Alpha-One   Bees   Seaside   Tigers   Threefold   Freebee   Monday-Four   Tuesday-Four   Five   Dudley  
Seaside  2024-25
  Score 1 4  
Wed-11-Sep  Seaside 1 - 5  Alpha-One 103    Seaside Points ~ 2  
Mon-23-Sep  Hazle Bees 2 - 4  Seaside 109   Players Aug SB-A SB-B Sol-A WQ Sol-B SC Lch Olt Red SW CB      
Wed-02-Oct  Solihull-A 2½-3½  Seaside 112   John L Emanuel 1957K 1 1 1                      
Wed-30-Oct  Seaside  Warley Quinborne 121   Alexander Iskauskas 1957K   2 2                      
Wed-13-Nov  Seaside  Solihull-B 127   Karan Kukreja 1925K 2 3 3                      
Mon-18-Nov  Sutton Coldfield  Seaside 128   Darren H Whitmore 1882A 3   4                      
Wed-15-Jan  Seaside  Lichfield 140   David Thomson 1833K     5                      
Tue-28-Jan  Olton  Seaside 144   Tim A Lane 1799A 4 4 6                      
Wed-19-Feb  Seaside  Redditch 153   Martin D Smyth                            
Thu-27-Feb  Shirley & Wythall  Seaside 155   Robert Glass                            
Wed-26-Mar  Seaside  Central Birmingham 165   Nathanael Kasafir                            
                      Bruno A Dos Santos Silva                            
 ❶ Played Won Drawn Lost For Against Points   Sean Ralph                            
 Solihull-A 3 2 0 1 10.5 7.5 4   Terry W Walker                            
Alpha-One 2 2 0 0 8.5 3.5 4   Milenko Walner                            
 Seaside 3 2 0 1 8.5 9.5 4   Mark A Drugan 1739A 5                          
 Solihull-B 2 1 0 1 5.5 2.5 2   Iulian Vaduva 1687K   5                        
 Lichfield 1 1 0 0 4 2 2   Matthew Little                            
 Central Birmingham 1 1 0 4 2 0 2   Filippo Montanelli 1575E 6 6                        
 Warley Quinborne 2 0 1 1 5 7 1                              
 Sutton Coldfield 1 0 1 0 3 3 1                              
 Redditch 2 0 0 2 4.5 7.5 0                              
 Hazle Bees 2 0 0 2 4.5 7.5 0                              
 Olton 1 0 0 1 2 4 0                              
 Shirley & Wythall 0 0 0 0 0 0 0                              
                                                             
  103   109   112  
   Seaside Aug 1 - 5 Alpha-One Aug    Hazle Bees Aug 2 - 4  Seaside Aug    Solihull-A Aug 2½-3½  Seaside Aug  
  John L Emanuel 1957K 0 - 1 Bernard Chan 2199A   Cory S Hazlehurst 2097A 1 - 0 John L Emanuel 1957K   Finlay Bowcott-Terry 2348A ½ - ½ John L Emanuel 1957K  
  Karan Kukreja 1925K ½ - ½ Elis Denele Dicen 2187A   Adithya Vaidyanathan 2110A 0 - 1 Alexander Iskauskas 1957K   Andrew P McCumiskey 2111K 0 - 1 Alexander Iskauskas 1957K  
  Darren H Whitmore 1882A 0 - 1 Martin D Smyth 1909K   Faraz Malik 1948K 0 - 1 Karan Kukreja 1925K   Luke Honey 2084K 1 - 0 Karan Kukreja 1925K  
  Tim A Lane 1799A 0 - 1 Sathya Vaidyanathan 1857A   Neil Clarke 1946K ½ - ½ Tim A Lane 1799A   Richard J E McNally 1989A 0 - 1 Darren H Whitmore 1882A  
  Mark A Drugan 1739A ½ - ½ Robert Glass 1855K   Sathya Vaidyanathan 1857A ½ - ½ Iulian Vaduva 1687K   Julian H Summerfield 1838A 1 - 0 David Thomson 1833K  
  Filippo Montanelli 1575E 0 - 1 Junior R Taitt 1645R   David Wilkinson 1400E 0 - 1 Filippo Montanelli 1575E   Rhys Edwards 1797A 0 - 1 Tim A Lane 1799A  
                                                             
  A few lines on the 1B vs 1C match last night. The teams were evenly matched with a combined grading difference of only about 450 points. I played the English (Botvinnik System) against Neil, and we agreed a draw when we were down to R+4P each.  
  On Board 6, Filippo (W) soon picked up David’s h8 rook with his fianchettoed QB.  David trapped the bishop at the cost of a couple more pawns, but the material deficit was too big and Filippo converted smoothly.  
  On Board 4, Karan (B) played a …c6/…g6 hybrid against Faraz.  After …c5 and dxc5, Karan picked up pawns on both c5 and e5.  Next time I passed by, Karan had won a rook – two-nil to the Seasiders!  
  On Board 1, Cory (W) played a Catalan and John replied with both ...d5 and …c5.  John never managed to castle, but the position looked even-ish whenever I wandered by.  When I heard the pieces being put away, I assumed peace had broken out, but in fact Cory had won.  
  Alex (W) played an early h4 against Adithya’s …g6 setup on Board 2, and never allowed his opponent to settle (or castle).  Adithya, as is his wont, used up a lot of time, and Alex kept the pressure on and eventually won the exchange and then another piece.  
  Sathya (W) vs Claudio on Board 6 was a closed Sicilian. Claudio lost the exchange but got plenty of counterplay, and eventually got two connected passed pawns that looked enough for victory. Sathya hung on tenaciously and, with the match already settled, a draw was agreed.  
  Final score: 4-2 to the Seasiders! Cheers, Tim  
                                                             
