The ninth and last Round of the Book Prize Tournament 2021-22 has been announced by organiser Peter Przybycin. The tournament ends on 28th June.

Current scores:

Major section:

• Keith Gregory 7/7
• Graham Stuart 5/7
• Sam Murphy 4.5/8
• Mike Henbury 4/7
• Eric Jones 4/6
• Manoj Chandar 3/7
• Keven Lamb 2.5/7
• Rob Sims 2/7
• Dick Meredith 2/8
• Peter Przybycin 2/8

Minor Section:

• Nobby George 7/7
• Maha Chandar 6/7
• John Kooner 5/7
• Steve Saunders 5/7
• Rob Strachan 4/6
• Ian Parker 2.5/7
• Geoff Parish 2/7
• Lee Mundy 1.5/6
• Rose Saunders 1/7
• Steve Dunleavy 0/7

Book Prize Round 9 Pairings

The pairings for this round include husband and wife club players Steve and Rose Saunders. They were inevitably going to play each other in an all-against-all tournament. Rose and Steve often play against each other, and online they have currently played over 2,300 games together! See our article when they reached the 2,000 milestone here.

Minor:

• Rose Saunders v Steve Saunders
• Lee Mundy v Steve Dunleavy
• Geoff Parish v John Kooner
• Ian Parker v Nobby George
• Maha Chandar v Rob Strachan

Major:

• Rob Sims v Keven Lamb
• Dick Meredith v Eric Jones
• Manoj Chandar v Peter Przybycin
• Keith Gregory v Graham Stuart
• Sam Murphy v Mike Henbury

Please note: the Book Prize Tournament will end on Tuesday 28^th June. No result will be recorded after that date.

All the best,

Peter.

Rules Reminder

(for full list see the Tournament’s Page) :

• Rate of play – 90 minutes each for the whole game.
• The first named player has the white pieces.
• Games will (preferably) be played over-the-board at chess club, or at the home of the player with the white pieces. Score sheets and clocks should be used.
• Games may alternatively be played online, using Lichess, by mutual consent. Score sheets are not needed for online games.
• Online games will not be sent for grading.
• The Book Prize Tournament will end on Tuesday 28^th June. No result will be recorded after that date.

Links

The Knockout Tournament 2022 , organised by Steve Dunleavy, has seen a record 26 entrants. It has a Preliminary Round plus six byes to establish the Round 1 players.

With a record 26 entrants this year we have 6 byes into the first round and 10 preliminary round games to qualify for the first round. If you are defeated in your preliminary round game you are eliminated from the competition. This system will reduce us from 26 to 16, and then 8,4,2 thereafter(for both the major and minor competitions- winners and losers from round 1).

Byes to Knockout 2022 First Round

The six byes into the first round are: Keith Gregory, Lee Mundy, Rob Sims, Steve Dunleavy, John Kooner, and Nobby George.

The Preliminary Round

The 10 preliminary games to qualify for the first round are as follows:

• Ewan Cave vs Geoff Parish
• Graham Stuart vs Ian Parker
• David Culliford vs Rob Strachan
• Alan Weaver vs Kev Lamb
• Steve Saunders vs Andrew Chivers
• Rose Saunders vs Peter Przybycin
• Patrick Pavey vs John Pellegrini
• Mike Henbury vs Sam Murphy
• Daniel Phillips vs Dick Meredith
• Peter Eales vs Joseph Henbury

Tournament Rules

The basic rules relating to this competition are as follows;

1. The player named first plays with white
2. The clock to be set at 90 minutes for both players
3. In the event of a draw the replay must be played asap after the deadline date with colours being reversed
4. All games to be played at club other than Mike Henbury who can play his game online
5. All results will be sent for grading
6. The deadline date to play the preliminary round is the 8th June (i.e. 3 club nights 24/5,31/5 and 7/6, + 1 day)
7. All results to be emailed to me Steve Dunleavy as soon as the game has been played. – Steve Dunleavy

Round 8 of the Book Prize Tournament 2021-2 starts, as organiser Peter Przybycin announces the player pairings for the Round.

