West Wales Closed Championship (E. J. Clarke)

June Evans has published a revised schedule for the competition to win the E.J. Clarke trophy.

Round 4: Tuesday 24th March - 7:15pm at Castell-Nedd Chess Club

Round 5: Monday 6th April - 7:15pm at Morriston Chess Club

Final Round: Monday 27th April - 7:15pm at Morriston Chess Club

Division 1

It was a busy week in Division 1 with all 8 teams in action. First up was the Morriston Benko v Nidum clash at Morriston Rugby Club. Nidum needed to win to keep their title hopes alive and they did so comfortably, or so the score would indicate. A 4-1 win for Nidum with Phillip Pe’s win over Craig Evans saving the whitewash for the Morriston team.

On paper the interclub match between White Knights B and C, which took place on the Tuesday, should probably have gone the way of the B team. The bottom three boards, however, all ended as draws and with a win apiece on the top two the match ended as a draw. The Monday win for Nidum had taken them to the top of the table and if White Knights A wanted to displace them they needed to win against Morriston Alekhine when they welcomed them to Llanelli on the Wednesday. No surprise, therefore, that they adopted a no mercy approach with four of their five players being rated above 2000. Although it paid off the Morriston team did not exactly roll over and in spite of being out graded on every board achieved draws on three of them. The 3½-1½ result took the Knights back on top with just two matches to play.

Bottom of the table Emperors travelled to Sketty where they faced a De la Beche A team that is going from strength to strength. It was all one way traffic and the 5-0 win for De la Beche means that there is virtually no way back for the Emperors.

Division 2

As in Division 1 every team was in action with the first match of the week being between two teams in the bottom half of the table. Upper Killay Merlins were at home to struggling Morriston English. The Morriston team did not help their cause by turning up two boards short and with Merlins winning on boards 2 and 3 only a win from Joel Chung against Ralph Cook stopped the whitewash.

Away from the bottom half of the table the situation at the top got even tighter. De la Beche C were at home to White Knights D in a close run match that ended with the Knights just scrapping through 3-2.

On the same night BF Giants played host to a Morriston Catalan team that contained three players from the Benko team defeated by Nidum on the Monday. It turned out to be the Giants worst defeat of the season with the Morriston Team winning 3½-1½. The win takes the Morriston team to within 1 point of the leaders.

The final match in this Division was between Morriston Dutch and De la Beche B where a win for either team would take them into top spot. However, neither team came out on top and they both had to be content with a share of the spoils and a 2½-2½ draw.

As the dust settles De la Beche B, Morriston D and White Knights D are all on 17 points with Morriston C on 16 and BF Giants on 15. The matches remaining will see these teams pitted against each other so the final outcome is still far from clear.

Division 3

Just two matches in this division. Brunel made the short trip to Bryncoch where they held on to their 100% record by beating Tribunes 4-1. A win for Maurice De Souza on board 3 against Albert Easton saved the Castell Nedd team from total embarrassment. Short of falling foul of the rules in their last two matches and subject to ratification from the League Controller Brunel will be taking possession of the Tom Hughes Cup for the third time (previously 2010-11 and 2017-18).

The other match was a tussle for second place between Morriston French and De la Beche D. The 3-2 result in De la Beche D’s favour suggests it was close and means that both teams now have 12 points. Morriston French, however, have a match in hand. Harriers on 11 points and with matches in hand are breathing down their necks and could, theoretically, overtake both of them.

08/03/2020