Sent: Monday, January 18, 2010 7:16 PM

It was very nearly an excellent weekend for White Rose but sadly Sunday had a tinge of disappointment for the first team.

Saturday was a great day for us as both teams triumphed.

The first team did enough to defeat the experienced South Wales Dragons. Richard Palliser set us on our way with a dashing win with the black pieces. Lucia was always in command against her opponent. Jan played his customary swashbuckling style and settled for a draw. Steve tried to make an opposite Bishop ending interesting before agreeing a draw and Pete, Colin and Simon all held slight edges but settled for draws when it became certain we would win the match.

I was nervous for the White Rose 2 as they faced Wessex 1 who were graded around 45 points per man higher than us. The match looked tight early on except for Matty’s game. I was discussing how well he was playing with a couple of the first team in the corridor when I returned to see his opponent had sacked a Knight on h5. Gulp! Speculation as to who was winning swayed for the next few moves but it soon became obvious that Matty had seen out the danger and it was 1–0 to White Rose.

Jon Arnott’s opponent soon sacrificed a piece and this also turned out to be unsound and it soon became 2-0. Paul Townsend and Dave Adams looked to be better in their positions and Peter Shaw was the recipient of his opponent trying to avoid a draw but blundering to a swift defeat. Paul and Dave duly won their games to give us a massive win.

After celebrating deep into the next morning we discovered the A team would be facing a strong Wood Green 2 team. Strengthened by virtue of their first team playing Pride and Prejudice in a possible title decider. It is accepted that the first team collectively played their worse game for many seasons and we hope this is all out of their systems.

The second team battled hard again. Brown Jack were bottom of the table but had recruited a couple of players to boost their chances of surviving. It left us an average of 50 points per man to make up. Jon and Peter Shaw drew early to cap off good weekends for them personally but Richard Archer was beaten. Kieran, Paul and Dave continued to press but could not make any real headway and had to settle for draws. It left Matthew and Evie to get at least 1.5 points between them to save the match.

Evie lost a pawn in the opening but was playing more actively than her opponent and by the 5th hour a draw was established. Matty knew he needed to win and he managed to enter the second time control a piece up. With that sort of advantage Matty patiently improved his position until there was no doubt that the full point was coming his way. Well deserved Matty and easily the player of the weekend.