Ealing A 6.5 - Willesden A 1.5
: Created:15 Oct 2008 , byEaling won their match at the Harvester last night over newly promoted Willesden.
The Old and the New
Amogh Sarpotdar made his debut for Ealing and set our team on its road to victory with a fine win on board eight. I understand that his opponent lost his queen because of a "fingerfelder" but Amogh was well on top at the time. Meanwhile former mainstay of Ealing Chess Club, Jurgen Jakob, having arrived at Heathrow from Germany barely an hour before our match, was settling down to his first game in three years for us. The old magic is still there and he gradually outplayed his opponent to arrive at a completely won, king and pawn ending.
The Established
Veljko Stanisic's opponent discovered what many had found to their cost before - Veljko is a very resilient defender indeed. When Veljko hit back with his own attack the game was quickly over. On the next board down the order Sainbayar Tserendorj was soon launching his h pawn in pursuance of a kingside attack. Gradually he stripped away his foe's defences before breaking through with a mating onslaught.
With the White pieces Mike Lamb skilfully accumulated extra pawns at regular intervals until he arrived at a bishop and six pawns versus a knight and three pawn ending. Unsurprisingly Black did not last long in this unbalanced ending. Adrian Ociepka dropped a pawn but performed heroically to hold a rook and minor piuece ending. This draw was sufficient to give us victyory at this stage of the match.
On top board Martin Smith was faced with one of those annoying universal openings, ...g6, Bg7, b6, Bb7, e6, Ne7, d6, Nd7. Martin showed admirable patience and avoided overstretching his forces. Switching his pieces to the kingside and advancing his h pawn (Sainbayar style?) he built a winning position.
True Sportmanship
We had a few difficulties with our venue managers before this Tuesday fixture. Willesden's captain and his players were hugely accommodating to us about the problems and behaved with exemplary sportsmanship. In due course we were able to confirm the original arrangements but I pay a very warm tribute to our opponents for their friendliness before and during and after the match.
1. M Smith 1-0 P Ackley
2. S Randall 0-1 D Ford
3. A Ociepka 0.5-0.5 A Fulton
4. V Stanisic 1-0 V Hernandez
5. S Tserendorj 1-0 K Jones
6. J Jakob 1-0 M Morgan
7. M Lamb 1-0 S Share
8. A Sarpotdar 1-0 C Silverman