Just one Book Prize Tournament game was played this week:

Mike Henbury 1 Dick Meredith 0

Current scores:

Major section:

• Keith Gregory 6/6
• Graham Stuart 4.5/6
• Mike Henbury 4/7
• Sam Murphy 3.5/7
• Eric Jones 3/5
• Manoj Chandar 3/7
• Keven Lamb 2.5/6
• Peter Przybycin 2/6
• Rob Sims 2/7
• Dick Meredith 1.5/7

Minor Section:

• Nobby George 7/7
• Maha Chandar 6/7
• John Kooner 5/7
• Steve Saunders 5/7
• Rob Strachan 4/6
• Ian Parker 2.5/7
• Geoff Parish 2/7
• Lee Mundy 1.5/6
• Rose Saunders 1/7
• Steve Dunleavy 0/7

Nobby beat Maha (who ran out of time in a winning position) to take control of the Minor section. He now needs just one more point to clinch the book prize.

Book Prize Round 8 Pairings

Minor:

• Rose Saunders v Steve Dunleavy
• Geoff Parish v Ian Parker
• Steve Saunders v Rob Strachan
• Nobby George v Lee Mundy
• Maha Chandar v John Kooner

Major:

• Rob Sims v Eric Jones
• Manoj Chandar v Keith Gregory
• Keven Lamb v Mike Henbury
• Graham Stuart v Dick Meredith
• Sam Murphy v Peter Przybycin

All the above games need to be completed by May 22nd if possible, when the final round pairings will be announced.

Please note: the Book Prize Tournament will end on Tuesday 28^th June. No result will be recorded after that date.

All the best,

Peter.

Rules Reminder

(for full list see the Tournament’s Page) :

• Rate of play – 90 minutes each for the whole game.
• The first named player has the white pieces.
• Games will (preferably) be played over-the-board at chess club, or at the home of the player with the white pieces. Score sheets and clocks should be used.
• Games may alternatively be played online, using Lichess, by mutual consent. Score sheets are not needed for online games.
• Online games will not be sent for grading.
• The Book Prize Tournament will end on Tuesday 28^th June. No result will be recorded after that date.

Links

85 players entered the Castle Chess 18th Fareham Congress 18-20th March 2022, a record for Castle Chess. And 5 of the entries were Chandler’s Ford Chess Club players. Here are photos and some results from Fareham Congress.

Photos of the tournament

Fareham Congress

The Castle Chess 18th Fareham Congress was held at the Lysses House Hotel in Fareham, 18th-20th March 2022. The format was a 6-round Swiss, Round 1 on the Friday evening, the next three rounds on the Saturday, and the remaining two rounds on Sunday. The games had a rate of play of 75 minutes per player per game, plus 30 seconds per move. There were 3 Sections, and each section had a sub category by ECF Grading.

• The Open, including the Premier (Under 2001 grade). Three Chandler’s Ford Chess Club players were entered in the Open: Keith Gregory, Graham Stuart, and Iwan Cave, who was 4th in the Premier category.
• The Major (Under 1901 grade), including the Intermediate (U1751).
• The Minor (under 1601), including the Challengers (U1451). Two players from our club entered the Minor, Keven Lamb, and Peter Eales, who won a prize in the Challengers. Great news for Peter as this was his first Tournament for 40 years.

Castle Chess were able to substantially increase the Prize fund due to the numbers of players that entered: 85 players, a record for Castle Chess.

For full results of all players, see the Castle Chess results page for the event via the button below:

Father vs son

In the Major, two closely-matched players who ended up with 4 points each inevitably had to play against each other: Richard Ursell and his son Adam Ursell. The two Highcliffe players drew in their Round 5 game.

A good cause

The organisers support a number of children in Zambia, and are pleased to announce that player donations during the weekend raised £186 to help with their school fees.

Links

• Castle Chess website
• Castle Chess Fareham 2022 page. Event Report and Results.
• ECF Events page for this tournament. Results via the Section links on the page.
• Previous article published on this website just before the tournament

The ECF are holding a 24-hour Charity Chess Marathon on chess.com in aid of the DEC Ukraine Humanitarian Appeal this weekend 2-3 April.

The English Chess Federation will be holding a 24-hour online chess tournament this weekend, 5pm Saturday 2nd April to 5pm on Sunday. You can play as much or as little as you like, dipping in and out of the event as it suits you. The time control is 5 minutes per player per game.

