North Circular Chess League, Ilford v Wanstead 3 – 18 July 2022
2 games with reversed colours. Rapid time control G20+10
Tom Barton (19.07.2022)
Both clubs agreed to as many boards as possible for this match as a great opportunity for juniors to gain experience. Wanstead fielded seven juniors and Ilford three in an 11 board contest, the largest team event at Ilford for many years which is something to celebrate, plus one friendly match making 12 boards in all. Given the high 30C heat, cold drinks all round were in order before play commenced.
Round 1 saw the top three boards halve out, the middle generally going to Ilford, and the Wanstead juniors proving too strong on the bottom three boards so at the halfway mark the match was tied at 5.5 each. After a further drinks break round 2 got underway with everything to play for. I had an early draw aganst Paul Barclay against whom I couldn’t get to complicate the position, this turned out to be the only draw of the second round. The Wanstead juniors were pressing the Ilford adult team hard and once again proved too strong on the bottom boards. Ilford started to reel Wanstead’s lead back in and the match went down to the final game on board 4. Here Adrian had a plus but it was difficult to see how he could make progress, in the event he tried too hard and his position collapsed. So the final result was 12-10 to Wanstead. See the final result on the LMS here.
For the record, the two round friendly on board 12 was between Gurukarthik Gurusamy (Wanstead junior) and Adhar Jaiswal (Ilford).
Ilford Chess Club 