Lost In Styal (From Messenger Newspapers)

Wilmslow 'A' vs Urmston on 23/11/09

1:28pm Tuesday 24th November 2009 in Urmston Chess Club.

Urmston didn't get off to the best of starts, with two of their players arriving late, having gone a magical mystery tour. This was Wilmslows first real action of the season, having played their B team a couple of weeks earlier, and the former Division 2 team put out a stong team averaging 17 grading points over Urmstons strongest offering. Board 2 was concluded within the hour after Keith Johnston lost material and struggled to recover. Captain Tim PLunkett squared things up for Urmston with a fascinating game which saw both sides racing to Queen their passed pawns, the Urmston player was successful and went on to win Queening a further two pawns in the process. Board 4 saw Chris Guffogg of Wilmslow trying to unsettle Phil Shaughnessy with a variant of the English which quickly transformed to the familiar Queens Gambit. With Chris having placed his Queen on b3 Phil launched a quick & aggressive Kingside assualt which could not be sufficiently defended. 2-1 to Urmston. Board 5 Andy Parry had got himself into a tricky position which coupled with severe time shortage, saw some poor moves and his position crumble, so all square again. As usual Joe Royle was last man, but could do nothing to avoid defeat.