On Monday, 6 October we welcomed Hammersmith 2 to the Actonians in our opening match of the season. The occasion was, however, tinged with sadness following the recent death of Alan Perkins. For many years his was the first name on the team sheet as he habitually played in all Middlesex matches. I sometimes joked with him that I needed 6 Alans which would make my captaining the team so much easier. His presence will be sorely missed.

On a brighter note, it was pleasing to see Alejandro debut for the team following his convincing win in the club championship. Unfortunately, it was not to be his night. He reports: “As White, I played the Catalan with my opponent playing an early Qa5. The infiltrating queen was pesky but manageable with accurate play. A couple of mistakes left my position unsalvageable leading to my early resignation.”

Our top board, Andrew, writes: “My opponent played the French Exchange to get an IQP position as White. His pieces headed towards my kingside but I was able to relatively comfortably liquidate and exchange pieces. We agreed a draw as a level but difficult-to-assess rook ending approached. I did have an interesting chance near the end to grab a seemingly poisoned pawn on h2 with my bishop which livened up the post-mortem but even that would have only been equal with best play.”

The Hillingdon captain, Mark, was playing on board 4. Reflecting on his game, he states: “As White we entered a closed-style Sicilian with both sides fianchettoed. When my opponent moved his knight to the flank it allowed a reasonable initiative, but after a couple of correct moves I mistakenly chose to simplify, and a draw was agreed on move 29 in an even position.”

Although he has played only a few games of classical chess in the last year, Raj kindly agreed to step in at short notice. He writes: “In response to my 1.e4 my opponent played the Nc6-Sicilian. Due to lack of confidence, I played d3 on the third move, rather than the more usual d4. For both us, the game became incredibly defensive until I visualised giving up my rook and bishop for his knight, pawn and bishop which opened up his kingside. Soon afterwards I gained another pawn. Later I trapped his rook, giving him no option but to exchange his rook for bishop. With my knight dominating his bishop plus a pawn advantage, there was no way to stop my h-pawn from crowning.” Sitting on the neighbouring board, one couldn’t help but be impressed by Raj’s sacrificing the exchange for long-term positional pressure.

In my own game nothing much happened until move 25 when my opponent left a bishop en prise which I took. He immediately resigned.

Playing on board two, Jonathan notes: “I played Bird’s Opening as White and had some pressure in the early middlegame, with a strong knight outpost and various pins and threats. Possibly both my opponent and I felt during the game that my position was better than the computer suggests. Failing to make much progress, I explored the possibility of an attack on his king along the open g-file, but his position seemed pretty robust there too. We agreed a draw in an equal position.”

So, a good start to the season with a win by the closest of margins, three and half to two and a half.

Ealing 1	Rating	Result	Hammersmith 2	Rating
FM Andrew Harley	2154	0.5-0.5	Cristof Brixel	2036
Jonathan White	2029	0.5-0.5	Tom Townsend	2039
Alejandro Lopez-Martinez	1860	0-1	Meet Shah	1900
Mark Winterbotham	1821	0.5-0.5	Richard Morgan	1852
Simon Healeas	1810	1-0	John Abbott	1722
Raj Jhooti	1761	1-0	Kenneth Kwaibiah	1581
		3.5-2.5