Horsham KO'd by Woodpushers

Tidying up the official record with the scorecard of a match I missed back in mid-December...

With the grading handicap Woodpushers required a 3-2 win to progress whereas a tied match was good enough for us.

For the first time that I can remember I finished first with Black on board 1 - a Czech Benoni going very very right against Roger Hutchings. I won a pawn on the queenside, smashed up the centre, and finished off on the kingside. Why aren't all games like this? Next Oliver succumbed on board 5 to Hugo Westwood-Dunkley - a powerful kingside attack winning material which Black was unable to recover from.

On board 4 Nick was unlucky, standing well against Juju Samworth-Calvier before losing his way. On board 2 Matt played out what looked like a deserved draw for both players against Andy Briggs. That left just Paul, who agreed a draw against Ian Kelly in the latter's time trouble (but Ian had a forced win on the board so fair enough!), ensuring Woodpushers went through by the narrowest of margins.

A.R.J. Higgs 1-0 R.M. Hutchings
M.J. Forster 1/2-1/2 A.J. Briggs
P. Richardson 1/2-1/2 I.G. Kelly
N. Warren 0-1 J. Samworth-Calvier
O. Thorne 0-1 H. Westwood-Dunkley

3-2 to Woodpushers.