Hargreaves Shield v Margate (a)

                                                 Broadstairs  3         Margate   1 

Andy Flood writes:

As a consequence of the worst flu epidemic in seven years, a slightly weakened unbeaten Broadstairs team visited second place Margate with Mike Doyle standing in at very short notice to play on board 4 . In fact he was the first to finish his game. Playing black against the higher graded John Clarke, he managed to drive his opponent’s king into the centre of the board before achieving a checkmate. Broadstairs were soon to go 2–0 up with Bob Page maintaining his 100% Hargreaves win record, going a piece up and generally outplaying Colin Gregory, his opponent on the top board. A tight game was being played out on board 3 between Andrew Flood and Paul Ruffle, a former Broadstairs player of 10 years ago who had recently returned to playing chess. With white having an advanced pawn to the 6^th rank and with perhaps a miniscule advantage, a draw was agreed which secured the Broadstairs win. The team left Paul Carfrae to play on against Margate’s Clive Le Baigue, the Broadstairs Christmas quiz champion. With Clive already a pawn up through some very clever earlier play, he subsequently went a further two pawns up. However Paul’s solid end game play was proving an obstacle and with the time control looming and just over a minute left on his clock, Clive offered a draw which was accepted.