Category: Ilford Chess

ESSEX CHESS LEAGUE DIVISION 2 28th April 2025

ILFORD I 3 – 3 SOUTHEND I

1993 RAHUL GHOSE 1-0 NEIL SUTHERLAND w 1963

1868 NEVILLE TWITCHELL 0-1 HOWARD GRIST b 1943

1877 VENKATESH SUBRAMANIAN 0-1 JOSHUA CORFIELD 1966

1797 TONY KENT 1-0 STEVE WEDLOCK 1880

1692 VINCENZO NICOSIA 0-1 JOSHUA DAVIS 1629

1697 RAYYAN ASIF 1-0 MICHAEL SAUNDERS 1626

(Based on Jef’s notes) Our match point proved crucial as we are now safe from relegation: not exactly our finest hour or season: Ilford played 10/12, won 3, drew 1, lost 6= 7 points. Loughton 12/12 (season over, won 3, 6 points; Upminster 10/12, Won 1, drew 1= 2 points.

A tough match for Ilford as before long we went 0-2 down , but then came a fight back: the result could have gone either way with winning players losing & losing players winning.

Grist’s Caro-Kann opening was hard to break down but Neville got the edge when he sent his lone Knight into the heart of Grist’s defence. But, Howard came up with an even better reply which saw him escape and win the trapped Knight. This was followed by Venkatesh having his q-side pawns destroyed but when he went first one, then two pawns down to Joshua, it was all over.

Anthony Kent had a modest advantage out of the opening against the Scandinavian. Steve swapped off the rooks which helped white enter into a Q&B endgame winning material. Final Position below.

Saunders managed to win a pawn with his French Defence and then invaded Rayyan’s King-side with a lined-up Q&B. It looked all over till Michael, so engrossed on winning R for B, completely overlooked Rayyan’s 1-move Q&B mate on h7!! The last 2 games to finish were Vincenzo’s and Rahul. Vincenzo wriggled out of having his B trapped from his favourite Kings Indian Defence, by offering a Rook sac’ which Davis couldn’t accept or he’d be mated. (See Below) But as Nicosia’s time was running out with seconds left Vin couldn’t quite find the correct continuation and lost.

Last to finish was Rahul. He easily held off Grist’s Bird’s Opening and went into the endgame R for B up and crucially his a-pawn proved to be a winner as it sped for home- Howard’s Bishop unable to stop it.

Charlton 1 V Ilford 1

London Division 3 Wednesday 2nd April

Board	Rating	Charlton 1	V	Ilford 1	Rating
1	1906 (1852K)	Morris, David RG	½ – ½	G Ghose, Rahul	2006 (1993K)
2	1867 (1875K)	Van Ijzendoorn, PatrickB	½ – ½	B Leslie-Smith, Lance	1887 (1876K)
3	1843 (1856K)	Everson, James PB	1 – 0	G Barton, Tom A	1876 (1890K)
4	1799 (1789K)	Moore, GarfieldG	1 – 0	B Twitchell, Neville H	1874 (1868A)
5	1797 (1714K)	Douglas, DanielG	½ – ½	G Subramanian, Venkatesh	1875 (1877K)
6	1752 (1788A)	Rogers, David MG	0 – 1	G Jaiswal, Adhar	1836 (1794A)
7	1721 (1713K)	Shmarov, VladimirP	0 – 1	B Kent, Anthony R	1764 (1797K)
8	1695 (1676K)	Stebbings, Robert JG	½ – ½	G Choudhury, Shakeel	1746 (1720K)
Average	1798		4 – 4		1858

(Based on Tom and Anthony’s notes). We had our strongest team of the season for this match and even marginally out graded the opposition. We also welcomed a new player to the team, Lance.

Rahul had a very equal game against Black’s Sicilian and could not get any imbalances to use. Lance advised he was slightly fortunate to get a draw and Neville tried for activity but it all came unstuck. Venkatesh had an early draw. Shakeel got play from the Benko Gambit but could not convert a knight and pawn ending, one pawn to the better. With Anthony and Adhar both winning we were ahead. Below, Anthony’s opponent has just played 21..e7-e5? but 22. Ne5 Qd8 23. Qe6 Nc5? 24. NxBch kg7 25. Bh6ch sees black lose his rook on f7.

