Thoroughly out-rated on all boards, the D team's away fixture at Clifton C was always going to be tough. Despite the comprehensive 5-1 score line in favour of Clifton many of the games were close for the most part, so there are plenty of positives to take from the match.
On board 1, Dave Williams stepped up against Roger Pearce. In a closed position Roger had built an initiative by move 14 by controlling the dark squares and attacking on the a file. By move 26 Dave managed to earn some counter-play with a timely central pawn push. 10 moves and a series of piece exchanges later, the position finished with both sides having a rook and 5 pawns, one aided by a bishop and the other a knight. At this point the players agreed to a draw, an impressive display on top board for Dave.
I played against Krzysztof Stosik on board 2 and opted for the Scandinavian Defence. I was happy with how the game started, but the happiness didn't last long as I underestimated the strength of Krzyzstof's Qb5+, defended incorrectly with c6 and lost my rook on a8 for his knight. I wasn't too upset about this as I'd recognised I could get quick development whilst white's Queen was stuck in the corner, several moves away from re-entering the game. The imbalance meant somebody would win so I launched an all-out attack hoping it would be me. With my remaining pieces pointing at what felt like a very open King I thought I had half a chance, but Krzysztof defended astutely and controlled all the key squares. With my attempt culled, Krzysztof began building a powerful counter-attack which was too much for my defences, finishing with a nice tactic that left me the choice of losing my queen or resigning. Having reviewed the game since, I never really had as threatening an attack as I'd thought and Krzysztof never lost the advantage he'd earnt, only building on it, so well played by him.
Carolus Tang - on board 3 against Alex Conway and out-rated by over 400 points - played a brilliant game. After sensible opening play from both in a familiar Indian Defence setup, Alex incorrectly took back on d5 with his e6 pawn, enabling Carolus to damage his kingside pawn structure with a piece trade on f6, and blocking his fianchettoed bishop on b2 at the same time. This gave Carolus a sizeable advantage which he retained for much of the game, activating his minor pieces and seeking ways to convert his positional advantage. Alex managed to nullify much of the attack with smart piece trades, but Carolus was able to reach a same colour bishop endgame up a pawn and clearly winning after punishing some inaccuracies. In the endgame battle Alex played more precisely and activated his King far better, earning back the pawn and taking the game to a dead draw. Unfortunately, Carolus blundered his bishop on move 58 by allowing a skewer on his King, and with that went the game. With no way of queening and no way of preventing Alex from queening, Carolus was left with no choice but to resign. Whilst one move blunders like this are certainly frustrating, Carolus should be very pleased with his game overall, not only going toe-to-toe with but outplaying his almost 1900 rated opponent for most of the game.
Greg Sumner kindly offered to fill in for missing players and supported the D team on board 4 against Kipp Freud. Opting for his newly favoured Dutch Defence, Greg lost a pawn on move 8 after nbd7 blocked the Queen's defence of his dark squared bishop and Kipp spotted a nice combination. For the remainder of the game Greg made no worse than an inaccuracy, but Kipp punished each one with near perfect play and grew his advantage throughout, putting Greg's rook "in jail" as he put it on move 23 and sacrificing the exchange on move 32 to create 2 unstoppable passed pawns and forcing a resignation. By my analysis Kipp played a 98% accurate game with only 1 inaccuracy and average centipawn loss of 11 - at such a standard he was unstoppable, even with Greg managing an impressive 92% himself.
Board 5 saw Joe Wing face captain Simon Dunphy in an even affair. 20 moves in the game remained equal with both players moving their pieces to active squares and castling their Kings to safety. Joe gained the first advantage when Simon opted to trade bishops on d5, giving Joe a strong passed pawn and forcing Simon's knight to a rather passive square. The neat d6+ followed but Joe missed the chance to press on with the advantage and Simon equalised. Sensing danger, Joe moved his Queen away from the action and back to safety, allowing Simon time to progress his soon-to-be passed d pawn and create a real threat. Joe put Simon under severe time pressure and last minute - quite literally - Simon saved himself by playing a safe Queen move, rather than the seemingly more forceful d2. Good job he didn't, as the enticing d2 was a nasty trap Joe had set, blundering mate in 2 were it to be played. Simon wrapped up the game soon after, reaching a position with checkmate inevitable.
The final board saw the D team's old captain John Paines (not so much of the "old", please, Ed!) play against Milan Milicevic. A Nimzo-Indian was how this turbulent game ensued and Milan missed the chance to nab John's bishop on move 6 after not spotting Qa4+. Undeterred, Milan lined up his Queen and bishop and was able to 'Greek Gift' the bishop with bxh6 and expose John's King to devastating effect. Re6 from John the next move allowed a checkmate in 4 for Milan, who started correctly but missed the follow up. Milan did conjure up another checkmate in 4 chance but one knight move too many and it was gone, this time John capitalising with a series of only moves to force the pieces off the board, force a draw by repetition and dodge a bullet.
Dan Parcell