Third Ballynafeigh Super Series quickplay

The June 2012 edition of the Ballynafeigh Super Series was slotted neatly between the Euro2012 football semi-finals, and for July it was placed between the end of the Tour de France and the start of the Olympic Games. This time quality and quantity were even better than before; 32 players taking part, with big-hitters like Michael Waters, Stephen Scannell, Eamonn Walls and Gareth Annesley vying with quickplay specialists Des Moreland, Damien Lavery and Damien Cunningham plus strong Intermediate players like Danny Mallaghan, Mark Newman, Ian Woodfield and Sam Flanagan. Throw into the mix a host of competitors fighting for three grading prizes and an exciting tournament was almost guaranteed. There were plenty of upset wins by lower-rated players (as a careful perusal of the crosstable below will show) but most of the usual suspects rose to the top in the battle for first place. In the end the tight nature of the contest was shown when three players - Scannell, Waters and Walls - tied for first on 4 points from 5 games. Scannell, Ballynafeigh's principal standard-bearer, had the best tie-break and was awarded first place, while even the tie-breaks couldn't separate the two Fisherwick players, Waters and Walls, who therefore shared the second prize. Grading prizes went to David Conlon, Matthew Chapman (both of the host club) and RVH's John Monaghan.

No Name                  Total  1    2    3    4    5   Prize

1  Stephen Scannell      4      7:W  4:W  2:D  3:W  6:D First
2  Michael Waters        4     15:W  8:D  1:D 21:W  7:W Second equal
3  Eamonn Walls          4     11:W 16:W 20:W  1:L 10:W Second equal
4  Desmond Moreland      3.5   26:W  1:L  8:W  5:D 16:W
5  David Conlon          3.5    6:W 15:L 12:W  4:D 17:W Grading U1700
6  Damien Lavery         3.5    5:L 18:W 23:W 24:W  1:D
7  Ian Woodfield         3      1:L 10:W 21:W 20:W  2:L
8  Gareth Annesley       3     23:W  2:D  4:L 25:D 15:W
9  Mark Newman           3     16:L 17:W 11:W 10:L 21:W
10 Mathew Chapman        3     32:W  7:L 27:W  9:W  3:L Grading U1500
11 Damien Cunningham     3      3:L 22:W  9:L 26:W 25:W
12 John Monaghan         3     24:W 23:L  5:L 19:W 20:W Grading U1200
13 Tony Redden           3     17:D 20:L 28:W 14:D 22:W
14 Colin Fenton          3     22:L 32:W 18:D 13:D 24:W
15 Sam Flanagan          2.5    2:L  5:W 16:D 29:W  8:L
16 Niall Troughton       2.5    9:W  3:L 15:D 28:W  4:L
17 Danny Mallaghan       2.5   13:D  9:L 25:W 18:W  5:L
18 Robert Lavery         2.5   30:W  6:L 14:D 17:L 29:W
19 Ram Rajan             2.5   29:D 25:L 26:W 12:L 28:W
20 Richard Gould         2     27:W 13:W  3:L  7:L 12:L
21 Martin Kelly          2     31:W 27:W  7:L  2:L  9:L
22 Paul Anderson         2     14:W 11:L 24:L 23:W 13:L
23 Paul McLoughlin       2      8:L 12:W  6:L 22:L 30:W
24 Mohamed Saad          2     12:L 31:W 22:W  6:L 14:L
25 Chris Armstrong       2     28:D 19:W 17:L  8:D 11:L
26 Dennis Wilkinson      2      4:L 30:W 19:L 11:L 31:W
27 Callum Ormerod        2     20:L 21:L 10:L 30:W 32:W
28 Paul Logan            1.5   25:D 29:W 13:L 16:L 19:L
29 Garry Johnston        1.5   19:D 28:L 31:W 15:L 18:L
30 Adrian Dornford Smith 1     18:L 26:L 32:W 27:L 23:L
31 Patrick Magee         1     21:L 24:L 29:L 32:W 26:L
32 Charlie Logan         0     10:L 14:L 30:L 31:L 27:L

Top seeds Waters and Scannell fought out an entertaining draw in Round 3.

