Jesmond Wasps v Reivers

This match was played on October 11th. We didn’t quite know what to expect, given that Jesmond had disbanded its fourth team and moved its young superstars into the Jesmond Rookies side in division one. We found ourselves facing a very young side with not an English name between them!
1. Dingyu Chen (110 rapid) v Alex Ashworth (127)
2. Hanif Zaman (97 rapid) v Phil Taylor (125)
3. Darina Andriychenko (89 rapid) v Steve Larkin (125)
4. Weiming Xu (87) v Dave Foster jr (91)
5. Sandric Andriychenko (29 rapid) v Damian Rudge (68)
First to finish was Damian, who described his game as “very straightforward”. He developed his pieces better, used his knights to prevent castling and then set about picking off his opponent’s pieces. 0-1
Steve’s opponent played the opening well and was only a pawn down when a rash move cost her her queen. 0-2
Phil writes of his game: “Hanif played a solid opening with a very aggressive push against my King’s Indian defence. Although this distracted me it never looked terminal and at a late stage in his thrust I won a knight for a pawn. This should then have been game over but with space opening up on the board and my King’s defence denuded I decided it was time to blunder my piece advantage away and select the wrong piece to lose, thereby giving my opponent the opportunity to get a perpetual check. Too many errors creeping into my game – I wish I knew why. This should take nothing from my opponent who played a very good game and deserved his luck at the end.” 0.5-2.5
Dave’s game was evenly balanced and came down to a rook and 3 pawns on each side, then a rook and one pawn each, and finally one pawn each. As neither King could both capture and defend, it was a draw. 1-3
Alex’s game was the last to finish by quite a bit. It looked very even in the later stages, with Dingyu perhaps having the edge with doubled rooks on an open file while Alex’s pieces appeared to be rather tied down. When Alex allowed black’s knight to fork rook and bishop, it appeared to be all over, but Alex had seen much further ahead than his opponent. Capturing a pawn with his rook, he opened a file which led to a forced mate in two. A fine finish. 1-4
So a good start to te season, but of course sterner tests lie ahead.