CASTLEHILL OTB CLUB CHAMPIONSHIP 22-23 – Round 2 draw

CASTLEHILL OTB CLUB CHAMPIONSHIP 22-23
Round One – Thurs 10th Nov 22, 7:30pm
REPORT

Oh what a night! We are still finding our feet again as a Chess Club after the pandemic and we have a lot of new members as well which has made the first round of our Club Championship a little tricky, but a nice problem to have!

It turns out we have 50 players entered. Yes that’s what I said, 50 entries for our OTB club championships 22-23! Some players had organised and played their matches already, but this was still going to be a big test on not only setting up, but our chess equipment (Boards & Pieces), but also our digital clocks! I am happy to report we passed the test!

The first round is a banana skin for the top players and for some of the lower graded or new players, it’s more like trying to dodge a Turkey shoot!

It did not disappoint as we had shock results for round one. Josh Dickson J12 (880) with black, took down the scalp of Ray Noble (1531)! Josh played well and the position was about equal. Ray in his attempt to win what was a drawn game, messed up and Josh pounced like a tiger in hiding and ripped Ray’s throat out! Credit to Josh for the way he played which got it’s just rewards!

It seems our juniors were in hot form (Unlike their opponents!), as Nhat Nguyen J13 with white got a shock win against one of the tournament favourites, Ross Bremner (1790)! Did not see that one coming and well played Nhat!

There were wins for some of our new players, Billy Westhead (UG), Jorge Rodriguez Perez (UG), Tom Wardlaw (1234), Saranraj Gururaj (1550), Vladislav Drabych (1560) and of course the tournament number one seed, Helge Magnussen (2141)!

All other matches went to the form book, but Norman Waugh (1160) gave Andy Rowe (1572) a fight and just missed out on delivering a sucker punch!

Now things will settle down and players will now know what is expected of them so the round two draw is now up on our website.

Players are advised to contact their opponent ASAP and arrange a date (Thursdays only!) for their match. The match has to be played before, by or on Thurs 15th Dec 22!
Emails will be flying out to everyone ASAP!

GOOD LUCK!
OTB Club Championship Rd 2 draw