[Event "Ballynafeigh Super Series 3"] [Site "?"] [Date "2012.07.24"] [Round "3"] [White "Waters, Michael"] [Black "Scannell, Stephen"] [Result "1/2-1/2"] [ECO "A04"] [PlyCount "68"] [EventDate "2012.??.??"] [Source "ChessBase"] [SourceDate "1997.11.17"] 1. b3 c5 2. Bb2 d6 3. e3 Nc6 4. Nf3 e5 5. d4 e4 6. Nfd2 d5 7. c4 Nf6 8. cxd5 Qxd5 9. Bc4 Qf5 10. O-O cxd4 11. exd4 Bd6 12. g3 O-O 13. Re1 Re8 14. Nf1 Qh3 15. Ne3 Bg4 16. Bf1 Qh5 17. Nxg4 Nxg4 18. h3 Nf6 19. Qxh5 Nxh5 20. Nd2 f5 21. g4 fxg4 22. Nxe4 Bb4 23. hxg4 Bxe1 24. Rxe1 Nf6 25. Nxf6+ gxf6 26. Bc4+ Kg7 27. Rd1 Rad8 28. d5 Ne5 29. g5 fxg5 30. Bb5 Re7 31. d6 Re6 32. Bc4 Ree8 33. Bb5 Re6 34. Bc4 Ree8 1/2-1/2

Ballynafeigh Super Series - June edition

With the European Football Championships taking a short break before their semi-finals, we cunningly scheduled the second edition of the Ballynafeigh Super Series for Tuesday 26th June. Interest is high in the Series so Damien Cunningham tries to ensure we don't overtax the capacity at Ballynafeigh Community Centre. So it was a disappointment that four players had to cry off on the night but Damien still conjured up four replacements.

I was again controlling the event and decided on experimenting with an accelerated draw in the five-round Swiss to get the main contestants for the first prize to meet each other a little earlier and also give the lower rated players a more equitable list of opponents in their search for grading prizes. Overall, I think it worked quite well and more than likely I will give the system another chance next time.

Ulster Champion Michael Waters had one of his rare off-days at the May Super series event but looked in determined mood from the off this time, in particular showing good time management, and raced to four wins out of four. Nearest pursuers were on three points so Waters only needed a draw in the final round. Despite this he didn't go for safety first and rolled out the risky Albin Counter Gambit - game on! Waters had clearly equalised by move 12 but then Masterson "started sacrificing pieces like Tal" as his opponent put it. It didn't look sound (but then Tal's attacks often didn't) and Waters, with his eye firmly fixed on overall victory, decided discretion is the better part of valour and allowed a perpetual check which Masterson had no option but to take.

Now to the grading prizes: Damien Lavery, winner of the May event, conceded draws in Rounds 1 and 3 to Steven Eachus and Damien Cunningham, but wins in the final two rounds, brought him the over 1700 Grading Prize and he was the only other unbeaten player after Waters. Karina Kruk beat Ballynafeigh Rascals team-mate Robert Lavery in the final round to secure the 1400-1700 Prize. However Robert's overall efforts (which included a brave attacking effort against May runner-up Des Moreland) secured the Under 1400 Prize on tie-break from Chris Armstrong.

Ballynafeigh Super Series - June 2012
Final Crosstable

No Name                  Total  1    2    3    4    5   Prize

1  Michael Waters        4.5    8:W 15:W 14:W 12:W  5:D Winner
2  Karina Kruk           4     20:W 10:W  7:L  6:W  9:W 1400-1700 Grading
3  Damien Lavery         4     13:D  4:W 12:D 16:W 11:W Over 1700 Grading
4  Gareth Annesley       3.5    0:D  3:L  8:W 15:W 12:W
5  John Masterson        3.5    6:W 12:L 18:W 17:W  1:D
6  Sam Flanagan          3      5:L 11:W 15:W  2:L 14:W
7  Desmond Moreland      3     12:L 17:W  2:W  9:L 18:W
8  John Bradley          3      1:L 16:W  4:L 22:W 17:W
9  Robert Lavery         3     23:W 18:L 13:W  7:W  2:L Under 1400 Grading
10 Danny Mallaghan       3     14:L  2:L 21:W 19:W 16:W
11 Chris Armstrong       3     22:   6:L 20:W 14:W  3:L
12 Damien Cunningham     2.5    7:W  5:W  3:D  1:L  4:L
13 Steven Eachus         2.5    3:D 14:L  9:L 21:W 20:W
14 Chris Black           2     10:W 13:W  1:L 11:L  6:L
15 Mark Newman           2     18:W  1:L  6:L  4:L 23:W
16 Mohamed Saad          2     21:W  8:L 19:W  3:L 10:L
17 Richard Gould         2     19:W  7:L 22:W  5:L  8:L
18 Paul McLoughlin       2     15:L  9:W  5:L 23:W  7:L
19 Dennis Wilkinson      2     17:L 23:W 16:L 10:L 22:W
20 Garry Johnston        1.5    2:L 21:D 11:L  0:W 13:L
21 Patrick Magee         1.5   16:L 20:D 10:L 13:L  0:W
22 Adrian Dornford Smith 1     11:L  0:W 17:L  8:L 19:L
23 Paul Anderson         1      9:L 19:L  0:W 18:L 15:L

