Our 1st team put in a fine performance with a 7½-½ win away at Hammersmith, to move into 4th place in Middlesex League Division 1.
| Hammersmith 1 | Hammersmith 1 | Hendon 1 | Hendon 1 | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Kelmendi, Bajrush | 184 | 0 - 1 | Cherniaev, Alexander | 233 | ||
| 2 | Woolley, John H | 156 | 0 - 1 | Eden, Tomer | 203 | ||
| 3 | Mabud, Sheikh A | 150 | 0 - 1 | Senior, Gary | 194 | ||
| 4 | Collard, Amel | 149 | 0 - 1 | Peiris, T Gayan M | - | ||
| 5 | Price, Michael C | 145 | 0 - 1 | Raoof, Adam N | 188 | ||
| 6 | Rentzos, Panagiotis | 139 | 0 - 1 | Ellis, Daniel | 182 | ||
| 7 | Lee, R. | - | 0 - 1 | Bigio, Jacob | - | ||
| 8 | Psychrani, E. | - | ½ - ½ | Kent, Anthony R | 174 | ||
| ½ - 7½ | |||||||
Match report by Adam Raoof
Hendon were heavy favourites to win this match, even without the inclusion of Russian Grandmaster Alex Cherniaev in the squad. However, our generous opponents did not demur, and even provided their usual tea and chocolate digestives as a peace offering.
In the end only Anthony – playing his first match for the Lions – took the offer, all the other games going heavily Hendon’s way.
In my game I had a much simpler continuation just before the time control with Bxg5! (not Rac1) hxg5, Nxg7 Kxg7, Rf5 with mate or the win of the queen. I had a strategically similar position in the 4NCL the day before and couldn’t win it, and the postmortem for that game gave me some ideas (Bd2-a5 and Nb6) which I could use to my advantage and to Mr Price’s disadvantage!
Congratulations to Jacob Bigio on his first win for the team, and a welcome addition to our squad he is.
Credit to John Woolley who, in a lost position, could have claimed the game when Tomer’s phone made a noise – but didn’t.