Challenge Cup Quarter Finals

All the games in the Challenge Cup First Round were fairly clear cut.

The Quarter Final draw is:

David Lettington vs Tyrone Jefferies

Douglas Smith vs Matt Bunn

Neil Miners vs Bob Fenn

Matt Gazes vs David Fowler

The games are due to be played on 8th May.

Snodland reach two finals in two days!

Wow! Two great results in two days!

Snodland beat Hastings in the U100 section of the National Club Championship to reach the final.
The team won 2.5-1.5, with David Lettington and Matt Bunn winning and David Fowler gaining a draw.

Matt Bunn scored a good win against the experienced Hastings player and David Fowler then achieved a draw against his young opponent.

This meant that David Lettington or Matthew Gazes only needed to draw to put Snodland through on board count. David's opponent had an opportunity to make a risky sacrifice, but decided to play safely and then grabbed a pawn which allowed David to make a counter attack that eventually gave him the initiative.

The following day Snodland beat Lewisham in the Kent County Chess Association's Harvey Cup to reach the final. The match was tied 3-3, but Snodland won on board count. The Snodland winning players were David Nicholls, Henry Williams and Matt Bunn. More details later....

A-league & B-league results

After some interesting results, the latest league positions are as above.

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The A-league results this week were:

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Matt Bunn 0.5 - 0.5 Neil Miners

Ben Stokes 0 - 1 David Lettington

Matthew Gazes 1 - 0 Len Hammond

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The B-league results this week were:

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Ben Edwards o - 1 Arjun Toor

John Morgan 0 - 1 Malcolm Stokes

Arjun Toor 1 - 0 Ben Stokes

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Malcolm's win means that he maintains his perfect score and his rating performance is more than double his actual grade.

IM Bob Wade visits club

The chess club were lucky to have IM Bob Wade visit and deliver some coaching.

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After demonstrating some opening variations in the Italian Opening, Bob went on to tell us how he helped Bobby Fischer prepare for his 1972 World Championship match versus Boris Spassky, including showing us some handwritten letters from Fischer himself.

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Bob also spoke about his time in Cuba when he played chess against Che Guevara amongst others.

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Bob then played a simultaneous display against 6 players, with Matt Bunn managing to beat Bob and Douglas Smith gaining a well deserved draw. Bob won the other 4 games.

Latest league positions

The leading A-league and B-league positions are as follows:

In the A-league, the two leading players are yet to play each other. In the B-league, Malcolm needs two more wins from four games to win the title.

Challenge Cup Preliminary Round results

There were some surprise results this week. In the Challenge Cup Preliminary Round;

Arjun Toor 1-0 John Morgan.
Despite John's good form, Arjun scored a good win.
Henry Williams 1-0 Malcolm Stokes.
Malcolm put up a good fight but lost ot his higher rated opponent.
Ben Edwards 1-0 Jason Boyes.
Young Ben progresses to play his school coach Neil Miners.
Nick Allen 0-1 Matt Gazes.
Matt fought on when material down and beat his higher rated opponent in a complex endgame.

The competition is down to the last 16, all games to be played on 24th April.

Snodland Teams Progress

After some fantastic matches with other clubs in Kent, Sussex and Essex, all of Snodland's teams have scored great results in the Kent County Chess Association and National competitions. At the time of writing, the Snodland 1st team stands second in Mid Kent "Harvey" league, the 2nd team stands second in the Mid Kent "Tom Fuller" league, the 3rd team stands 2nd in the Mid Kent "Intro" league, and the 4th team stands 4th in the same league.

The final league positions will be announced in the next few days, and if the positions remain the same, then 3 of Snodland's 4 teams will have reached the Kent Semi-Finals. This a fantastic achievement for a club that is only 4 years old and only started playing competitively last year.

Snodland have also reached the Semi-Finals of the National Club Championship "U100" section and face a tough match with Hastings in a couple of weeks.

Special mention goes to:

Matthew Gazes and David Fowler for their fantastic records this season. They have chalked up over 15 wins between them and only one loss!

Neil Miners for holding a draw whilst material down and with only seconds on his clock, to score the vital half point need to beat Hastings in the Harvey Cup.

David Parkins for a neat checkmate to give the 4th team a draw against Weald of Kent.

Soriah Williams for a brilliant combination to her crush her opponent when playing Maidstone.

Matt Bunn for scaring his opponents with aggressive, uncompromising opening play.

John Morgan for consistent improvement and taking a big lead in the B-league.

Everyone at the club has made a fantastic contribution to our successes so far this season. Hopefully there are lots more victories to come!