On Monday night Downend B headed down the M5 to Clevedon and sadly returned with a 4–2 defeat. Clevedon had put out a strong side, which was slightly inconvenient as we were missing some of our registered team.

I was on board one against Robert Thompson, rated 2201, so I approached the game with the usual confidence that comes from being 262 rating points behind your opponent. It was a long evening, but I somehow managed to hold on for a draw. I was reasonably pleased with that. It isn't every week you get half a point against someone rated 2201, although obviously I would have preferred the other half as well. We can't have everything.

The best result of the night came from Carolus Tang, who produced a very good win on board three against former Downend player, Matthew Wilson. Dave Tipper also secured a draw on board four against a higher-rated opponent, David Painter-Kooiman. With those results added to my draw, we had somehow accumulated two points and, for a brief and rather dangerous moment, looked like a functioning chess team.

Then reality intervened. After some interesting struggles Martin White, Alejandro Vilchez Diaz and Alan Papier lost on boards two, five and six respectively, meaning that the scoreboard gradually returned to more familiar territory, making the final score Clevedon A 4–2 Downend B.

So there we are. We managed a win, two draws and three losses, which is one fairly efficient way of turning six chess games into a 4–2 defeat. Congratulations to Carolus and Dave on their results, and thanks to everyone for making the trip. Against a strong Clevedon side, it was never going to be straightforward. Unfortunately, we appear to have taken that as a challenge rather than a warning.

We'll try again next time.