  To steal a WhatsApp comment of Neil’s, on Wednesday a small band of scrappy locals took on the might of an expensively assembled superteam.  Anyway, enough about the Villa: this is a report on Solihull 1A vs the Seasiders.  
  Solihull’s list of registered players is alarming (thirteen players rated > 2000) but many of these are occasional guests.  The Seasiders were at full strength, and the teams lined up as follows:  
  First to finish was the Dazzler, white on Board 4 and outrated by 107 points, who lived up to his name with an eye-catching demolition of his opponent’s Steinitz Defence.  White came out of the opening with complete central control, then doubled his rooks on the a-file   
  to win a pawn on a6.  Black tried to whip up a bit of counterplay by doubling Darren’s f-pawns, but it was a futile demonstration, and eventually white’s beautifully centralized queen won a piece.  1–0 to the Seasiders.  
  On top board, John was outrated by a mere 391 points by Finlay Bowcott-Terry, and had to play black too!  The opening was a wild variation of the Winawer (I think it was the 1. e4 e6 2. d4 d5 3. Nc3 Bb4 4. e5 c5 5. a3 Bxc3+ 6. bxc3 Ne7 7. Qg4 Qc7 8. Qxg7 Rg8 9. Qxh7 cxd4)  
  and I’m told that white played his first twenty or so moves with just a few seconds thinking time for each one.  John, as usual, was using a lot of time.  White got a pawn to h7, but his king was caught in the centre, and John had castled long.  White sacrificed an exchange on c6  
  where the pawns and after that I lost sight of the game, but Alex tells me that the resulting attack didn’t work, and John was able to steer the game into an ending, still an exchange ahead.  There was more drama to come, though, with white sacrificing his bishop to reach   
   R+2P vs 2Rs, were connected and mobile.  A post-match tablebase check revealed that this position was won for black, but at the board, with only seconds on the clock, John wisely settled for a draw – a fantastic achievement against an outrageously strong opponent.  
  Karan, outrated by 159 points on Board 3, was black in a Caro-Kann.  I didn’t see much of this, but it was another tactical affair, with the kings exposed despite both players having castled early in the game.  In the end Karan had to throw in the towel: 1½–1½!  
  Dave and I were playing ordinary mortals on Boards 5 and 6.  Dave responded to Julian Summerfield’s English Opening à la Steinitz, accepting a very congested position in return for conceding no weaknesses.  At one point Dave had a nice collection of back-rank pieces,  
   including knights on d8 and e8.  Eventually both sides pushed their e- and f-pawns to their fourth ranks, and late in the evening the position broke open.  By this time I was deeply engrossed in my own game, so I didn’t see the denouement, but Julian emerged victorious.  
  On the bottom board I had the ratings edge – by two points!  The game started 1. c4 c6 2. Nf3 d5 3. g3 Nf6 4. Qc2 dxc4 5. Qxc4 Bf5, with the bishop going into hiding on h7.  I built up a nice edge, but black gave up a pawn to force the game into a R+5P vs R+4P ending,   
  where I had 5P vs 3P on the K-side but black had a passed a-pawn that I had to keep under supervision.  Could I win?  
  The other game that was still in progress was Alex vs Andy McCumiskey (rating difference: 154 points) on Board 2, which started with the Pirc Defence.  I didn’t see much of this, but Alex tells me that Andy set up a strange self-pin on the d-file that gave Alex an opportunity  
  to try a promising exchange sacrifice.  The compensation persisted for the rest of the evening, and Alex was eventually able to resolve into an easily won ending.  
  I hadn’t seen the end of Alex’s game, but somebody slipped the match card under my nose, and I saw that the score was 2½–2½!  My opponent had a tricky dilemma, and decided to give up his passed a-pawn in order to get his rook among my five K-side pawns (which then  
  became four).  I think this was probably the wrong decision, but I wouldn’t have fancied having to make the choice myself!  Anyway, my king and two of the pawns marched up the board and, with his king stuck on the back rank and his flag about to fall, my opponent walked  
   into a mate – and we had won the match 3½–2½! Dazzler and Karan had headed home by this time, but the other four of us stood around and chatted for a few minutes.  I don’t know about the others, but I was completely gob-smacked –  
  not just by the final score, but by the fact that we had gone toe-to-toe against such a strong team and had emerged victorious without having to rely on any gifted points. Cheers, Tim  
                                                             
  121   127   128  
   Seaside  Warley Quinborne    Seaside  Solihull-B    Sutton Coldfield  Seaside  
       
       
       
       
       
       
                                                             
  140   144   153  
   Seaside  Lichfield    Olton  Seaside    Seaside  Redditch