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

25 September 2014 - Central League Divison 1

Cumbernauld v Stirling A
Steven Kelly   Mark Monaghan   Ralph Stirrat   George Thomson   J Pearson	1906   1782   1737   1593   1568	½ - ½   ½ - ½   ½ - ½   ½ - ½   0 - 1	1907   1787   1782   1727   1416	Shivan Murdochy   Jim Shemilt   Steve Smith   Graham Anderson   Gordon Allcock
		2 - 3

Gordon finished first, in just less than an hour, when a passed pawn in the endgame proved unstoppable. I didn't see much of the other games, but I finished last, agreeing a draw to win the match. I thought I was winning, but the computer disagrees, and rudely pointed out that if my 30th move in the position below had been Qf7+ instead of Qg4+, I would have won.

Anderson - Thomson

22 September 2014 - Central League Division 2

Stirling C v Stirling B
Gordon Allcock Robert Leckie Craig Manson David Brodie Mick Bloor	1416 1362 1262 1236 1199	0 - 1 ½ - ½ 0 - 1 1 - 0 0 - 1	1573 1566 1536 1442 1245	John Blake Bill Cook Tony Pitson Dave Hewitt Robert Togneri
		1½ - 3½

The game below is from board 1, where Gordon Allcock had White against John Blake.

Allcock - Blake

15 September 2014 - Thornton Cup

As well as the allegro match between the two Stirling teams, there was the battle of the Roberts - Mr Leckie v Mr Togneri - in the Thornton Cup. The game played as below, with analysis from Mr Leckie.

Leckie - Togneri

15 September 2014 - Central Allegro League

Stirling Bruce 8½ - 7½ Stirling Wallace
Round 1
Paul Prescott	½ - ½	Steve Smith
John Blake	0 - 1	Tony Pitson
Bill Cook	½ - ½	Robin Hayles
Graham Anderson	1 - 0	Martyn Roe
Round 2
Paul Prescott	1 - 0	Martyn Roe
John Blake	0 - 1	Steve Smith
Bill Cook	1 - 0	Tony Pitson
Graham Anderson	1 - 0	Robin Hayles
Round 3
Paul Prescott	1 - 0	Robin Hayles
John Blake	0 - 1	Martyn Roe
Bill Cook	0 - 1	Steve Smith
Graham Anderson	½ - ½	Tony Pitson
Round 4
Paul Prescott	1 - 0	Tony Pitson
John Blake	½ - ½	Robin Hayles
Bill Cook	½ - ½	Martyn Roe
Graham Anderson	0 - 1	Steve Smith

Starting their defence of the Central Allegro League title, Bruce managed to grind out a victory over Wallace in a match that went down to the very last game. My lucky underpants were over-worked in rounds 1 and 2 - I recovered from a piece for a pawn down to a roughly equal endgame. I then survived Martyn missing a fork to win my rook. In my second game, Robin allowed me to queen a pawn, as he forgot that it could promote.

The last round saw Bill and John agreeing draws, before I miscalculated against Steve to lose a rook while already behind. This left the match tied at 7½ - 7½, before Paul triumphed against Tony.

Thornton Cup - 8 September 2014

The first competitive game of the season was played at the club last Monday, a prelimnary round match of the Thornton Cup. Dave Hewitt had White against 10 year old James Warwick. The game is notable as James' first ever competitive game (when James is a GM in 15 years time, Dave will happily claim "Ach, beaten him."), and a discovered checkmate from a pawn promotion.

Hewitt - Warwick