Horsham Chess Club

Congratulations to Matthew Forster for winning the Knight trophy with a very impressive score of 86% (6 out of 7).

As a club we scored 102 points from 210 games in the MSL leagues and KO which represents 49% .

I have circulated the full results by email but have copied all those with over 50% in the picture. Please remember that those with fewer than 4 games are not eligible for the Knight (hence the shading).

Julie, Anthony and I represented the club at the AGM last night. It was a pleasant evening which was not too contentious. I took home brief notes which I copy below. Julie stood down as fixtures secretary and earnt a round of applause for all her excellent work for the MSL.

As the season heads to the final week on 27 June we have had a flurry of results which I will summarise here.

Last night James Mansson secured the Rook championship to join Paul Taylor as the Bishop victor and Julie Denning as the Knight winner.

Also last night Paul Taylor beat Mick Harris is the final of the Knockout Plate.

In the quickplays - James Mansson also won this while in an all junior plate final Zevon Rustom nudged out Lucy Bennet-Stevens to win his first adult trophy...the first of many I suspect!

Division 2 has been finalised and Horsham 3 have just missed out on promotion.

Prior to the adult club's lightning competition the juniors got in on the act with their own frenetic brand of 10-second chess - actually I'm being slightly unfair as there were plenty of decent quality games...

Another evening of ten second chess with all the usual upsets and exciting turns! Mike Forster went through to the final after a tiebreaker with Paul Taylor. In the other division three players shared top spot but Anthony Higgs and James Mansson were edged out by Morgan Blake who went through to the final.

It was the usual tense final but Mike took the lead to set the scene for a thrilling final game. Morgan managed to take the lead but there were complications in the centre which Mike optimised. Morgan's King was forced forward to h4 before succumbing.

Here is an unusual thing to play with on the internet - Bewitched chess. Its gives you a form of aided blindfold chess with a fun visual display which at times can be a bit perplexing. Its not the strongest engine to play against which is just as well because I didnt adjust so well.

Might be a bit of fun for a Bank Holiday

www.bewitched.com/chess

Horsham 3 have been confirmed 2nd in the second division - this is a very strong division and does a lot of credit to the players involved.

John got an update from Brian Denman (see below) about the Brighton Crowborough match and its the worst possible result for Horsham 1 and Horsham 2 - a draw. This pushes Horsham 1 to second place, just nudging them out of the top spot once again (our last win was in 2010) and means relegation for Horsham 2 ... a disappointing end to the season.

The 2nd team completed their fixtures with two matches in the space of 4 days. Last Friday we played our re-arranged match away at Crowborough who fielded their strongest team of the season (!) and edged a 3-2 victory.