More needs to be said regarding the way it computes, nevertheless an interesting development.
115. A regrettable incident
The Badmaster (Diggle) has always been an inveterate P-K4 man, regarding all other openings as fit only for deviants and ‘long-haired leftists’. Occasionally, however, when the mood seizes him, he plays through a few hypermodern games from respectable chess periodicals, and he recently selected at random a British Championship 1982 effort commencing with 1. N-KB3 P-QN3, as he had espied a lengthy note by the victor (White) explaining Black’s reply, which promised to open up before the BM’s eyes vast up-to-date strategical subtleties and even put him in the way of ‘thinking like a Grandmaster’. The experiment, indeed, surpassed expectations, as the note ran as follows: ‘A very sly move. My opponent had not yet appeared when I made my first move and so I departed to watch the top games on the demonstration boards. I was later told, by an aspiring supergrass, that when [my opponent] finally turned up at the board he made his move and quickly left through the nearest exit. His hope was that I would not notice this ‘small’ move from a distance and would lose a lot of time on the clock. Fortunately, this dastardly ruse only cost me 8 minutes…’
The BM, however is in no position to moralize over ‘such goings-on’ in high places, as he himself once featured in a ‘regrettable incident’ while his opponent was away from the board. It was in a London Banks League Match, and his worthy adversary, having got a winning game, wandered away ‘all debonair’ while the BM was slowly stewing in his own juice. It must be explained here as part of the false bonhomie in Banks League encounters refreshments are provided halfway through the evening; there is, however, none of that degrading cafeteria queuing sometimes seen at low weekend Congresses, and though the fare consists of one cup of coffee and one piece of cake per warrior, these dainties are served in true Lombard Street style, being silently brought round to the various boards by silver-haired messengers of grave demeanour. On this occasion, the ‘feast’ arrived with the BM’s opponent still absent, and with the BM himself pouring over the board in great mental stress and groping simultaneously for some saving resource and for his cake ration which, alongside his opponents, he was vaguely conscious had just been placed amidships. Having partaken freely of cake in his abstraction, he made his move and came to, only to find to his horror that he had wolfed not only his moiety but had started on his opponents as well. That gentleman, on his return, finding himself virtually victorious if partially cakeless, generously said, “not to worry, I’m not at all hungry”. But some of the BM’s malicious teammates deliberately raised a great hue and cry, and (ostensibly to preserve the good name of the Club, but in reality to embarrass and humiliate the BM) proffered profuse apologies to the opposition – ‘He just can’t help it, you know!’ ‘You should see him at our Annual Dinner!’ ‘Do let him finish it up, Sir, it’ll be the first time in his life HE’S EVER BEEN A PIECE TO THE GOOD!’
June 1985
The type of playing hall that Diggle frequented in his earlier years can be seen below.
Posted in My own warped humour | Leave a Comment »
Whilst visiting a retired friend in Cha am, Thailand a few years back, he told me that he once beat his fellow compatriot and the current world champion Magnus Carlsen as we played a few friendly games in his lovely house. With Carlsen being quite young at the time, only 10 years old in fact, the game is something of a Pyrrhic victory for my old playing partner…not that he was boasting or anything like that of course. Anyway, here is their game:
http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1394407
The final position after 52. … Ra3.
Cha am. A quiet resort, popular among Thais.
Posted in Life beyond the chess board | Leave a Comment »
Victorian times in the home counties -a gentleman cycles across rural Bedfordshire to participate in a chess match but ends up in prison -how quaint?
The gentleman’s destination.
Posted in Bedfordshire Chess, Quaint Chess History | Leave a Comment »
GM Michael Adams, arguably England’s greatest ever player, won a game in fine style against GM Maxim Matlakov at he European Club Championship with a deep move that had chess-playing friend Peter Frost in awe.
White (GM Adams) has just played 27 Bb3, a very deep move allowing a loss of material as well as structural damage.
You can play out the rest of the game here -Mickey at his best.
Posted in Life beyond the chess board | Leave a Comment »
En route to becoming county champions of England for the first time, Bedfordshire received help from yours truly on more than one occasion. Just look at this…this amazing effort below kindly sent on by author Richard James.