The event, on chess.com, is in aid of the DEC Ukraine Humanitarian Appeal via the British Red Cross. Everyone can donate with their entry or via the Red Cross Tiltify Page here – https://tiltify.com/british-red-cross/ecf-chess-marathon. You can register from 4pm Saturday.

Details of the event from the ECF

To play

Make sure you are a member of https://www.chess.com/club/english-chess-federation – which is free to join.
The tournament starts at 5.00pm UK time on Saturday April 2. From 4.00pm UK time you can join at https://www.chess.com/play/arena/1792555
Anyone can join free through the link above, but if you wish to be eligible for a prize please register first and donate £5.00 or more via the registration form found at https://www.englishchess.org.uk/ecf-charity-marathon-for-ukraine/ As with all Chess.com Arena tournaments you can play as much or as little as you like. You can even join late. The games are 5 minutes a side.

Prizes

To be eligible for a prize you need to register first and donate £5 or more. There are various prizes, for details see the ECF webpage: ECF Charity Marathon for Ukraine – English Chess Federation

To Watch

There will be live coverage of the tournament at https://www.twitch.tv/ecf_commentary
The commentary team will include GM Michael Adams, GM Matthew Sadler, GM John Emms, GM Chris Ward, GM Jon Speelman, WFM Kanwal Bhatia, WIM Natasha Regan, IM Tom Rendle, IM Ali Mortazavi, and MrDodgy.

Links

British Red Cross 24 hour Chess Marathon page on Tiltify.

Chess.com – the hosts for the event.

The ECF 24 hour Chess Marathon Page

The player pairings for the Book Prize Tournament 2021-2022 Round 7 are announced. Tournament organiser Peter Przybycin gives an update from Round 6 and the scores so far, and announces the Round 7 pairings.

Hi All,

Two results this week.

In the minor section Rob Strachan beat Rose Saunders, and in the major section Eric Jones drew his round 5 game with Mike Henbury.

Current scores:

Major section:

• Keith Gregory 5/5
• Graham Stuart 4/5
• Sam Murphy 3/6
• Eric Jones 3/4
• Mike Henbury 3/6
• Manoj Chandar 2/6
• Keven Lamb 2/5
• Rob Sims 2/6
• Peter Przybycin 2/6
• Dick Meredith 1/5

Minor Section:

• Nobby George 6/6
• Maha Chandar 6/6
• John Kooner 4/6
• Steve Saunders 4/6
• Ian Parker 2.5/5
• Rob Strachan 3/5
• Geoff Parish 2/6
• Lee Mundy 1.5/6
• Steve Dunleavy 0/6
• Rose Saunders 0/6

Book Prize Round 7 Pairings

Minor:

• Rose Saunders v Geoff Parish
• Steve Dunleavy v Steve Saunders
• Rob Strachan v Lee Mundy
• Nobby George v Maha Chandar
• John Kooner v Ian Parker

Major:

• Rob Sims v Manoj Chandar
• Eric Jones v Keven Lamb
• Mike Henbury v Dick Meredith
• Graham Stuart v Sam Murphy
• Peter Przybycin v Keith Gregory

Games to be completed by April 24^th if possible.

All the best,

Peter.

Rules Reminder

(for full list see the Tournament’s Page) :

• Rate of play – 90 minutes each for the whole game.
• The first named player has the white pieces.
• Games will (preferably) be played over-the-board at chess club, or at the home of the player with the white pieces. Score sheets and clocks should be used.
• Games may alternatively be played online, using Lichess, by mutual consent. Score sheets are not needed for online games.
• Online games will not be sent for grading.

Links

Castle Chess have their Fareham Congress tournament (over the board games) on 18-20 March 2022. It will be at the Lysses House Hotel, 51 High Street, Fareham, PO16 7BQ. In this article, details of the tournament, plus poetic praise for the previous Castle Chess Fareham Congress from Gillian Moore.

At the time of publishing this Post, there were 75 entrants to the Congress, a huge level of interest.

Castle Chess have run a number of Congresses (tournaments) over recent years at this pleasant venue. Until the Pandemic, they hosted two Congresses per year at the Lysses, one earlier in the year, one in the Autumn. They return to this schedule, with the Autumn congress being set as 7-9th October 2022.

