We travelled to the Folk Centre for a top versus almost bottom of the table clash expecting to pick up a win as well as much needed game points. The evening started with a reversal of circumstances surrounding our home match against their A-team: Barry Davies travelled to Downend (after saying that he didn't need to be reminded about the match) although by the time that he had realised his mistake he could only arrive seconds too late to prevent their super sub 'Gee' taking over on board 2 against me.

This was yet another match where we struggled to obtain clear advantages despite our grading superiority. The only exception to that was on board 3 where James quickly established a winning position against Roger and picked up the full point virtually out of the opening. Dominique looked to have slightly the better of his game from an early stage, whilst I was suffering quite badly against Guillaume, a player rated 80 points below me, who was playing well above his grade. The other three boards were unclear although thankfully Nigel had decided not to go all out for an attack and donate a piece this week: Neil's position from his gambit was slightly unbalanced whilst the other two awaited some close quarter combat. It was soon obvious that this was not going to be the one-side match that we had anticipated.

My opponent had the better position, after recovering a-pawn that he had gambited in the opening, and also a huge time advantage. I fought on and found one good defensive move yet still felt uncomfortable. An unexpected gift of a-pawn swung the advantage. Guillaume then seemed to lose concentration, as this was shortly followed by him blundering a bishop. A lucky escape and I expect his grade to rise sharply in the next year or so.

I heard several draw offers from Doreen on board 1 and assumed that the position was quite level, yet a study of the game showed Dominique was in control and rightly turned them down. However, he may have temporary lost focus at one point when the computer finds tactics which would have given his adversary a large advantage. Fortunately this was missed and he continued to steam roller down the board with his King and heavy pieces to deliver checkmate.

Meanwhile John had arrived at a rook and-pawn ending which offered him one chance of a win yet the draw which resulted was good enough to secure both match points. Nigel also agreed a draw in a semi-blocked position, yet John's exchange of rooks immediately before this had changed the nature of the game. After some analysis, and a not too obvious move order, this would have allowed Nigel to promote a choice of-pawns.

That left Neil, who was now the exchange up, to survive a tricky looking attack. Giving back the exchange would have easily won the game and so it was that at this point that Kevin resigned.

We remain on top of Division 3 for now, yet there is a sense that we have had more than our fair share of luck to get there.