[Event "Ballynafeigh Super Series"] [Site "Belfast"] [Date "2012.06.26"] [Round "5"] [White "Masterson, John"] [Black "Waters, Michael"] [Result "1/2-1/2"] [ECO "D08"] [PlyCount "47"] [EventDate "2012.06.26"] [Source "ChessBase"] [SourceDate "1997.11.17"] 1. d4 d5 2. c4 e5 3. dxe5 d4 4. Nf3 Nc6 5. a3 Bg4 6. Nbd2 Qd7 7. g3 Nge7 8. Bg2 Ng6 9. O-O Be7 10. b4 O-O-O 11. c5 Ncxe5 12. Nxe5 Nxe5 13. f4 d3 14. fxe5 dxe2 15. Qb3 Qd4+ 16. Kh1 exf1=Q+ 17. Nxf1 Qxa1 18. Qa4 Kb8 19. Bxb7 Qxc1 20. Bg2 Qc4 21. Qc6 Kc8 22. Qb7+ Kd7 23. Qc6+ Kc8 24. Qb7+ 1/2-1/2

Ballynafeigh May Rapidplay results

Tuesday 22nd May saw the first in a summer series of rapidplay tournaments at Ballynafeigh Chess Club. A strong field included Michael Waters, Stephen Scannell, Eamonn Walls and Gareth Annesley, but there were shocks from an early stage and in the end Damien Lavery and Desmond Moreland rose to the top. The latter two won their first four games before drawing with each other in the fifth and final round. Lavery took first prize on tie-break. Grading prizes went to Ballynafeigh pied-piper Damien Cunningham and Mohamed Saad.

Final Crosstable

No Name                  Total  1    2    3    4    5   Prize

1  Damien Lavery         4.5   17:W  5:W  3:W 10:W  2:D First
2  Desmond Moreland      4.5   13:W 15:W  6:W  7:W  1:D Second
3  Gareth Annesley       4      9:W 11:W  1:L 14:W  8:W
4  Eamonn Walls          4     14:L 21:W 18:W  6:W  7:W
5  Stephen Scannell      3.5   18:W  1:L 11:D 12:W 15:W
6  Damien Cunningham     3     12:W  8:W  2:L  4:L 11:W Under 1800 Grading
7  Danny Mallaghan       3     21:W 16:W 14:W  2:L  4:L
8  Calum Leitch          3     19:W  6:L  9:W 15:W  3:L
9  David Conlon          3      3:L 17:W  8:L 20:W 16:W
10 John Bradley          3     16:L 20:W 22:W  1:L 14:W
11 Ian Woodfield         2.5   22:W  3:L  5:D 13:W  6:L
12 Michael Waters        2.5    6:L 13:D 21:W  5:L 19:W
13 Mohamed Saad          2.5    2:L 12:D 23:W 11:L 20:W Under 1400 Grading
14 Karina Kruk           2      4:W 23:W  7:L  3:L 10:L
15 Sam Flanagan          2     20:W  2:L 16:W  8:L  5:L
16 Robert Lavery         2     10:W  7:L 15:L 18:W  9:L
17 Paul Anderson         2      1:L  9:L 19:L  0:W 22:W
18 Paul McLoughlin       2      5:L 19:W  4:L 16:L 23:W
19 Chris Armstrong       2      8:L 18:L 17:W 22:W 12:L
20 Adrian Dornford-Smyth 1     15:L 10:L  0:W  9:L 13:L
21 Martin Kelly          1      7:L  4:L 12:L 23:W  0:-
22 Ram Rajan             1     11:L  0:W 10:L 19:L 17:L
23 Paul Adamson          .5     0:D 14:L 13:L 21:L 18:L

Rapidplay at Ballynafeigh

Ballynafeigh Chess Club are running some rapidplay tournaments over the summer at their clubroom on Tuesday evenings. Planned schedule is to have one a month. Damien Cunningham has modestly christened this addition to the local chess calendar as the Ballynafeigh Super Series.

I'm going to be controlling at the first one on Tuesday 22nd May. There will be five rounds, 15 minutes each player per game. Players need to be there by 7.30 pm and the whole thing should be wrapped up by 11.00pm. I'm reliably informed places are going fast and there's already a good field entered for the series opener, so if you're thinking of playing get in touch pronto with Damien - his contact details are at the Ballynafeigh CC website.

