Horsham Chess Club

Horsham 1 finished the season with a 3-1 win over Eastbourne 1.

First game to finish was on board one, where Gavin Lock's opponent failed to turn up, giving him a win by default.

Next, James McGrath played out a solid draw on board four as White against Paul Carpenter.

The final two games were closer.

At one point late on, James Mansson, who was Black against Oliver Froom on board three, was offered a draw, which he declined as Mark Broom, who was White against Rasa Norinkeviciute on board two, seem to be in trouble.

A weakened Horsham 1 lost narrowly to Bexhill 1 at the start of April.

With none of the team's top three players available, James Mansson was on board one, Phil Stimpson on board two, James McGrath on board three and Rob McDonald on board four.

James Mansson drew with Howard Tebbs in a game where he initially gained an advantage, but subsequently got into trouble and was a little lucky to share the point.

Phil Stimpson played solidly to draw with Anh Nguyen.

James McGrath was gradually ground down by Michael Hubbard.

It's been a busy few weeks for Horsham 2 with 4 games in as many weeks.

Firstly Crowborough away on a Friday night was looking touch and go if there were going to be 4 Horsham players turning up, many thanks to Daniel and Julie for playing in the end. Julie fell foul of a nasty attack in a Scotch gambit while Daniel was pressing in a rook endgame that ended in a draw. Alex missed his chance for a draw after sacrificing his queen to defend against a very strong junior and my own game was stopped by the match clock after 2 exchange sacrifices to lock the position into a draw.

In a sequence that summed up the team's season, Horsham 1 veered from disaster to triumph in consecutive matches, as they slumped to a big loss against Hastings 1 before they scored a narrow but deserved victory over a very strong East Grinstead 1 team.

In the Hastings 1 match, Horsham 1 went down at home by the margin of 0.5-3.5, with most boards suffering some sort of disaster. Only James Mansson was able to escape with a draw.

With my visits to the club heavily curtailed, I have been playing in a 4NCL online tournament, 7 rounds played fortnightly with a time control of 45+15.

This position arose in my latest game as white after my opponent played Bd6-Bb8...

Horsham 2 ventured down to Worthing for the halfway mark of the season. Unfortunately I missed this game with Roy volunteering as captain on the night. A very close loss of 2.5-1.5 against a strong team, disappointing that it only came down to one board in the end.

A comment from Ian about his game below.

Many of Horsham teams are having a tough time this year but Division 3 is a different story with a very satisfactory look at the moment!

Horsham 5 faced Bexhill 4 away on 24th January. It wasn't until we arrived at Bexhill that my grey cells clicked into action and realised that one of our players had become ineligible for the 5th team since the team selection had been made. This necessitated that we moved up boards 3 and 4, and declared a default against ourselves on board 4. Other team captains, and indeed players, please take care to avoid a similar mistake as the season progresses and more players get caught by the rule about 4 appearances for higher teams.

Last Thursday, Horsham 1 were away against Haywards Heath 1; they managed to record a comfortable victory due to wins on the bottom two boards.

First to end was the top board game between Gavin Lock and Feliks Kwiatkowski. A complicated Rossolimo Sicilian end up as a draw, giving us a good result to build on.

Next was James McGrath's victory over Edward Upsdell on bottom board. James McGrath played the Sicilian against his opponent's 1 e4; his opponent played an unwise piece sacrifice that was easily refuted. The made the score 1.5-0.5 in our favour.

Horsham hosted two matches, Horsham 2 vs East Grinstead 1 and Horsham 6 vs East Grinstead Bookshop. Along with the other internal club competition matches, it was another full night. As usual we were out-graded on every board, particularly so with this very strong East Grinstead team.

First to finish was Phil on board 3. Black had a strong kingside attack after an opposite-side castling Scandinavian but white found all the defensive moves and with the position destined for a drawn rook ending, the players agreed a draw.