I remember that match quite well, it was played one sunny afternoon at The Purcell School in Bushey, Watford on the B462. We took an early lead as I was left to wander around for ages in my green puma jumper, making jokes with teammates that the opposing side had brought ‘criminal types’ to the match (see board 11), not knowing if my opponent would arrive. Here’s the position when I won on time, I was black.
A stunning victory in which I played no bad moves, Bedfordshire then went on to make history.
Posted in History of Bedfordshire Chess from 1980-2000 | Leave a Comment »
Someone once said ‘When I give check, I am never afraid’. Apart from the fact that the counter-check can give mate, it’s generally not a good idea to stop thinking in chess. Here’s an example of just that from the hallowed antiquity of 1987, taken from Burgess’s ‘Quickest Victories of all time’ (1998)
R.Huque – J.Hodgson London ‘Chess for Peace’ 1987
1 d4 Nf6
2 c4 c5
3 Nf3 cxd4
4 Nxd4 e5
5 Nb5 d5?!
6 cxd5 Bc5
7 d6? Ne4
8 Nc7+??
Instead of gaining a tempo, white now loses on the spot. Can you find the winning move?
8. … Qxc7!
9 Qa4+ Qc6 0-1
Posted in Life beyond the chess board | Leave a Comment »
Posted in Personal Interest & Experience | Leave a Comment »
As you might expect, the well-oiled machine that is http://www.chess24.com has brought us yet another wonderful video to watch. In the European Club Championships a non-European, namely Nakamura, is defeated handsomely by Swiss legend GM Pelletier, rated some 200 points plus below. Naka plays his familiar King’s Indian Defence and is lost before he knows what to do against a very clever piece sacrifice. An entertaining and instructive game is analyzed and explained in the vernacular by the multi-lingual, multi-talented GM Jan Gustafsson. Here it is, enjoy:
Posted in Life beyond the chess board | Leave a Comment »
More from GM Nunn here. Who wouldn’t play Ke5? (Note that white has a peak rating of 2732 and even he got it wrong!)
Posted in Life beyond the chess board | Leave a Comment »
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A side note on how to read old Tom Sweby's columns
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Not perhaps, but quintessentially, Old Tom Sweby is best thought of as a passionate devotee to the newspapers he wrote for. He was well read and knowledgeable of the Bedfordshire chess scene and well beyond, given that he was the president of the S.C.C.U. once upon a time. He was generally well-respected and rubbed shoulders with many, if not all, of those eminent within British chess circles. It would, however, be a critical mistake to see his column is primary source material entirely. That it is not. You will also find secondary source material quoted too, and the reliability of that is not quite as Tom hoped. Given that he wrote for decades, this is to some degree inevitable, and after all we are all prone to error whether we realize it or not. Thankfully, with regards to old Tom Sweby, they are infrequent and for the most part old Tom continued to document events and developments in the Bedfordshire league from the get go as best he could but, of course, everything lies open to interpretation. Despite this, and generally speaking. this does indeed make him informative and thus worth reading. Dare I say his columns constitute a narrative describing the latest developments, match reports and changing nature of the Beds league...he knew his audience and wrote according. This manifested itself over decades but brevity was always in play courtesy of the restictions imposed by writing a column. Should you wish to read a in instrumental figure of the Beds' league post WW2, you are quite welcome to peruse what has been posted here... . :-) I should, however, point out that as the decades wore on he gradually moved on away from narratives concerning the Bedfordshire league towards affairs both historical and international. The reasons for this are multifarous, old age was a predominante factor presumably, however, the bottom line is with regards to how the Bedfordshire chess scene developed post WW2: old Tom Sweby is your go to guy. He wrote more about chess in Bedforshire than anyone else did but given he was a Lutonian and writing for a Luton newspaper there is both bias and greater coverage of his hometown than the rest of the county.
Gallery
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- I’m either 10 or 11 here
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- 1982, myself versus Brian from Sunderland.
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- At the Thai Junior chess championships. My daughter of course.
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