A Festive club night was added to the 2025 calendar to launch the New Year and the reopening of Wanstead House after the festive closure.
THURSDAY 2 JAN 2025, 7.30 pm
Members were invited to play in:
A) the Finchley Cup Rapid semi final FC2 v FC3 at 7.30 (G10+5). This is normally two games played at G20+10, which equates to two one hour games for 60 moves, longer if games go beyond 60 moves, and four boards a side. The advertised schedule for the evening allowed just one hour for this semi-final, to make way for a two hour, 9-Round, blitz! Tournament Secretary/Fixtures Secretary, Mark Murrell, squeezed a quart into a pint pot by playing both rounds for the Finchley Cup semi-final simultaneously at G10+5 over six boards, by using four squads – read his report below!
B) at 8.30 the Hogmanay individual G3+2 ECF blitz rated Swiss; 9 quick fire rounds.
Mark Murrell reports:
NCCL Finchley Cup Semi-Final, Wanstead 2 v Wanstead 3
In typical WWCC tradition Wanstead 3 progressed to the Final of the Finchley Cup at the expense of the higher-rated Wanstead 2 and will meet the victors between Barking 2 and Enfield 1 who play on 4 February 2025.
Cup and Baum Trophy encounters in the NCCL usually comprise two games with colours reversed. For Gala Night we made use of the substitution rule with weaker players substituting for the stronger players in the first round to leave time for the festive blitz event involving the full club. For the Cup match the NCCL second team squad in Division B was split from the available players to provide the second leg pairings for this Wanstead 2 v Wanstead 3 match played over 6 boards (extended from the minimum of 4). These players were substituted (save for board 6) in the first leg by players drawn from our NCCL third team in the rating limited U1675 Division C; with Wanstead 3 on all boards being represented by an all junior team (11 or under), making their second appearance of the season and with two debutants in action too. With one minor exception to accommodate one of the junior debutants Wanstead 2 outrated their Wanstead 3 opponents and on paper were favourites to progress.
The Juniors played their part in securing victory for Wanstead 3 narrowly losing by a single point. The top order of Wanstead 2 failed to compensate whilst appearing to suffer from a Hogmanay hangover; managing just two draws on boards 1 to 4 (7 to 10 on the match card); sufficiently far adrift to give Wanstead 3 the match by a 1 point margin.
Details: Match card on ECF LMS
Hogmanay Gala Night 9-Round Swiss Blitz G3+2
A Hogmanay Gala Night presented an opportunity to hold a rare fast blitz Swiss tournament to see in the New Year and for our up and coming younger juniors to engage in main club competition.
Having dispensed with the all-Wanstead Finchley Cup Rapid Semi Final within an hour, 22 members of the Club competed in 2 hours of fast and furious back to back 9 rounds of 3 mins + 2 secs increment chess. By prior arrangement, Alfie and Sarwa played a double-header in the Cup match and were replaced by David Spearman and John Cawdery from the Lawrance Cup (Division A) squad for the blitz (who drew their two G10+5 Rapid Challenges).
David Spearman showed off his online blitz form with a near-perfect 9 just dropping half a point in his final game (8½/9). John Cawdery was a clear second, with no gifts from his daughter this time round, but a full point behind (7½/9). Two juniors, Ray Chu and Ashwin GopiKrishna, outperformed the rest of the field including many higher rated opponents to take a share of third (6/9).
Plenty of scalps for our other juniors along the way, with Toby Pang being the third highest place junior on 4½/9 just ahead of Mary.
Almas provided the best entertainment of the evening demonstrating an array of ways to draw a blitz game!
Vega tournament pages: Hogmanay Blitz