Lightning Tournament [Current Standings]
Sets of games played tonight
(4 games per fixture):
Andrew Robinson 3 George Flitcroft-Smith 1
George Flitcroft-Smith 3 Harvey Quaresmini 1
Doug Foster 2 James Hiller 2
Andrew Robinson 3 Harvey Quaresmini 1
George Flitcroft-Smith 4 Peter Hiller 0
The Lightning tournament
continued tonight and after an absence of many years, George Flitcroft-Smith
has come back to the club. George has won the Best All-Rounder Trophy (1988)
and shared the Flood Cup (1989) so the club is pleased to welcome another
strong player back to the club.
George was unfortunate not
to win his first two tournament games (against Andrew Robinson) on return. In
both lightning games he had 2 minute advantages midway but squandered these by
continuing to move at a pace probably faster than necessary. Indeed game 2 saw
him a bishop + 3 pawns vs 4 pawns, but he managed to inadvertantly block his
bishop from covering a vital square on the way to queening resulting in
catastrophe. Lack of time still was an issue, and Andrew was fortunate to
achieve mate with a single second left on his clock. Game 3 was another loss
for George, but he inflicted his own massacre in the corner on an unprotected
castled king in game 4.
Harvey appeared to throw
away several opportunities where he had initiatives during his first 3 games.
In game 2 in particular, he had a huge positional advantage until he left his
queen en prise. He managed to bring some respectability to the scoreline
in game 4.
In the most surprising
result of the evening, James achieved his first wins in competitive chess
against veteran Doug Foster. Doug said that he’d had a few reds before coming
along tonight. However, rather than dwell on Mr Foster’s bout with Bacchus, we
should extend our congratulation to James and hope it is the first of many to
come.
Andrew was once again
involved in a dramatic and close finish during his 4 game tussle with Harvey.
Harvey won the first game with black, but the second came down to a rook ending
with seconds left when Andrew claimed victory for Harvey making an illegal
move. Harvey acknowledged the illegal move, but there was a question about
whether it was in time – the DGT indicated that Harvey’s flag had fallen first,
and Andrew explained that he had a single second left when the claim was made.
Harvey play seemed to go down a notch after this and Andrew won the final 2
games.
George defeated Peter Hiller 4-0 in the final competitive games of the night before the scene switched to TRANSFER CHESS. George partnered James Hiller (Venus), and while George demonstrated that he had indeed spent (squandered?) many hours versing himself in the intracacies of transfer, he had indeed unfortunately picked the wrong Williams sister. After losing the first game, Andrew and Peter Hiller (Serena) cleaned up, with most of the games being decided centrecourt, Andrew & George (on the outer court) taking turns at performing unconscious Richard Williams imitations (no, no, move your king!! Don’t touch that piece!! etc etc). Stumps were drawn at midnight, with talk turning to cricket and how Doug appears to be in the pockets of the Indian bookmakers…..
Standings after 18 January 2002
All players to play 32 games
|
No. |
NAME |
POINTS |
PLAYED |
|
1 |
19 |
24 |
|
|
2 |
8 |
12 |
|
|
3 |
5½ |
12 |
|
|
4 |
5 |
8 |
|
|
5 |
4½ |
10 |
|
|
6 |
2 |
4 |
|
|
7 |
2 |
8 |
|
|
8 |
2 |
10 |
|
|
9 |
2 |
12 |
Click here for the full crosstable of the 2002 Lightning Tournament.