Good enough

My February 4NCL weekend actually began on the Friday afternoon, as I got paid to help set up. Such are the perks of being unemployed. It meant that Saturday was a little less hectic (I even found time to finish blogging the January weekend!), which was fortunate since it looked like a much better opportunity for me than Sunday's match.

We were playing Guildford 3, which meant that most of the opposition were known to me - and with five of our players based in Surrey, I guess the feeling was mutual. On paper, and especially by ratings, we were underdogs: 210-222, 208-213, 186-211, 195-205, 182-198, 183-187, 181-183, 177-167. The trajectories were on our side though, and that proved decisive. My contribution was on board six, with black against Alan Punnett (187/2059). Whilst it was a second slightly drab game in succession, I solved my problems in a rare Najdorf line fairly well and held on without any serious drama.

The team was in good spirits afterwards, and deservedly so after a 5-3 upset (LWLDWDWW) gave us renewed hope of avoiding the relegation pool, or at least taking a lot of points into it. There were plenty more impressive efforts in this match, but mine was still useful.

6. a4 is a dangerous line if Black doesn't know what to do, although I feel that Black has a choice of ways to equalise if he does. As the game shows though, White doesn't take any particular risks by playing like this; as against Burrows I never really had a chance to play for a win, with only my moody evaluation of 14... Bxd5 a possible lost opportunity. Continuing the parallel with the last post, I again refused to be squeezed, although my vulnerability to time trouble seems to be worsening all the time and made for some unnecessarily rash choices (26... Ke6; 29... Rc4; 37... f5). Still, given that I wasn't expecting 6. a4 at all I'm satisfied with how the game went.

Sunday's match against Anglian Avengers was bound to be more difficult - and especially for me, since our board order rotation took me up to board 4 and continued my run of 200+ opponents in the Sunday rounds.