Waters wins Williamson centenary edition

Michael Waters continued his right vein of form to win the 2012 Williamson Shield, 100 years on from its first edition. Crucial to his overall victory was a round 5 win over nine-time Williamson champion, Stephen Scannell. Waters went into the game with full points from his previous four games, with Scannell a half-point behind after taking a half-point bye on Saturday night. Waters with the Black pieces was content with a draw but was clever enough to offer the possibility of a pawn race between rival a- and h-pawns in a bishop and 4-pawn endgame. Scannell decided to grasp the opportunity to leap-frog his main rival for the title and played a move which looking like forcing Waters to give up his bishop to prevent the White a-pawn queening. But Waters countered immediately with a push of his h-pawn - he could afford to let his bishop go because now his pawn would queen first. Scannell immediately resigned.

Waters eventually finished with 5.5 points out of 6 after drawing with Danny Mallaghan, the only person who could still catch him, in the final round. That draw looked like securing Mallaghan one of the minor prizes; he had 4.5 points along with Ian Woodfield, who emerged the winner from a short but brutal battle with third-seed Gareth Annesley in the last round. The only other players who could reach 4.5 were Scannell and Callum Ormerod.  They were paired against each other and their game looked a certain draw from the time quite early in the game that a Queen and 5-pawn ending was reached. There were no obvious weaknesses to exploit or breakthroughs to make so it looked like the only thing Mallaghan and Woodfield had to worry about was who took second and who took third on tie-break.

However Scannell still had ambitions to make the prize-list and decided to try to tease out a win. The inexperienced Ormerod showed he had very strong nerves, worthy of a seasoned campaigner, and after a lot of careful manoeuvring, Scannell decided to take a very big risk to create complications, but in reality all he was doing was signing his own death warrant. Ormerod snaffled up the full-point to join those on 4.5. When the tie-break standings were calculated, it turned out that Ormerod was second, Woodfield third and despite his draw with the centenary champion, Mallaghan was remarkably out of the prizes.

Ross Harris won the 1300-1600 grading prize. Along the way he drew with the much higher- rated Mallaghan and Annesley and finished off his weekend by beating early pace-setter Damien Cunningham. Harris has just broken through the 1500 barrier and looks to be making strong strides towards 1600. He has the makings of a strong Intermediate player if he can continue to progress at his current rate. Raymond Smith took the under 1300 Grading Prize. Smith is one of those players who seems to raise his game against higher-rated opposition and he played a strong field in reaching 3.5 to win his prize on tie-break from the unlucky Gary Johnston.

Williamson Shield in early March

This year's Williamson Shield is a about a month later than usual. A few scheduling difficulties have pushed it back to the first weekend in March, but it's at its normal venue - the Maynard Sinclair Pavilion. You can find more details at the UCU website.

It will be interesting to see whether this time-slot proves popular with players. UCU Chairman John Cairns tells me that the entries so far are very encouraging with 5 of last year's top 7 already confirmed in the field. That 5 doesn't include last year's champion, Stephen Scannell, but he usually like to leave his entry late and it would be a big surprise if Scannell didn't turn up to defend his title. Main rival is likely to be Ulster champion, Michael Waters, who seems to be winning everything these days, but former winners Cairns and Gareth Annesley, the latter just back from a good performance in Bunratty, will no doubt be in the mix too.

I'm controlling the Williamson so I'm looking forward to seeing some excellent competition at close quarters.

Submarine gambit brings success for Annesley

The Bunratty weekender was held 17-19 February. The main event, the Masters,  had its strongest ever field and was won by English GM Michael Adams after a blitz play-off with former World Championship challenger Nigel Short. IM Mark Orr,  resident now for many years in Scotland, was the only Ulster player in that section and finished on 3.0 points.

There were four separate tournaments at Bunratty and four Ulster players competed in the second-tier Challengers section. Unfortunately two of them met in round one with Danny Mallaghan turning the rating list on its head by beating second seed Gareth Annesley. However Gareth shrugged off that setback to win his remaining five games and secure himself an equal first place with three others, though Jan Heinrich took the Challengers title on tie-break. Danny lost in rounds 2 and 3 but finished strongly by beating fourth seed Pete Morriss in the final round. The other two Ulster players were Cecil Sloan and Paul McLoughlin. Cecil finished on a very creditable 3.0 after playing a strong field, rated an average 161 points higher - he also beat the afore-mentioned Mr Morriss. Unfortunately Paul, who tends to blow either hot or cold, couldn't raise the temperatures of his opponents this time.

