In our second match we were up against last year’s runners up in division 1, Newport. However, we were able to field our top team, as Ed Goodwin was available for us, so I wasn’t entirely without hope, particularly as Newport were missing two of their big guns, Tom Pym and Gavin Cooper. I knew I would have a tough fight on my hands, facing the County’s second-highest rated player, Nick Rutter, on board 1, and tough it proved to be!
I defended with a Scandinavian, Nick obtained a space advantage and a rook on the seventh rank, as well as control of the open d-file. Nevertheless, I felt my position was tenable, provided I was patient. Nick continued to press for a long time, gradually advancing his pawns on both sides of the board. This, however, created chances for me too and, probably unused to the thought of my actually threatening something, Nick blundered, allowing me to pick off a Bishop and Pawn. Things were not entirely straight forward, though, as Nick had a dangerous passed f-Pawn. Ever resourceful, he kept creating problems and, in the last few minutes of the time allocation, I allowed him to win both of my remaining Pawns, reaching a drawn Rook and Bishop versus Rook ending. Despite the disappointment of not winning a won game, I was pleased with the result and the game was actually very interesting. You can play through an annotated version here. Having been concentrating so fully on my game, I was unaware of the dramas going on elsewhere!
Ed describes his game as follows: “After a fairly standard QGD exchange variation, I ended up in a position where I had hanging pawns on e4 and d4 whilst Nat had 2 to 1 on the Queenside including a pawn on b3. He then played a sequence of forcing moves threatening to trap my rook on e1 and/or win the d pawn. I managed to defend against these threats to emerge into an endgame of 2 rooks and bishop each and 2 pawns up. Possibly, this was not winning as my 3 king side pawns were on f3,f5 and h3. Anyway, the niceties of finding a decent plan were irrelevant after Nat attacked my bishop with his rook and I forgot to move it.”
In the meantime, Daniel on board 3 was cruising to a draw against Simon Maydew and I was beginning to think that the match had slipped away from us.
There was better news on boards 4 and 5, however. David, ever inventive in his choice of opening, had played the sharp Warren Goldman line against Chris Lewis’s Caro Kann. In the first twelve moves, David had sacrificed THREE pawns for rapid development and piece activity. With hindsight, it was just as well that I was so engrossed in my game, as I would have been extremely nervous for most of David’s! Chris missed an opportunity on move 28 to turn the game in his favour, after which David pressed home his advantage in a Knight and Pawn ending. A fascinating struggle which you can play through here.
On board 5, Peter was facing Athar Mehmood, who seemed to mishandle the opening, an off-beat line of the Queen’s Gambit. Peter won a pawn in the late middlegame and continued to press. Inexplicably, Athar decided to allow the exchange of rooks, simplifying to a won King and Pawn ending for Peter. Peter has annotated his win here. Despite the latter’s shortage of time, he made no mistake in converting the win. A great result to get us off the blocks for this season.
| Shrewsbury A | Newport A | |
| Francis Best | ½-½ | Nick Rutter |
| Ed Goodwin | 0-1 | Nathanael Paul |
| Daniel Lockett | ½-½ | Simon Maydew |
| David Everington | 1-0 | Chris Lewis |
| Peter Kitchen | 1-0 | Athar Mehmood |
| 3-2 |
Francis Best