Avengers 2: Defeat By White Rose Dashes Promotion Hopes
In a critical R9 encounter, Avengers 2 were narrowly defeated by Chessable White Rose 2: one of the strongest 2nd Division sides.
| Chessable White Rose 2 | 2029 | Anglian Avengers 2 | 2038 | |||||
| 241 | w | Keetman, Maaike | 2169 | 0 – 1 | Talsma, Paul | 2177 e | ||
| 242 | b | Gayson, Peter M | 2150 | 1 – 0 | White, Russell P | 2117 c | ||
| 243 | w | Wills, Tom | 1967 c | ½ – ½ | Bui, Kyan | 2057 e | ||
| 244 | b | Parkhouse, Max | 1832 c | 1 – 0 | Kerr, Rowland | 1802 c | ||
| 2½ – 1½ | ||||||||
Rowland obtained a promising position in a Queens Gambit Exchange Variation. But opened up the position prematurely allowing Max Parkhouse a winning tactic.
Kyan equalized rather easily against Tom Wills in a Four Knights, and accepted a draw in a level 2Rs + opposite bishop endgame on move 26.
Russell didn’t get much for his pawn in a Mora Gambit, and so threw in the exchange, and then a further piece. Peter Gayson kept all of the offerings and forced Russell’s resignation on move 54.
The bright point of the evening was once again provided by “The Tank” Talsma. In his debut game for the 2nd team, Paul slowly but surely outplayed Maaike Keetman in a Closed Lopez, finally ending resistance in an opposite bishops endgame on move 72.
A consolation point for the 2nd team, taking Paul’s personal score to an amazing 8 out of 8!
For practical purposes, this ends the 2nd team’s chances of
qualifying for the Championship phase, and earning promotion to the 1st Division. This is still mathematically possible, but we would need to win in R10 and for 3
other results to go our way: only the England football team manager would
think this a realistic path to qualification!
Enjoy the final game of the season!