Tonight the B-team entertained fellow strugglers Horfield B in a match to establish prime candidates for relegation to Division 2. It was a match that Downend simply must not lose. Horfield were at full strength leading to a very closely graded top four boards and an overall insignificant advantage for the home team.

There were some unusual openings, some played more rapidly than others, but generally balanced positions resulted. Indeed, Nigel and Mike L was such that following repetition of moves they agreed an early draw.

The advantage then swung to our opponents, most noticeably on board 3 where Alex's pieces were invading Michael's castled king position and creating myriads of apparent threats. Javier's opening had not gone well either, whilst Ian had given up a-pawn for what now seemed to be a strangled attack. Dave and Mike H had not yet developed into a middle game although Dave looked to be better. Martin's position appeared the most promising.

Javier managed to turn things around and gain a slight advantage before then sacrificing a-pawn to try to open up the closed nature of the position. Unfortunately this back-fired on him and in an attempt to prevent his kingside position from becoming horribly exposed he abruptly trapped his queen. Nigel repelled Ian's attack and created mating threats as well as connected passed-pawns that together were too strong for Ian to cope with in his remaining five minutes: .5-2.5.

Martin had arrived at a favourable bishop plus four pawns against a knight and three-pawns ending and needed to find a way of creating a passed-pawn without allowing Peter to pick up a-pawn and create his own. Unfortunately he couldn't find the correct plan and with time running out for both players agreed a draw. Immediately afterwards, having picked up material and dominated in his game from early on, Alex delivered checkmate. Dave had built up a considerable advantage by superbly outplaying Mike H in the opening and early middle game, yet the position then seemed to slip back and with only minutes remaining the players agreed a draw.

A match to be quickly forgotten if our B-team are to advance up the Division One table.