27 October 2014 - Central League Division 2

Stirling B v Grangemouth B
John Blake Tony Pitson Dave Hewitt Martyn Roe Gordon Allcock	1573 1536 1442 1440 1416	1 - 0 1 - 0 0 - 1 1 - 0 1 - 0	1511 1473 1352 1047 862	Bill Gray Hugh Hanlon Crawford Welsh Hutch Williams David Fowler
		4 - 1

22 October 2014 - Central League Division 2

Grangemouth B v Stirling C
Bill Gray Hugh Hanlon Crawford Welsh Ross Heenan Keith Kleinman	1511 1473 1352 1245	0 - 1 1 - 0 0 - 1 ½ - ½ ½ - ½	1416 1262 1245 1236 1199	Gordon Allcock Craig Manson Robert Togneri David Brodie Mick Bloor
		2 - 3

20 October 2014 - Central League Division 1

Stirling A v Grangemouth A
Shivan Murdochy   Jim Shemilt   Steve Smith   Graham Anderson   Robin Hayles	1907   1787   1782   1727   1584	½ - ½   0 - 1   1 - 0   1 - 0   ½ - ½	1954   1511   1473   1352   1245	Dougie Will   Bill Gray   Hugh Hanlon   Crawford Welsh   Ross Heenan
		3 - 2

My game, presented below, was first to finish. It's been a long time since I faced 1 f4. Next to finish was Jim resigning against Bill while two pieces down. Steve then defeated Hugh, with two passed a and d pawns proving too much to stop. The last two games had Robin a pawn up in 3P v 2P ending which Ross defended well, while on board 1 Shivan had a bishop for two pawns. Both matches agreed draws within seconds of each other, to give Stirling a rare win against Grangemouth.

Welsh - Anderson

13 October 2014 - Richardson Cup

Thanks to John Blake for providing the game below. This was a qualifier for the Richardson Cup (club championship) between John Blake (White) and Bill Cook. While Stockfish analyses the final position as a draw, unfortunately John lost on time.

Blake - Cook

6 October 2014 - Club Allegro

Dave Hewitt writes: The autumn allegro on Monday evening was well attended, with 16 players including the two juniors Andrew and Ewan - they both had to leave before the end but it was good to see them getting involved. Given that various regulars were absent there could well be scope for an event with 20 players in due course, and it's good to see the club busy.

For a while it looked as if Shivan was going to stroll to 5/5 (he beat me in a long game and then saw off Neil in nine moves en route to 3/3), but Robin uncorked a Q sac against him in r4 and was suddenly on 100% himself. The last round saw Robin lose to Neil and Shivan beat Graham, so it finished as a three-way tie between Neil (who was also joint-winner last time), Shivan (making his debut in the event) and Robin, who had somehow contrived never to win any of the 18 previous allegros. Tony finished fourth with 3.5/5, while Robert T played well and made an excellent start - a draw with Graham and a win against Steve - before finishing on 2/5. Craig had his best result thus far, 3/5, including a curious r3 encounter with Gordon where both players ended up with not much time but Gordon had been the beneficiary of a two-minute bonus for an illegal move earlier, except that this had been remembered rather than actually added (don't tell anyone at FIDE, otherwise we'll be banned). At least with Craig's flag being the one to fall this meant that there wasn't any need to solve the puzzle of what to do if the person with spare unadded time actually ran out of the regular stuff first. (Problems relating to digital clocks, no.263...)

Time control: 15 minutes each for all moves

	Name	Grade	Rd 1	Rd 2	Rd 3	Rd 4	Rd 5	Place
1   2   3   4   5   6   7   8   9   10   11   12   13   14   15   16	Shivan Murdochy   Graham Anderson   Neil Irving   Steve Smith   Robin Hayles   Dave Hewitt   Tony Pitson   Gordon Allcock   David Brodie   Robert Togneri   Mick Bloor   Craig Manson   Paulo Ferreira   David Little   Andrew Richardson   Ewan Lennox	1907   1610   1603   1583   1522   1502   1425   1376   1332   1197   1189   1134   u/g   u/g   u/g   u/g	1 W 9   ½ B 10   1 W 11   0 B 12   1 W 13   1 B 14   1 W 15   1 B 16   0 B 1   ½ W 2   0 B 3   1 W 4   0 B 5   0 W 6   0 B 7   0 W 8	2 B 6   1½ W 12   2 B 7   0 W 10   2 B 8   1 W 1   1 W 3   1 W 5   1 W 14   1½ B 4   1 W 15   1 B 2   1 W 16   0 B 9   0 B 11   0 B 13	3 W 3   1½ B 5   2 B 1   1 bye   3 W 2   2 B 10   2 B 11   2 B 12   2 B 13   1½ W 6   1 W 7   1 W 8   1 W 9   1 B 15   0 W 13   -	3 B 5   2½ W 11   3 W 8   2 W 13   4 W 1   2½ W 7   2½ B 6   2 B 3   2½ W 10   2 B 9   1 B 2   2 B 14   1 B 4   1 W 12   1 bye   -	4 W 2   2½ B 1   4 W 5   3 B 11   4 B 3   3 B 8   3½ W 9   2½ W 6   2½ B 7   2 W 12   1 W 4   3 B 10   1 W 14   2 B 13   -   -	=1   =8   =1   =5   =1   =5   4   =8   =8   =11   =13   =5   =13   =11   =13   16

Thanks to Neil for providing his third round match against Shivan below, with analysis.

Murdochy - Irving

29 September 2014 - Thornton Cup

After much negotiation over the summer, we managed to complete our first Portuguese signing, from CC Porto, of Paolo Ferreira. Unfortunately he arrived injured, and was unable to make his competitive debut until last Monday night. He faced, as White, Craig Manson in the Thornton Cup.

Ferreira - Manson