Tom’s game was the last to finish. “My opponent and I were both under 5 minutes but still in the middle game and I had a definite edge, however, on move 33 I played Qb4 (see board image below) having missed a neat tactic – can you see Black’s reply?”

NORTH CIRCULAR CHESS LEAGUE A DIVISION 24th March 2025

ILFORD 2½ – 3½ CHINGFORD I

1993 RAHUL GHOSE 0-1 GAVIN HUGHES 1949 W

1868 NEVILLE TWITCHELL ½ DAVID BRADY 1843 b

1837 ADHAR JAISWAL ½ PETER ROSE 1800

1797 ANTHONY KENT ½ ROBIN OAKLEY 1729

1687 RAYYAN ASIF 0-1 BRIAN SPEAR 1739

1685 JEF PAGE 1-0 default

(Edited from Jef’s notes). After Ilford II lost narrowly to Chingford II last week, They have now done the ‘double’ over us. A 6 boards match had been agreed, and Jef won our only game- by default.

Brian Spear quickly got the advantage over Rayyan as was troubled by the earlt Qb3 against his Leningrad Dutch opening, losing his b-pawn and another pawn. Brian held on as he weathered Rayyan’s attempts at a breakthrough, and then forked his King and Rook to finish the game.

On board 1, Gavin Hughes got a strong position from the Grand Prix Attack. His Knight got in among Rahul’s Kingside defence and once Hughes’ Rook and Queen joined the attack it was all over. So from here on we went from 1-nil up to 1-2 down.

Anthony played his ‘usual’ Kingside pawn push and attempted to break through, but Robin came up with a very neat defence of forcing a draw by repetition of Rook checks against Tony’s open King. in the diagram below Black plays Rh3 check, and the Rook can keep checking the black king. If the king moves to the g-file, black retreats the Rook to h6. If the king goes to the back rank, the black queen joins in the fun. Computer analysis confirmed the game was completely drawn.

On board 2, Neville, won a pawn against Brady’s French defence, but with accurate defensive play, Knight against Bishop, and his with King well placed, David held on for a half.

The wildest game of the night was Adhar’s as it seemed where ever you looked someones Queen, usually Adar’s, seemed to be en pris. Both Kings were open to attack. In the end, with Adhar’s Queen rather off-side, it was Peter who forced a draw by repetition.

NORTH CIRCULAR CHESS LEAGUE B DIVISION 17th March 2025

Time control: 80 minutes + 10 seconds a move. Current NCCL ratings.

CHINGFORD II 3 – 2 ILFORD II

1838 DAVID BRADY ½ ADHAR JAISWAL 1837 w

1784 PETER ROSE 0-1 ANTHONY KENT 1772 b

1816 SEAN COLLIETY ½ JEF PAGE 1657

1766 ROBIN OAKLEY 1-0 VINCENZO NICOSIA 1664

1714 BRIAN SPEAR 1-0 JIAYI ZHENG 1148

Based on Jef’s Notes. A match we let slip away as we had chances in all the games. I got the better of the opening against Colliety but as he wriggled out into the middle game and began to prepare an attack I quickly sought to swap off Queens and my offer of a draw was rapidly accepted. Anthony’s game transposed into a Kings Gambit Accepted. Rose got his bishop trapped and sacrificed it for a pawn, with little rewardr as he couldn’t get his pieces going. eventually losing a Rook, that quickly forced the end of the game in Anthony’s favour. Position below after 19. B (on b3) xf7 ch KxB

But from here on it got tricky. Vincenzo was doing OK when he got control of the c-file but with pawns level in the endgame, Robin’s B was better than Enzo’s N and his isolated and spread pawns became easy targets for Oakley’s King. Jiayi had a really good game against captain Brian Spear as he sac’d a piece to strip Brian’s K-defence of its pawns. However Jiayi couldn’t quite find the correct continuation for his Q,R & N and a bad blunder cost him the N and the game. I’ve hardly ever seen Brian having to think so much having to find the best defence. So it was up to Adar to see if he could win and at least achieve a drawn match for us and he tried to force the issue on the Q-side. But as Brady’s time ran out he managed to come up with a passed a-pawn that ran down the board forcing Adar to leave his N on a1 to block the queening square. Fortunately he was able to race his K right across the board to capture it and then race back to stop David’s g-pawn from queening.