Tournament format

The format of the Congress is a six-Round Swiss: round one on the Friday evening, three rounds on the Saturday, and the last two games on the Sunday. Byes may be requested (except Round 6).

There are three sections:

• Open: Under 2001 (=175 former ECF grade system),
• Major: Under 1901 (=160),
• Minor: under 1601 (=120).

The Congress costs £40 to enter, with a £7 discount for Juniors. Non-ECF members will need to pay £9 extra. There are also various accommodation packages – available through Castle Chess – if you would like to stay at the Lysses.

Tea and coffee will be provided for a donation.

Results of all games will be be sent to the ECF for Grading.

There will not be a Prize-giving ceremony as prizes will be sent via bank transfer, as was swiftly and successfully done in the the October 2021 event.

Rate of Play

The rate of play for the games is 75 minutes plus 30 seconds per move (about 3 and a half hours). All moves must be recorded throughout the game.

Photos of the October 2021 Fareham Congress

Covid

Castle Chess plan to run the event as a normal over the board weekend chess tournament.

Further information

EVENT ENQUIRIES:
Tony Corfe, 51 Borough Way, Potters Bar, Herts. EN6 3HA
Tel: 01707 661160 Mob: 07973 516718
email: tony@mrcorfe.co.uk or marc.shaw.chess@gmail.com
or Marc Shaw 07947 813303

See the Castle Chess website’s Fareham Congress page: CastleChess.co.uk – 18 Fareham Congress

Poem: In Praise of Chess, by Gillian Moore

CASTLE CHESS CONGRESS
FAREHAM.
Return to over the board games
The congresses over the board
Are something I have missed,
And entering this one at Fareham
I could not resist.
Several times before, I’ve stayed
At the Lysses House Hotel,
Competing in the Castle Chess
At this hotel as well.
I’m coming back, and I am like
A puppy with two tails,
Which wags each time that I recall
The pleasure it entails.
For I am very overdue
For formal rated play,
But with a congress that is planned,
I’m heading soon that way

Links

Castle Chess website

Castle Chess Fareham Congress 18-20 March 2022 Page

Venue: Lyssses House Hotel, Fareham

English Chess Federation

Gillian Moore’s poetry on Hampshire Chess Association website

The C team hosted Basingstoke C in the League last week. Both teams at double-strength for numbers of players – an 8-board super-match!

The fixture was in the Southampton Chess League’s Division 5, a home fixture for our C team, on 1st March 2022.

Extra Games

Chandler’s Ford C Team captain Steve Dunleavy arranged with his Basingstoke counterpart David Graham to have additional players participate, continuing a feature of the League’s Divisions 4 and 5 before the pandemic, in which teams could field extra players for grading purposes in the English Chess Federation.

The extra games gave both teams the opportunity to give as many players as possible graded games in match conditions – and against players from a club other than their own.

The Basingstoke C team had several junior players, and their parents brought them and were there to support them. Not that the youngsters needed much support, being very good players.

It was great to see such a big attendance at the club: the 8 players from each team, plus the visitors’ families, plus more Chandler’s Ford Chess club players playing their various club tournament games. The double-sized match was the largest such event since before the pandemic, when Chandler’s Ford C and D teams played an 8-board match in January 2020.

Match result 2-2

The match was well-contested and ended with a 2-2 draw – for the match boards 1-4. The extra games played for grading and match experience saw the Basingstoke visitors win all the remaining games on boards 5-8.

Everyone seemed to enjoy the evening. See below for details of the individual results.

Board	Home Team C. Ford C	Result	Away Team Basingstoke C
1	Keven Lamb	0-1	Liam Durangparang
2	John Kooner	0-1	Harry Smith
3	Peter Eales	1-0	Edward Yang
4	Nobby George	1-0	Ojas Dhall
		2-2

Extra boards for grading and match experience

Board	Home Team C. Ford C	Result	Away Team Basingstoke C
5	Steve Saunders	0-1	Shams Dilly
6	Rose Saunders	0-1	Adam Matthews
7	Lee Mundy	0-1	Saksham Rana
8	John Pellegrini	0-1	David Graham

Links

Southampton Chess League

SCL Division 5 match result report card

English Chess Federation

When C and D teams played their 8-board super-match

The player pairings for the Book Prize Tournament 2021-2 Round 6 are announced. Tournament organiser Peter Przybycin gives an update from Round 5 and the scores so far, and announces the Round 6 pairings.

