Thursday, May 13, 2010

Big Board Match: North Sydney v St George


The annual "grudge" match was on again. On Tuesday night, the players from St George travelled to North Sydney (Norths) for the annual Big Board match.

The majority of the players from St George turned up and although the games are scheduled to start at 7.30pm, unfortunately, the pairings did not happen until a good 45 minutes later.

In the end, a whopping total of 50 boards was finalised.

My opponent was Graham Allison (1368). There was nothing fascinating about the game. I can only say that I made a few blunders, he made a few mistakes. And in the end, as Tarrasch said,"I was the next to last person to blunder", which was rather unfortunate for Graham and he resigned on move 63.

This was my first OTB game for over a year and I was pretty disappointed with my play despite my win. I got into a winning position and miscalculated... badly and my opponent failed to capitalise on it.

My brother-in-law Steven won his game in his typical 1.d4 opening while my friend's son Dylan won his game in a very nice style with a neat tactical combination by beating a pin with a counter pin.

My board was among the last to finish. In the end, North Sydney emerged with nice little 30-20 victory over St George. This was a slight improvement over last year where North Sydney (Norths) 28.5-19.5 (only to get subsequently clobbered by St George in the return match with 33.5-12.5 *ouch*)

The Grade Matches are due to start in a fortnight's time and I've planned to participate.

I realised that my OTB play has deteriorated beyond comprehension. I seriously need to pull up my socks before then.

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