Next NCL match: Monday 24th March Ilford I v Chingford I

ESSEX CHESS LEAGUE DIVISION 2 11th March 2025

WANSTEAD 3 4-2 ILFORD 1

1850 FINBAR McLOUGHLIN 1-0 RAHUL GHOSE 1993 b

1857 MARK MURRELL ½ VENKATESH SUBRAMANIAN 1877 w

1791 M LATAILLE 0-1 ADHAR JAISWAL 1794

1797 PAUL BARCLAY ½ TONY KENT 1797

1684 E DE BOK 1-0 VINCENZO NICOSIA 1692

1744 P NICKALLS 1-0 JEF PAGE 1685

1788 Average grade 1807

Toss won by Wanstead, White on odd boards.

(Based on Jef’s notes) Up against a strong Wanstead team (though we actually outgraded them) it proved to be as tough a match as expected, but a disappointing result not helped by me getting my Queen pinned against my King. Vincenzo returned to his favourite Kings Indian Defence but Ed Bok put in a powerful K-side pawn attack which eventually overwhelmed Enzo. Venkatesh arrived late and went a pawn down but it wasn’t catastrophic as it went into an opposite colour Bihops ending and a draw was agreed, Tony got some advantage from the opening but also had to settle for a half. Meanwhile Adhar seemed to be in trouble against Lataille. But when he overlooked being back-rank mated he defended, costing him a piece. Although Adhar’s pawn structure did him no favours having to nurse doubled-pawns, eventually his 2 Kn’s & B got in amongst Lataille’s pawns, 2 B’s and defence. Rahul hard a hard time holding off McLoughlin’s pieces and eventually it proved to be a lost cause as with the extra pawn in a K,R&P ending, Finbar slowly marched up the board to victory.

Board Metropolitan 2 Ilford

1 1935 (1930A) Carmichael, Ned 0 – 1 Pereslavtsev, Alexandr 2215 (2090A)
2 2073 (1993P) Kamar, Mohammad 0 – 1 Ghose, Rahul 2023 (1993K)
3 1862 (1867K) Marrow, Jonathan ½ – ½ Jaiswal, Adhar 1827 (1794A)
4 1842 (1867K) Lepetun, Jan ½ – ½ Kent, Anthony R 1777 (1797K)
5 1822 (1821K) Lenaghan, Kevin 1 – 0 Choudhury, Shakeel 1730 (1720K)
6 1774 (1768K) Day, Gareth 1 – 0 Page, Jeffrey 1657 (1685A)
7 1817 () Asade, Tolu 0 – 1 Undre, Taha 1548 (1561K)
8 1733 (1738K) Benson, Neil 1 – 0 Croitoru, Riley UNG
Average Grade 1858 4 – 4 Average Grade 1598

(Edited from Jef’s notes). We had some difficulty sorting out the team for this match: Ilford’s usual captain Tom Barton was away, and one player dropping out due to illness. In the event, it was good to get a full team out. At one stage, with so few members available, it looked as though we night have to default the match.

Junior Ilford member Riley made his Ilford debut- a tough baptism of fire and his game quickly ended after he went a knight down. After that some of the games seemed to end in a strange fashion. Taha was under pressure on the Q-side from Tolu’s Q&R’s but a terrible error cost him the game . Whilst Shakeel managed to win R for B, but being pawns against 2 powerful Bishops, an oversight saw Shakeel try to avoid them, and blundered putting his Rook en pris. Jef held off Gareth for quite a while with a nice opening, but then let it all slip away in time trouble losing a pawn and the endgame.

Adhar recovered from his loss in the last match to play a more conservative opening and hold for a draw. Anthony Kent as Black played an Old Indian and got down to a Queen and opposite coloured Bishops ending. The hurried queen swap led to a draw against Lepetun. However, instead of 32…QxQ, 32…Qc1 would have given black a key material advantage.

Alexandr on board 1 played a nice forcing Q,R and B attack down the open KR On Board 2, reached a late middle game with a Rook and 4 pawns each, where he had a Bishop and white a knight. After the Rooks went off, hos Bishop dominated the knight which had to sacrifice itself. Rahul won with his Bishop blocking his opponent’s passed b pawn and his king soon to take white’s a pawn (picture below).

