On Thursday, we held our last club night at the Holly Bush before we move to the Cumberland Club! It was a full house, with two Middlesex League matches: Hendon Barnet Knights comfortably defeated King’s Head 2, but Hendon 1 lost their return match against Muswell Hill.
| Hendon 1 | Hendon 1 | Muswell Hill 1 | Muswell Hill 1 | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Richardson, John R | 2373 | ½ - ½ | Finn, Peter | 2177 | ||
| 2 | Brozel, Sacha | 2288 | 1 - 0 | Wilks, Simon | 2172 | ||
| 3 | Stoica, Savas Marin | 2139 | 0 - 1 | Thatte, Nishchal | 2088 | ||
| 4 | Jain, Gautam R | 2032 | 0 - 1 | Ethelontis, Alexandros N | 2108 | ||
| 5 | Eedle, Eric F | 1854 | ½ - ½ | Bird, Joel | 2120 | ||
| 6 | Bolchover, Anthony | 1853 | 0 - 1 | Wilson, David J | 2022 | ||
| 2 - 4 | |||||||
Fittingly for a night when a (brief) era was coming to a close, we were fortunate to see the return of Sacha and Gautam, who both played for the club in previous seasons, but have been away at university most of this year.
The match didn’t start well, with Savas losing to talented youngster Nishchal Thatte, and though I think Sacha levelled the scores briefly, a couple more losses elsewhere sealed our fate.
It was a strange outcome: our line-up was at least as strong as when we played Muswell Hill away in February (for one thing, we didn’t default a board as we did on that occasion), and yet our opponents won. Still, both matches were close, both on paper and in results, so some variation shouldn’t be a surprise.
| Hendon Barnet Knights | Hendon Barnet Knights | Kings Head 2 | Kings Head 2 | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Borces, Randolf | 1 - 0 | Beachley, Evan | 1699 | |||
| 2 | Bakacsi, Zsolt | 1 - 0 | Ainscow, Faye | 1575 | |||
| 3 | Michener, Max | 1198 | ½ - ½ | Parfett, Gerald F | |||
| 4 | WALKOVER | 1 - 0 | DEFAULT | ||||
| 5 | WALKOVER | 1 - 0 | DEFAULT | ||||
| 6 | WALKOVER | 1 - 0 | DEFAULT | ||||
| 5½ - ½ | |||||||
The Barnet Knights match was already “un-loseable” before kick-off, with our opponents defaulting three boards, and the home team romped home with two further wins and a draw.
Many thanks to everyone who played! Goodbye Holly Bush – see you at the Cumberland Club!