Chess Scotland Club Tournament Finals

Grangemouth - April 8, 2006

report by Ken Stewart

The finals of the Chess Scotland team competitions were played at Grangemouth on Saturday 8 April.

In the Richardson Cup the two most recent winners faced each other with Hamilton strong favourites to beat Glasgow Polytechnic as, apart from Board 1, they had a grading advantage of 100 to 200 points per board. As last year, neither side had its strongest team available.

Hamilton started off well with wins for Macdonald and Stalker. Around the first time control, two other games finished, Davis scoring a good win over Coffey while Thomson eventually outplayed Rattray. Next to finish was board 8 where Kawmi won a rook and pawn ending against Donohue. This left three games in play; although Hamilton remained strong favourites it still seemed possible for Polytechnic to succeed, as it was now clear that tie-break in a 4-4 result would favour them. Redpath went seriously astray against Kirk and Watt held an inferior ending against Tweedie, leaving the top board game to decide the cup. Shaw had gone wrong in the first time scramble and Muir had two bishops for a rook with winning prospects. Clearly he had to take risks to win and instead blundered in the last few minutes, leaving Polytechnic apparently clearer winners than the actual flow of the match would justify.

In the Spens Cup final Glenrothes held a very substantial grading advantage and always looked clear (and first-time) winners over Edinburgh Civil Service who were hoping for a third consecutive victory in the event.

The Jack Campbell Rosebowl final pitted together teams who had previously met in the Spens, with the same outcome. Although Hamilton Juniors were heavily outgraded on the face of it, their players are improving rapidly and a very close match resulted. Connor Woods (by far the youngest ever team captain in such finals) led by example with a quick win over his much higher graded opponent who probably took too many risks. Eventually Hamilton required to draw inferior positions on boards 2 and 3. On the latter, McIntosh found a clever trick to secure the draw but Brown of Dumfries always looked to have sufficient positional edge to win a pawn ending, giving the trophy for the first time to Dumfries and District by the narrowest of margins.

Polytechnic - Richardson Champions

Glenrothes - Spens Champions

 

Richardson Grading Data 2005-2006

Spens Grading Data 2005-2006

Chessbase Game File

Richardson Finals

Spens Finals

 

Richardson Cup Final

Board No Polytechnic Hamilton Colour Name Grade Score Name Grade Score 1  B  J Shaw 2478 1  A Muir 2291 0 2    E Davis 2171 1  P Coffey 2223 0 3    G Rattray 2149 0  C Thomson 2245 1 4    L Kirk 2083 1  J Redpath 2185 0 5    D Watt 2000 ½  S Tweedie 2172 ½ 6    G Lyons 1927 0  A Stalker 2122 1 7    D Jenkins 1797 0  C MacDonald 2053 1 8    A Kawmi 1725 1  T Donohue 1911 0       Total 4½   Total 3½

Spens Cup Final

Board No Glenrothes Edinburgh Civil Service Colour Name Grade Score Name Grade Score 1  w  M P Carballo 2095 1  A Prince 1834 0 2    G Pyrich 2048 1  C Macnab 1720 0 3    B Jenkins  1938 1  D Stewart  1645 0 4    R Kynoch 1817 ½  S Bate 1587 ½ 5    M Spurr 1700 1  G Brown 1569 0 6    P Selbie 1439 ½  D Heatlie 1539 ½       Total 5   Total 1

Jack Campbell Rosebowl

Board No Dumfries Hamilton Juniors Colour Name Grade Score Name Grade Score 1  B  M Green 1840 0  C Woods 1734 1 2    D Brown 1728 1  M O'Donnell 1574 0 3    K Saunders 1674 ½  W McIntosh 1486 ½ 4    S Marchbank 1669 0  J Montgomery 1119 1 5    R Sim 1441 1  N Donohue 998 0 6    A Dallas 1416 1  J Tawdrous 837 0       Total 3½   Total 2½

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Richardson Cup

1.  Bon Accord 5.5	Bon Accord 4	Glasgow Montrose 2.5	Glasgow Polytechnic 4.5	Glasgow Polytechnic
2.  Kilmarnock 2.5
3.  Phones 0.5	Glasgow Montrose 4
4.  Glasgow Montrose 7.5
5. Irvine Porthead 1.5	Inverclyde Central 1	Glasgow Polytechnic 5.5
6. Inverclyde Central 6.5
7.  Glasgow Polytechnic 4.5	Glasgow Polytechnic 7
8.  Edinburgh 3.5
9.  Castlehill 2.5	Cathcart 3.5	Hamilton 6	Hamilton 3.5
10. Cathcart 5.5
11.	Hamilton 4.5
.
12.  Oban 1	Wandering Dragons 4.5	Wandering Dragons 2
13.  Wandering Dragons 7
14.  Dundee & Victoria 3.5	Edinburgh West 3.5
15.  Edinburgh West 4.5

The four seeded clubs (based on weighted performance in reaching the semi-finals over the past three years) are (in order) Hamilton , Polytechnic, Edinburgh West and Glasgow Montrose.

 

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Spens Cup

1.  Carse of Gowrie 2.5	Peterhead 1.5	Glenrothes 5	Glenrothes
2.  Peterhead 3.5
	Glenrothes 4.5
	Edin Civil Service 5	Edin Civil Service 1
7.  Dumfries 4	Dumfries 1
8.  Hamilton Juniors 2