In the money at Hereford

Game 5 - The Goodfellow Opening
I felt a bit tired on Monday morning when I woke up at Hereford after all the exertions and subsequent celebrations on Sunday. Still, I was lying 2nd in a chess tournament and an appointment on Board 1 awaited, so there was stern work ahead.

After checking out of the hotel, Colin and I went to Wetherspoons for breakfast where I wrote the last entry. I managed to avoid the full fatboy fried breakfast and had a sausage morning roll and some toast instead. Then we headed off to the venue.

Sure enough, I was on board 1 playing Black against the one person on 4/4. It is nice being involved in the "business end" of a tournament on the top boards - there's always more interest in your games, and there's all the fun of calculating what results you want on the other boards to maximise your earnings.

The chap I was playing was relatively low-rated - though still a lot higher than me - at 108, and I'd overheard him yesterday telling the bloke he'd just beaten how he (the first bloke) wasn't a good player! Obviously he was having a good tournament though.

He opened with 1. b4, an offbeat opening which I've only ever played against once, in a correspondence game. Russell Goodfellow had given me some tips on how to meet it, since he used to play it himself and I remembered the first few moves

1 b4 c6
2 Bb2 Qb6
3 a3 a5

and there are quite a few tricks and traps for the unwary. Unfortunately I couldn't remember much more of Russell's sage advice and the opponent didn't fall into any of the traps, with the result that I was soon a pawn down with no compensation. The only comfort was that it was a relatively unimportant a-pawn, and so I didn't feel too dispondent as yet. I also felt that his pieces were slightly misplaced - there was a Knight on b5 or somehwere and a Bishop on b2 hemmed in by pawns and I gradually manoeuvred my pieces onto better squares.

Then he made a bad mistake and left a pawn where I could just take it for nothing, and not only that I got a rook fork into the bargain, so soon I was an exchange up. He was furious with himself; covered his scoresheet with question marks and tutted a lot.

It wasn't actually all that bad for him though, as so often is the case when you take material you damage your own position and soon it was me on the b ack foot defending a weak pawn on c6 which , if he took it, also allowed him to fork two rooks. It was all extremely complicated. As I was trying to figure it all out, he chose a good moment to offer a draw. Being somewhat lazy in such matters, and being well aware of the value of a half point at this position, I accepted.

Martial arts and a 50 year wait
We went to analyse the game but he spent the next 20 minutes telling me his life story. Apparently he is 68 years old and has spent the last 50 years unsuccessfully trying to win a chess tournament, so this was a big moment for him! His passions are chess, motorcycles and martial arts. He said chess and motorbikes have cost him two marriages! He even demonstrated some martial arts moves, showing me - as martial arts types always do - how easy it is to disarm someone with a knife etc.

Colin came along to the analysis room. He was happy because he had won his game, his first win of this his return to tournament chess. He told my opponent that he used to do karate, whereupon the chap punched him in the stomach as a demonstration of another move!

We had a look at the game eventually and concluded that I did probably stand somewhat better at the end. Nevertheless he was clearly on a roll so I was still content with the half point.

Bitter recriminations in the tournament hall
We went back to the main hall where a most entertaining blazing row was in progress in the middle of the hall. What it seemed to boil down to was that in the Open section a bloke from Bridgend was playing a Dutch woman (clearly plenty of scope for communcations problems there). He said he had asked her about the time control but that she had misinterpreted that as a draw offer, shaken his hand and started walking off. When he protested that he had not offered a draw an argument broke out, involving also her husband who was standing watching the game.

For some reason no-one called in the arbiter to make a rational explanation of what was clearly a misunderstanding, and it soon descended into a full-blown row with the husband calling the Welsh bloke a bastard and pushing and shoving. By the time the arbiter did come the Welsh bloke was in a towering rage and said the arbiter was incompetant and withdrew from the touranment before he could be disqualified. It did seem rather to be a storm in a teacup.

Colin and I went out for a little walk and ate sandwiches provided by the Girl Guides.

Final Round
So in the afternoon I was on board 2 on 4/5 , half a point behind my morning opponent. I needed to win and then I would share first place if he lost or drew, but would be only second if he won.

My opponent for this game was on 3.5 and there was no-one else above 3, so even if I drew I was likely to win something but I couldn't afford to lose. My opponent, being half a point behind, had to win. Overall, I was quite nicely placed.

I was playing a chap called Sage who had beaten Colin earlier in the tournament. During that game he had apparently got through two plates of sandwiches, two cakes and two teas and biscuits. In my game he didn't eat much but he did keep dozing off which I've not before. I was hoping he'd stay asleep and lose on time but he kept waking up when I pressed the clock!

It was actually quite a dull, cagey game. Colin had told me he was solid and so it proved. The game was a Queens Gambit Declined (I was White) with him playing a Kingside fianchetto which is a bit odd. It was a typical drawish QGD - all the heavy pieces got exchanged on the c-file and we went into an ending with 2 minor pieces each (he had BB against my NB) and lots of pawns. Really it was evident from quite early on that with decent play it would be a draw. I offered a draw but he turned it down - reasonably enough, because he needed to win.

He did have a Bishop pair but with so many pawns it was limited use and he had to tie a Bishop up defending pawns. The games on board 1 and 3 were drawn. The Karate bloke's draw meant he was guaranteed to win the tournament - shared with me if I won my game. It was becoming increasingly evident that our game was drawn. One of his Bishop's couldn't even move - it was stuck on h8 with my Knight and a pawn covering all its squares. All I was doing was shuffling a Bishop back and forth on a diagonal which prevented his other one from penetrating the position.

We went past the time control and I started contemplating calling the arbiter to get the game declared a draw, when eventually Sage accepted the inevitable and offered a draw.

So the Karate guy won, and his opponent, an amiable South African, and I shared second place. Won £65 which was nice, and I was very pleased with the result. I have now come joint 2nd in two of my last three tournaments, Grange over Sands and this one - though Grange was a much easier section (under 80, whereas this was under 120 (in effect - though its now described as under 135 as grades have been changed).

We collected our prizes and the Karate guy gave a short speech explaining how his school motto had been about how persistence is always rewarded. Colin had disappointgly lost his last game after being ahead, and ended with 1 win and 1 draw, but that's not bad considering he'd not played a game for two years. We said our goodbyes and I set off for my tedious 3 hour drive home.