.html

Luke McShane played in this incredibly strong event that featured 106 GMs and finished 40th= with 10/18, the highlight being a 2-0 victory against GM Ivan Cheparinov in round 8. Players played 9 rounds with each round comprising 2 games, 1 with white and one with black, against the same opponent. The time limit was 3 minutes each + a 2 second increment. Sadly Luke lost GM Evgeny Bareev 2-0 in the final round.
The overall winner was French GM Maxime Vachier-Lagrave who defeated Russian GM Dmitry Jakovenko 2-0 in the last round to finish on 13.5/18 just half a point clear of 7 players!

Cappelle La Grande International Chess Open
http://www.cappelle-chess.fr/en2/default.php

The English challenge was led by GM Mark Hebden and comprised of IM Andrew Whiteley, Philip Tozer, Gerald Parfett and juniors Sam Franklin, George O'Toole, Joe Quinn, Ravi Haria and Isaac Sanders.

Final scores from the English players were as follows:

GM Mark Hebden 6/9 with a 2563 performance
George O’Toole 5/9 with a 2249 performance
IM Andrew Whiteley 5/9 with a 2205 performance
Samuel Franklin 5/9 with a 2140 performance
Philip Tozer 4.5/9 with a 2032 performance
Isaac Sanders 4.5/9 with a 2114 performance
Jo Quinn 4/9 with a 1830 performance
Ravi Haria 4/9 with a 1973 performance
Gerald Parfett 3/9 with a 1610 performance

32nd Marchand Open USA February 20 & 21, 2010
http://www.uschess.org/msa/XtblMain.php?201002211281.1

Kanwal Bhatia played in the FIDE rated open and scored 3.5/5 defeating FM Igor Nikolayev rated 2310 in round 4 before losing to Ben Dean-Kawamura rated 2382 in round 5. She won the U2200 rating prize. Peter Levermore also played and scored 2 points.
In addition to the individual websites the latest international chess news can be found at the following link:
http://www.chesscenter.com/twic/twic798.html

Lawrence Cooper
Director of International Chess
English Chess Federation 23/02/10

[Richard James]

Hi Loz

Many thanks for keeping us up to date on this.

I'm surprised that the participation of two England teams in the European Senior Team Chess Championships in Dresden, which finished last week, does not seem to have been mentioned either in your round-up or on the ECF website.

http://www.schachfestival.de/www_festiv ... 154f5a.php

[Leonard Barden]

I'm surprised that the participation of two England teams in the European Senior Team Chess Championships in Dresden, which finished last week, does not seem to have been mentioned either in your round-up or on the ECF website.

http://www.schachfestival.de/www_festiv ... 154f5a.php

Perhaps because our teams finished adrift of Scotland?

[Jonathan Rogers]

Actually Craig (Pritchett) just emailed me about his own good result (2390 performance) and managed to say nothing about any English teams! I had thought, before visiting this forum, that perhaps we hadn't sent any, what with two of our likely representatives having played instead in the 4NCL for Barbican Youth (don't, please don't .... )

[LozCooper]

Hi Loz

Many thanks for keeping us up to date on this.

I'm surprised that the participation of two England teams in the European Senior Team Chess Championships in Dresden, which finished last week, does not seem to have been mentioned either in your round-up or on the ECF website.

http://www.schachfestival.de/www_festiv ... 154f5a.php

That's probably because no one sent us the link or any covering information! Now I have it I will be able to report on it next week though, many thanks.

[LozCooper]

Hi Loz

Many thanks for keeping us up to date on this.

I'm surprised that the participation of two England teams in the European Senior Team Chess Championships in Dresden, which finished last week, does not seem to have been mentioned either in your round-up or on the ECF website.

http://www.schachfestival.de/www_festiv ... 154f5a.php

That's probably because no one sent us the link or any covering information! Now I have it I will be able to report on it next week though, many thanks.

Better still, I've added it now, rather than have it take second place to the new FIDE ratings next week. Thanks for pointing it out. If you find any other events I've missed or you feel should be included please let me know.