On Thursday, we were visited by two teams from Hammersmith. Hendon 3 secured a convincing 5–1 home victory over Hammersmith 2, while Hendon Barnet Knights drew 3–3 at home against Hammersmith 4.
Hendon 3 captain Sundip Tailor had selected a strong side, hoping to improve on the run of three straight defeats.
The match looked slightly in our favour on paper, with Hammersmith having slight rating advantages on the top two boards, while we looked stronger on the rest (especially the bottom three).
However, Jonathan Rubeck got us off to a flyer by winning his game quickly on Board 2, and we won all three of the bottom boards to put the match out of reach. Elliott and Andreas drew their games to ensure we won the match 5–1 without conceding a game.
There was a minor arbiting incident towards the end of this match, when one of the Hammersmith players fell foul of Rule 7.5.2 of the FIDE Laws of Chess:
The player concerned did exactly this, and seemed quite upset when his opponent stopped the clock and called me over, when I awarded extra time to the Hendon player for his opponent’s illegal move.
The Hammersmith player felt this was “gamesmanship” by his opponent, since the promoted piece was clearly going to be captured immediately regardless. However, I had little sympathy, as I had been watching the game, and the Hendon player’s claim was clearly correct.
The rule is absolutely black-and-white in this case; players are perfectly entitled to ask that the rules be enforced. It pays to know the FIDE Laws!
| Hendon 3 | Hendon 3 | Hammersmith 2 | Hammersmith 2 | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Macneil, Elliott CM | 1997 | ½ - ½ | Zadymov, Ihor | 2042 | ||
| 2 | Rubeck, Jonathan | 1943 | 1 - 0 | Townsend, Tom | 2039 | ||
| 3 | Bohnacker, Andreas | 1873 | ½ - ½ | Kennelly, Paul | 1800 | ||
| 4 | Alster, Robert | 1873 | 1 - 0 | Abbott, John | 1722 | ||
| 5 | Bhaduri, Aviraj | 1824 | 1 - 0 | Steyn, David | 1641 | ||
| 6 | Funk, Alexander | 1804 | 1 - 0 | Kwabiah, C Kenneth | 1581 | ||
| 5 - 1 | |||||||
In the Barnet Knights match, we were out-rated on all but one board (many thanks to Tony Hulstrom for stepping in at the last minute to prevent a default!). However, thanks to fine wins by Rineesh, David and Julian, we tied the match 3–3.
| Hendon Barnet Knights Juniors | Hendon Barnet Knights Juniors | Hammersmith 4 | Hammersmith 4 | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Bansal, Rineesh | 1557 | 1 - 0 | Toma, Florin | 1755 | ||
| 2 | Jacobs, Stanley G | 1467 | 0 - 1 | Bouchinet, Denis | |||
| 3 | Lewis, David | 1380 | 1 - 0 | Hamdan, Ali | 1502 | ||
| 4 | Morin, Julian | 1298 | 1 - 0 | Townsend, Max | 1395 | ||
| 5 | Bansal, Ronak | 1212 | 0 - 1 | Yang, Rachel | 1313 | ||
| 6 | Hulstrom, Tony | 1391 | 0 - 1 | Zacek, Frantisek | 1240 | ||
| 3 - 3 | |||||||
Many thanks to everyone who played in these matches, and congratulations on these fine results!