Horsham Chess Club

Every Thursday evening Horsham has been meeting for some online blitz chess. For two weeks out of three we meet on chess.com at 8:10pm to play 5|5 in a frantic arena style. This includes this week, I look forward to the hectic pace and seeing lots of people there.

Last Thursday Horsham players took part in another MSL Team Battle with Brighton, Eastbourne, Bognor and Crowborough members.

Brighton came out top with 59 points, thanks to a top performance by Luke Rutherford conceding only one draw. His last game was a hard-fought victory over Horsham's Gavin Lock who produced the next best performance out of all the players and led us to 2nd place overall with 46 points.

This week we are back on chess.com for our Thursday Horsham Blitz, see you there!

A couple of weeks ago Horsham were pitted against MK Phoenix 2 in the Online 4NCL. MK Phoenix 2 were a team we aimed to beat with our team being noticeably higher graded and a win would put us comfortably into mid-table. The bottom two teams in each group get demoted so we are aiming to stay well above that.
Disaster struck straight away as one team member forgot about the game and defaulted their board. This meant that we not only lost the game but got a 1-point penalty on top for the default. This meant we were effectively 2-0 down with 3 games going.

Last Thursday we took part in a team arena tournament on LiChess against Bognor, Brighton, Crowborough, Eastbourne, and a team of other Mid-Sussex League players.
Playing for Horsham were Anthony, Chris, Dix, Marian, Monika, Nick, Richard and myself. Anthony repeated his form from last Thursday being the best player in the tournament with 5.5/6 and with pretty much everyone else in good form Horsham won the tournament comfortably.

Two weeks ago, Horsham faced Crewe in the online 4NCL.
On board 4 Marian was in a bit of trouble after his opponent managed to grab a couple of queen side pawns with tactics. Unfortunately, those pawns marched and Marian had to surrender.

Over the last few weeks Horsham Chess Club has been hosting tournaments on chess.com on Thursday evenings at 8:10pm, with a time control of 5minutes + 5second increment that is open to all.

Two weeks ago on Thursday it started out as a close race, with Anthony, Chris, Ian, and Nick all in the mix. Nick and Anthony managed to break away and Nick managed to get a 1 point lead, which went down to their final games. They both won so Nick won the tournament with a commendable 6 wins 2 draws and 1 loss.

Last Tuesday Horsham faced Warley Mighty Quinborne in round 2 of the 4NCL online league and we had white on even boards. Warley Mighty Quinborne are ranked first in our group on initial seeding so this was going to be a tough match.

Horsham Chess Club is running tournaments on chess.com on a weekly basis.

On Sunday we played a Swiss blitz tournament with 3 rounds. Lucy showed her prowess with a convincing 2.5/3 to win the tournament with ease.

On Thursday we tried the hectic Arena format where you get repaired instantly. It was generally agreed to be a lot better with some players getting in as many as 9 games. After the initial rush I managed to grab the lead and held it for the middle of the tournament. But Chris came storming through to snatch the lead and hold of all challengers.

The 4NCL has set up an online tournment taking place every Tuesday over the next ten weeks. Horsham's team is in the third division and today we faced our first opponents, 3 Smarties 1 Tube, who are one of the top teams in our division. Things got off to a smooth start with every game starting on time with no technical issues.

I thought it was time to replace the suspension news with a more jolly post - so here you go Horsham 1 dominating a very strong Division 1!

In the meantime we are looking into how best to promote chess in the new strange times - we are hoping to arrange some online tournaments so watch this space.