Check out the complete results at the Bunratty website

Blitz, Williamson, and Black is the new Black

The first ever Ulster Blitz Championship was held at the Belfast Boat Club on the 27th December. I popped in about 4pm to see how the final rounds unfolded. New UCU supremo (please note the alias el presidente is copyrighted) John Cairns had magically arranged that the four contenders for the title, the Robbin brothers, Cal Leitch and the veteran (at least in this company) speedster Damien Lavery were encountering each other in the final rounds. In round 13 Leitch and Kiran Robbin had "contrived" a grandmaster draw and once again proved the maxim "discretion is the better part of valour" when they ended up tied for first place. An Armageddon game was ordered to break the tie. Leitch had Black and less time but only needed to draw. After a complicated middle game that needed a proper amount of time rather a few seconds contemplation, Leitch came out a pawn ahead and carefully hoovered off the remaining material to leave K and P v. K. Just as I was trying to work out if he had the opposition (a lengthy process for me at the best of times) Leitch calmly offered the pawn up to his opponent - after all, he only needed a draw! 


For those who want an entertaining if fictionalised account of the event I warmly recommend the Beard's gossip column at the Ballynafeigh Chess Club website. I see the Beard is concerned about the embarrassment of not resigning when you've been completely mashed and provides video evidence of this phenomenon. I understand the Ulster Chess Union had arranged extensive video coverage of the event (coming to YouTube some time soon) so I look forward to examples of the equally embarrassing spectacle of some bozo having a completely won position and simply sitting there until his time runs out.


At the closing ceremony John Cairns announced that the next UCU competition will be the Williamson Shield. Although not absolutely confirmed as yet, expect it to be held on the first weekend in February at its normal venue, the Maynard Sinclair Pavilion in the Stormont estate. If I'm wrong, you didn't hear it from me!

Finally, those who have not lost the will to live (or at least visit these pages) due to my rather infrequent blogs will note that the website has had a makeover - Black is the new Black in Ulster chess circles as I now realise I have come dangerously close to plagiarising Sam Flanagan's house-style over at his Malone Chess Team website. Still it has to be better than the purple shag pile over at Ballynafeigh. BTW, congrats to my team-mates on the Angels for topping the League table at Christmas (my absence from the team-sheet obviously  instrumental!)

Rookie rides again

It took three seasons after 5 consecutive 5-2 defeats, but at last Malone beat Bangor in the UCU League on 8/12/11. Despite those defeats, Malone had won UCU League Division Two in the last two campaigns. How ironic it would be if Bangor go on to win it this season.

Groomsport was the windswept setting for the match and Bangor got "the wind up" when captain Martin Kelly's favourite Vienna Gambit "waltzed" to victory against young "ashen-faced" Ashley McWhinney. The 2011 Henderson Cup winner was able to "make winning" moves against McWhinney as shown below.

R. Proctor "gambled" and lost to J. Bryars, while D. Ruben avoided a "drubbing" by drawing against P. McLaughlin. P. McGuigan said "play it again, Sam" after beating Sam Flanagan to keep Bangor's hopes alive but it was "alan a day's work" for Stephen Morgan as he clinched victory for himself and Malone against Alan McConnell! The final score was Bangor 1.5-Malone 3.5.

[Event "UCU League prelim"] [Site "?"] [Date "2011.12.08"] [Round "7"] [White "Kelly, Martin"] [Black "McWhinney, Ashley"] [Result "1-0"] [ECO "C29"] [PlyCount "45"] [EventDate "2011.10.??"] [EventType "team"] [WhiteTeam "Malone"] [BlackTeam "Bangor"] 1. e4 e5 2. Nc3 Nf6 3. f4 Nc6 4. fxe5 Nxe5 5. d4 Ng6 6. e5 Ng8 7. Nf3 Bb4 8. Bc4 h6 9. O-O d6 10. Bxf7+ $1 Kf8 ({If} 10... Kxf7 11. Ng5+ ({or} 11. Nh4+ { wins.})) 11. Bxg6 Ne7 12. Ng5+ Kg8 13. Nf7 Qd7 14. Nxh8 Kxh8 15. Rf8+ Ng8 16. Bf7 dxe5 17. Rxg8+ Kh7 18. Qd3+ Qf5 19. Qxf5+ Bxf5 20. Rxa8 exd4 21. Nd5 Bc5 22. Kf1 c6 23. Nf4 1-0

Ulster Masters

The Ulster Chess Union has announced a new event on their calendar: the 2011 Ulster Masters, to be played on the weekend of the 10th-11th December at the Belfast Boat Club.

EDIT 07/12/2011: Entry fee reduced from £20 to £12 (£10 if entered by 09/12/2011)

Full details at the UCU website