Epic Matches

[Joey Stewart]

With it being april, most leagues and team competitions are entering their final stages, with many teams in a position where they have a lot to play for.

Anyway, it got me thinking, what is the most exciting match you have ever been involved in?
Ideally one without quick draws and leaving it all to rest on the shoulders of one or two players exciting games - I am looking for something more then that, the sort of rare games where there is a lot at stake and every single player is putting in maximum effort for the team, with a close finish.

For me personally, it was back in the days of playing for warwickshire. There are a lot of pretty solid county players around the county so many matches tend to go down to the wire, but this specific match was in the 2010 u 180 county chapionships vs Devon. We were getting absolutely battered in a lot of the games and at one point were 3.5-6.5 down but really dug deep, turning several losses into draws and a few draws into wins to draw the match 8-8 and win the thing on board count, going on to win a pretty closely fought final.

Those are the sort of games that really stay with you - has anybody else got any story of great matches to share?

[IM Jack Rudd]

Pick any one of Somerset's recent national stage matches except the one against Lancashire. They all meet the criterion.

[Matt Mackenzie]

Maybe not quite the same thing, but the Lancaster & District League back in 1984/85 saw Lancaster I and University I finish level on both match and game points after a full match programme - this necessitated a play off which the Uni won 4-3. It doesn't get much closer than that

[Steven DuCharme]

Don't play with matches!

[MartinCarpenter]

Plenty of course, thinking this year Lancs - Yorkshire got incredibly tense towards the end, not many quick draws. Also actually York - Sheffield.

If we're allowed to use epic in the mountaineering sense of the word then the York - Harrogate match on Saturday was scarily close. Playing Harrogate (lurking near the bottom of the league), needing a win to nail the Yorkshire league down. Opposition not awful, and very solid but still ~25 grading pts/board advantage so it really should have been comfortable enough.

But nerves, nerves everywhere. No fast results and horrible time scrambles/out of character play all over the shop. One nasty time scramble leading to a loss against the flow of the game on board 2 to go with a bad loss from someone on 9/9 before this match.

Took Simon Ansell staying sane on 1 to grind out a win to get us to 4, then our board 7 - who was I think winning fairly easily then dumped an exchange - to conjure a very cute mating net with nearly no time left to win a rook, get a draw and win us the match. I've just about recovered

The finish from a match vs Harrogate in 2011 was probably the scariest single match end I've ever seen. That one had the scores on 3.5 - 3.5 and a young Jean Luc Weller blitzing in an initially drawn rook ending with basically no time at all. With not very trustworthy anologue clocks too. Absolutely terrifying to watch, but he won it and we needed it in the end!

[Andrew Zigmond]

Around 2006 Harrogate B played Sheffield D in their last match of the season needing to win at all costs to avoid relegation. They went 3-0 very quickly and then slowly but surely won all five remaining games.

[JustinHorton]

The match I will always remember is the one Streatham and Brixton I lost (4.5-3.5) to Coulsdon II after one of our team lost from rook and four pawns against rook.

[Matt Mackenzie]

Blundered the rook away, or stumbled into a mate?

[MartinCarpenter]

Always the dread clock as an option

Most people would accept a draw when down that far of course, but not everyone is practical enough to offer one first....

[JustinHorton]

Blundered the rook away, or stumbled into a mate?

Skewered. Even then, not losing.