Mid Sussex League

Horsham 2 completed their Division 1 fixtures on Tuesday with another narrow 2-3 defeat, this time at home to Eastbourne 1 - the 5th time this season that we have suffered this score-line!
Alex faced an on-form Rasa who executed her attack clinically to secure the only victory on the night. Paul held the initiative for much of his game and won a pawn but the resulting Rook, Knight and Pawn ending was difficult and his opponent was able to equalise.

The 2nd team acquitted themselves quite well in a tough away fixture losing 2-3 to Worthing 1.
A special mention for Alex and Peter who both drew against opponents who out-graded them significantly on Boards 1 & 2 respectively. In fact we went home thinking we had a good chance of drawing the match as Alex seemed to have the initiative in his position at adjudication - unfortunately on deeper analysis there was not enough advantage to give a win.
David Graham (201) ½-½ Alex Freeland (182) (W)
Michael Nicholas (200) ½-½ Peter Harbott (171)

Horsham 2 had another close encounter, this time against Crowborough 1 on 15th March. At adjudication we were 0-1 down, Roy having lost with the black pieces to a highly talented junior who has represented England.

The 2nd team travelled down to Lewes 1 last Tuesday and were unfortunately narrowly defeated 2-3. As expected this proved to be a very tight affair between two evenly matched teams and there were some interesting games.

Horsham 1 were held to a draw by Brighton's second team last week...

Horsham 3 travelled to Eastbourne last week for a match where we were missing our top board player Ian due to illness. Thankfully John Cannon was able to step in on board 5 and we had a full team.

A brief report on a match that happened a couple of weeks back for which the final result has now been agreed...

Horsham 2’s strength in depth enabled the team to record another impressive victory to move into 4th place in Division 1.
Alex, playing Board 1 for the first time, had a tough initiation with the black pieces. Paul was unlucky on Board 2 having outplayed Howard Tebbs for much of the game and winning his opponents backward e pawn. Unfortunately his opponent found some counter-play that enabled him to win back his pawn and move into a won ending.

Horsham 2 achieved a pleasing 3-2 victory against Haywards Heath 1 last Tuesday. This promised to be a very tight match with both teams having the same average grade of 173 – they were stronger (on paper) on Boards 1 & 2 and we out-gunned them on 4 & 5 (with our strength in depth!).

A pretty impressive looking result for Horsham 3 last night.

The most unusual opening was on top board where Marc Bryant tried to outwit Roy Page with 1.a3 g6 2. h3 b6 which is unusual. He tried a later g3 and Rh2 to allow Bg2 but Roy always looked very strong and his attack soon became overwhelming.