The Crusaders travelled to the Bitterns venue , a nice well lit coffee shop / café that was unfortunately closed ! Mark and I popped over to the Londis to get supplies and we exchanged team sheets. The Broadland Bitterns are the strongest side rating wise in the league and they didn’t hold back when playing us minnows. We were outrated but nearly 30 points on every board. Despite this, the Crusaders put in an excellent performance.
Dan was up against a 13-year-old with a 201 rating and was outplayed in the middle game and almost mated. I commented “unlucky Dan” and he grinned and replied, “No luck there I was outplayed.” I made an inaccuracy in the opening and found myself in a strategically lost game after about 12 moves. I just couldn’t find any counterplay and was slowly squashed and strangled into submission. My opponent was Gerald Moore, the current Norfolk Champion so I wasn’t too surprised. Mark had the white pieces against Roy Hughes, another tough chess nut to crack. Mark played his Colle opening and neither player managed to get any sort of advantage and the pieces were getting exchanged until there was just rook and pawns. I heard Mark offer a draw and Roy decline. A few more moves were made and a second offer was made. Again Roy refused and played on. Eventually, it was Roy who offered and Mark accepted. A very good result against a top player. Nice one Mark. The game on bd 4 was Sebastian v Ken McEwan and it was clear that Ken was after a quick win, hurling his pieces at Sebastian who had to defend accurately. Then Ken castled queenside and Sebastian seized the initiative and launched his own attack. With both clocks getting short McEwan blundered and Sebastian struck decisively to get a superb win against the Broadland skipper. So we lost the match but took 1.5 points off last year’s champions and current league leaders.
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October 2022
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