Stirling chess club – and the Central Scotland Chess League – lost its longest-serving member with the death on 25 January 2020 of Robert Togneri, aged 81. Both club and league have many pleasant people among their memberships, but no one was more liked, over the half-century-plus of his involvement, than Robert. He was the most thoughtful, committed and diligent member any club could wish to have – and it helped that he was a very handy player, too.
His first appearance in a league match for Stirling appears to have been a draw against J M Allan of Dunfermline on 1 April 1964, and his first win – likewise against Dunfermline, R Roxburgh this time – came on 18 November that same year. Robert also played (and won) for Stirling C earlier this season, so he appeared in 57 of the league’s 62 seasons to date, an unrivalled achievement.
During his time at the Stirling club, Robert served in a variety of roles: secretary, assistant secretary, treasurer, league secretary, first-team regular and then long-time captain of the Stirling B team. He also captained the under-1500 team during the early years of the period when it won that particular trophy nine times in 11 seasons, and was a member of the Stirling team that won the Spens Cup in 1967-68, recording a draw on board seven in the 5-2 final win against Benarty.
Robert was never club champion, as his best playing years coincided with the club having greater top-end strength than it does today, but he was runner-up at least twice, in 1967-68 and 1968-69 (behind Rainer Bartsch and Maxwell Thornton respectively), and he won the Lindsay Cup – the reserve section of the championship – three times, in 1964-65, 1983-84 and 1993-94. Robert also won the Keddie Cup – when it was played as a traditional knockout rather than the handicap tournament of modern times – in 1970-71, and he was runner-up in the club lightning tournament (what would now be called blitz) in 1970-71 and 1971-72. The club used to have something called a matchplay champion – which appears to have been determined by a season-long cumulative tally of overall results – and Robert was runner-up in this three times in a row: 1965-66, 1966-67 and 1967-68. His prowess at fast chess remained into his senior years, and as late as November 2007 he was joint-winner of the twice-yearly club allegro tournament – the five-round Swiss which from 2015 was happily played for the Robert Togneri Trophy, instituted to mark his half-century of involvement with the club.
Almost certainly, however, Robert’s finest tournament achievement was winning the Scottish Open, with a score of 5½/7 (and an extraordinary final-round stalemate to clinch the title – see below) in Dundee in 1967, and he went on to play in the main Scottish championship in the summers of 1968 (Ayr) and 1969 (Glasgow). In those days the Scottish was a closed event, and this gives some indication of Robert’s strength during that time. Grading lists dating back to 1981 show a highest grade of 1715 in 1989-90, and a steady presence in the 1600s during the earlier years of that decade. This in itself represents a very respectable standard of play, but it’s reasonable to assume Robert was quite a bit stronger than that in the pre-grading days, particularly from the mid-1960s to the mid-1970s.
He had a sound and quietly effective technique, with a notable ability in the endgame – for many years he was regarded as the best endgame player at the club, and stories abound of his turning lost endgames into draws and drawn ones into wins. The present writer can recall embarking on a double-knights with pawns endgame against Robert that initially seemed a near-trivial win but gradually became a desperate struggle for survival, with considerable relief when a draw was eventually achieved. Dougie Will of Grangemouth similarly notes that “sometime, possibly in the late 1990s, I went into a rook and pawns endgame against Robert two pawns up, and despite being 400 points higher graded lost dismally…”. There were countless such pieces of endgame magic, and Robert retained this ability well into old age. He was often to be seen studying endgame positions alone in a corner of the club room (or demonstrating some subtlety to other club members), in much the same way that many players opt to study opening theory.
Robert appeared to have a natural aptitude in endgames, but it’s worth remembering that he grew up in the days when games were regularly adjourned – rather than thrashed out in quickplay finishes – and players would take the unfinished scoresheet home with them, study it over the course of several evenings (no computers in those days), before returning to bring the game to a conclusion a week or so later. It was in adjournment analysis that strong endgame players such as Robert honed their ability, and this was something he brought with him into the more frantic modern era.
Another notable feature of Robert’s play was how rarely he found himself in time trouble. Some people – John Blake is another with this ability at the Stirling club – seem able to play simple but strong chess at a steady rate that sees them keep comfortably on the right side of the clock. Robert for many years was Stirling’s prime exponent of this, as his various fast-chess tournament wins demonstrate. At some point in his final year or so he did actually lose a game on time – and he believed that this was the first time it had ever happened to him.
All this tournament and league detail provides only part of the picture of Robert, however. He would play friendlies with anyone, regardless of strength or age – indeed he was a great encourager of junior chess, and the recent upturn in junior enthusiasm at the club, along with the increase in membership generally, is part of his legacy. He was also a notable welcomer of new people: since his death, several of the current club members have commented that Robert was the first person they played at the Stirling club – but there is nothing surprising about this, because that kind of meet-and-greet, fancy a game? thing was what he did, year after year.
Above all, he was almost always there, a near-permanent benevolent presence at the club. There were occasional absences due to ill-health – a heart bypass at one stage and a partial withdrawal from playing, in league matches at least, for a while after his beloved Marie died in 2012 – but he would be back as soon as he was able, as the chess club, and the game itself, meant so much to him. In terms of his chess longevity – and the Stirling club’s habit of producing such people – it’s worth noting that on his 1964 league debut, Robert played on board four (of five), and sitting alongside him on board three was James Keddie – who became club champion for the sixth and final time that same 1963-64 season, having first won it in 1924-25, so the overlap with Robert covers pretty much 100 years of the club.
There is so much more that could be said about Robert – for instance his unwillingness to raise his voice even when he had a strong opinion, and his being the most neatly turned-out person at the club, with his cardigans, his old-fashioned hat and his umbrella. In his final few months he even started sporting a rather natty beard. He had exemplary manners, would always find time for a chat, and numerous of his friends from this club and beyond have described him as “a gentleman” – which is exactly what he was.
Others, elsewhere, will be able to tell of his family life, his work as a teacher, his religious faith; but in chess terms he was an absolute stalwart who gave hugely to the chess scene in central Scotland over half a century, and he will be missed greatly. Condolences to his family, and to his friends elsewhere.
Robert's last win for the club is presented below.
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