match report by Andrew Flood
A casualty of the fuel crisis, this crucial re-arranged Hargreaves Shield match saw Broadstairs, without Manoj on board 1, meeting Bridge, the only other team in the Hargreaves Shield.
The out – rating of opponents on the 4 boards were evenly matched at 2 – 2, but with Dominic Blundell out rating his opponent on board 2 and in recent months playing some of his best chess, it was no surprise that he was first to finish and notch up a point for Broadstairs. A rook sacrifice and forcing moves along the h rank saw his opponent mated (as can be seen in our recent Game of the Week)
Paul Carfrae on the top board secured an important half point, agreeing a draw having fought hard to get a slight advantage.
Board 3 saw the two team captains battle it out over 46 moves. Black obtained early positional advantage but couldn’t drive home any advantage until very late on in the end game when it was possible through tempo to successfully advance a pawn to become a queen forcing white to resign and a win for Black and Broadstairs
On board 4, new boy Paul Verrall, won his first league point and secured the 3.5 – 0.5 win for Broadstairs. Playing some very good chess, in a game which he did not look like losing, Paul advanced his centre pawns into an end game, and all the way to the eighth rank, before his opponent resigned after a solid 3 hours of playing.
| Broadstairs | 3.5 – 0.5 | Bridge |
| Paul Carfrae 1683 | 0.5 – 0.5 | Peter Blundell 1698 |
| Dominic Blundell 1630 | 1 – 0 | Zach Stonier 1450 |
| Andrew Flood 1593 | 1 – 0 | Graeme Boxall 1435 |
| Paul Verrall 1188 est | 1 – 0 | Ray Rennells 1285 |