The final league fixture of Shrewsbury Chess Club’s 2013-2014 season was completed on Friday night as Shewsbury B – already safe from both promotion and relegation – hosted big hitters Ludlow – already promoted, but gunning for the title. The visitors enjoyed a grading advantage on all 5 boards and had recorded wins over the Shrewsbury club in their last two meetings.
This time, though, the only item on the agenda for Matt Best’s B team was pride, rather than any pressure to stay up/in the cup, and it meant that all the games were fairly interesting. The first game to finish came on board 2, where Dan Lockett was looking for a 19th straight game without defeat for Shrewsbury. Dan was up against Joe Watson – always a tricky opponent – and the game took a fairly wild turn from the opening, transposing from a Modern Defence into a Sicilian Hyper-Accelerated Dragon and then a French Advance. The result was a fairly congested position, and although Dan appeared to have a slight edge, a draw was agreed fairly early on.
Next to finish was board 5, where Ivor Salter was up against Robert Woodley – a player he beat with a spectacular piece sacrifice just over a year ago in the Minor Knockout. This time, however, the outcome was different – although Ivor did give up a piece again, it was unintentional this time! However, Matt’s surprise win over Richard Croot on top board – after his Rooks dominated the open e-file and infiltrated Richard’s position – levelled the scores.
With nothing riding on the match for Shrewsbury (have I already mentioned that?!), both Mark Smith and Norman O’Connor were happy to agree draws in reasonable positions against John Whittaker and Graham Shepherd respectively – a result which returns Ludlow to top spot in the division with one game still to play.
The next action for the Shrewsbury Club will come from the Summer Knockout competitions in team play, and the Shrewsbury Town Championships for individuals. It’s time we had a Shrewsbury Club winner again!
Shrewsbury B 2½-2½ Ludlow
M. Best 1-0 R. Croot
D. Lockett ½-½ J. Watson
N. O’Connor ½-½ G. Shepherd
M. Smith ½-½ J. Whittaker
I. Salter 0-1 R. Woodley