Given the average grading difference, a good result and the solitary point for the drawn match after a series of losses. That gets us off the bottom of the division 3 league table. Our inspirational captain below.

Board	Rating	Ilford	V	Wanstead 1	Rating
1 ( B )	1993 (2011)	Ghose, Rahul	1 – 0	Cawdery, John	2086 (2109)
2 ( W )	1868 (1882)	Twitchell, Neville H	½ – ½	Spearman, David	2110 (2083)
3 ( B )	1794 (1823)	Jaiswal, Adhar	1 – 0	Rix, Steven JL	2019 (1986)
4 ( W )	1797 (1752)	Kent, Anthony R	1 – 0	McLoughlin, Finbar	1850 (1861)
5 ( B )	1687 (1724)	Asif, Rayyan	0 – 1	Hunnable, Ian D	1927 (1827)
6 ( W )	1685 (1670)	Page, Jeffrey	0 – 1	Anjulan, Ashwin	1765 (1792)
Average	1804		3½ – 2½		1960

Played 4 won 2 Lost 2 so far in the North Circular Chess League Division A, but Ilford scored another rare (and surprising) win over Wanstead.

Neville got a draw on board 2. On Board 5, Asif played a Slav Defence and was a pawn down in a queen and pawns ending. After queens were exchanged, the game was lost. With Jef losing, we were 2 1/2 – 1/2 down. Then we won the last 3 games

(Notes by Rahul) In my game versus John Cawdrey on board 1, it was interesting to see that at the final position I was down to less than 2 minutes on the clock and it was hard to find the win. White played Qh5 in the final position and his flag fell (below). I saw the repetition with Rf6, Qe8 Rf8, Qh5 Rf6… however engine says it’s -6 for black. https://lichess.org/4gehBY5e/white#1

On Board 3, Jaiswal took advantage of some innacurate play by white against the French. 19. g3?? was met with 19……Nd5 – e3 below. https://lichess.org/xjNTlCAz#1

Board 4 saw Anthony play a Vienna Hybrid emerging off a bit worse off from the opening. When Black castled kingside on move 14, the advantage swung towards white who gained a strong knight on d6. On move 25, White castled queenside and applied pressure. With time short, white checkmated the black king. Game score does not include time scramble, but computer says White is +4 on move 35 in diagram below after playing 35 Qc6 – h1. https://lichess.org/83GmCBZR/black#1

ESSEX CHESS LEAGUE DIVISION 2: 28th January 2025

Toss won by Ilford, White on odd boards.

UPMINSTER II 1½ – 4½ ILFORD II

1. 1801 LES CRANE 0-1 NEVILLE TWITCHELL 1872
2. 1812 AIDAN CORISH 0-1 VENKATESH SUBRAMANIAN 1849
3. .1676 SERGEY PESERSLAVTSEV 0-1 ADHAR JAISWAL 1836
4. .1715 R ATTANAYAKE 0-1 TONY KENT 1753
5. 1679 TREVOR CARR ½ VINCENZO NICOSIA 1710
6. 1631 P BRIGGS 1-0 JEF PAGE 1686

(Based on Jef Page’s notes) A good win for Ilford with all 4 top boards winning . Om top Board Neville led off with a nice attack against Les Crane’s Sicilian and quickly got on top. And so began a procession of wins as Venkatesh won the exchange and went into a 2 Rooks ending against Aidan Corish’s R&N. On board Adhar was too strong for his opponent and he too won the endgame. Tony Kent followed that up with a backs to the wall Leningrad Dutch Defence opening. Attanayake’s castled queen side and had a promising attack down the open h-file. Black held out, and Tony calmly pounced on an error to mount his own Q-attack to win a piece and the game. Vincenzo was always equal to Trevor Carr who also, with his brother Neil, used to play for us. But Trevor put in a strong attack getting his R’s threatening the 7th rank and a draw was soon agreed. Jef went on a manic King chase smashing to Biggs’ King’s defence and threatening mate with my Q & both R’s (which should have been more than enough) sent Peter Briggs’s Houdini King running from g1 over to a4! And still he could not find the killer move, and running out of time made an unfortunate blunder. Thanks to everyone who played.

From Board 4: White has just played 31 Qh8 to b8, but has overlooked the stength of 31….Qe3ch which exploits white’s weak black line

5 moves later, it was all over for white