We travelled out for a Friday night div 3 game with the crabs, despite the traffic woes in Norwich we arrived with a few seconds to spare and a very exciting evening unfolded. I'll take the games in the order they finished..
Board 4 me versus Jacob Mulligan (est 35) I had black pieces against Jacob who played the London against me. I set up my usual defence but he went down a strange side line with c4 and Qb3. After swapping off the centre pawns he retreated his queen (attacked by my knight) and allowed a pawn fork of queen and knight. After that I launched everything and found a nice mate with knight and 2nd rank pawn on his helpless king. 1 0 knaves Board 3 Charlie versus Jack 'topknot' Evans (101) Charlie faced the French exchange in what looked a fun and open game. Charlie found himself up the exchange and with pieces coming off it looked good for the flying scotsman. Pawn play was even and charlie had rook versus dark square bishop. I was able to enjoy watching him sack back the exchange in return for an unstoppable coronation and Jack threw in the towel at this point. 2 0 knaves Board 1 Brian versus Alex 'topknots dad' Evans (122) Brian played his Trompowsky attack against Evans senior and a very technical battle ensued. Brian had a fearsome attack with knight supported by doubled rooks down the g file and whilst Alex defended manfully, it allowed Brian to go 2 pawns clear. The rooks came off so we ended up 6 vs 4 pawns and a knight each. A very cagey grind followed and whilst Brian lost one of his pawn advantage eventually the knights came off and Alex resigned as winning the passed pawn would mean hed lose all 3 of his queensiders to a dominant king. I particularly enjoyed Brian forcing Alex's knight to h8! 3 0 knaves Board 2 Delsey versus Ed Hackford (122) Delsey employed the French defence against the very solid and deliberate Mr Hackford. I think fair to say Delsey was under extreme pressure throughout and forced into a mass defence, which held impressively although he went down the exchange unavoidably. Looking at the board with queen, 2 rooks and an extra pawn versus Delseys queen rook and knight I thought how nice it would be if he could get his Queen on the long diagonal against the white king on h1 with only an h2 pawn in front of him..... Ed ran short of time (6 mins) and inexplicably to my mind sacked back the exchange for no real benefit and send the queen barreling in whilst Delsey calmly picked up a pawn on the 2nd with his rook. Ed saw mate in 3 and attacked. Delsey then played Qb7+ with mate in one and a horrified Ed Hackford resigned after making an illegal move (not spotting he was in check). Delseys first attacking move of the game was fatal. Beautiful. And a very string contender for the rabbit trophy already! 4 nil to the knaves and top of the table!! Dave Knave
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