Round 5 update

Hi All,

There is just one result to report from the fifth round this week, but it is a significant one. Steve Saunders beat John Kooner in the minor section. This means that John has dropped his first point in the tournament, and now there are just two players unbeaten on five points; Maha Chandar and Nobby George. John has a chance to fight back however, as he has still to play either Maha or Nobby in the tournament. In fact, he is paired against Nobby in round six!

Current scores:

Minor Section:

• Nobby George 5/5
• Maha Chandar 5/5
• John Kooner 4/5
• Steve Saunders 3/5
• Rob Strachan 2/4
• Geoff Parish 2/5
• Ian Parker 1.5/4
• Lee Mundy 1.5/5
• Steve Dunleavy 0/5
• Rose Saunders 0/5

Major section:

• Keith Gregory 5/5
• Graham Stuart 3.5/4
• Eric Jones 2.5/3
• Sam Murphy 2/5
• Manoj Chandar 2/5
• Rob Sims 2/5
• Peter Przybycin 1.5/4
• Mike Henbury 1.5/4
• Keven Lamb 1/4
• Dick Meredith 1/5

Book Prize Round 6 Pairings

Minor:

• Rob Strachan v Rose Saunders
• Steve Saunders v Lee Mundy
• Steve Dunleavy v Ian Parker
• Geoff Parish v Maha Chandar
• John Kooner v Nobby George

Major:

• Mike Henbury v Rob Sims
• Keven Lamb v Dick Meredith
• Eric Jones v Keith Gregory
• Manoj Chandar v Sam Murphy
• Peter Przybycin v Graham Stuart

All games in round 6 to be completed if possible by March 26th 2022.

All the best,

Peter.

Rules Reminder

(for full list see the Tournament’s Page) :

• Rate of play – 90 minutes each for the whole game.
• The first named player has the white pieces.
• Games will (preferably) be played over-the-board at chess club, or at the home of the player with the white pieces. Score sheets and clocks should be used.
• Games may alternatively be played online, using Lichess, by mutual consent. Score sheets are not needed for online games.
• Online games will not be sent for grading.

Links

Husband and wife chess players Rose and Steve Saunders have played 2000 chess games together since joining online chess game provider lichess.org! And that’s just the online games they’ve played against each other!

Rose and Steve Saunders are keen chess players, both online and over-the-board, and they play for Chandler’s Ford Chess Club in the Southampton Chess League.

Online Chess

Why play online against each other when they can play on a board with pieces? During the Covid pandemic the Chandler’s Ford Chess Club, like all such clubs, could not meet in person. Our club’s solution was to set up an online, virtual Chandler’s Ford Chess Club on one of the chess game websites. We considered chess.com and lichess.org, and went for the latter: Graham Stuart set up our “Club” on lichess.org.

Keen chess player couple

Steve and Rose Saunders quickly joined lichess.org in April 2020 and have been keen online players ever since. They have played against each other in the club’s online versions of its long-play tournament games, plus the regular online rapid-play tournaments. From time to time they would be paired against each other in the various tournaments. They also play many games against each other online outside of the tournaments, and over the board. These online games against each other give them practice at the various time controls and settings, plus their games are graded on the gaming platform, a useful measure of their playing strength. Incidentally, Rose and Steve’s lichess ratings are almost identical:

Steve and Rose are members of other clubs on lichess in addition to Chandler’s Ford, and Rose is a member of the England-women lichess team. Steve has played over 3,000 games on lichess since joining, and Rose has played over 3900 online games! Games can be played in the ‘clubs’ or as individual challenges.

2000 Games against each other

Steve, ever the gentleman, told me today not to be misled by those scores: “Before lockdown Rose had won far more games than me over a number of years on the board“.

It seems that a shared interest in chess is a recipe for a successful marriage!

Links

Lichess.org

Chess.com

England-Women: lichess club, see also our Article England Womens Chess Team and Rose Saunders’ thoughts on playing in the match against Libya.