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50 years ago, pre-Olympiad beginnings – Stuart Hutchings writes ……
With the 2022 Olympiad in Chennai, India imminent, my mind drifted back some 50 years. When 1972 is mentioned, chess fans immediately think of the Fischer – Spassky World Championship match. For Wales, 1972 was also the first time ever the country played in an Olympiad.
Prior to that, on July 22nd and 23rd 1972, an historically significant event took place in Newport, this being Wales’ first match since seceding from the British Chess Federation (BCF). It was a double rounder against England, which according to ‘Chess’ magazine August 1972 also celebrated the centenary of the Newport and County Chess Club and 100 years since the death of Captain W. D. Evans, originator of the Evans Gambit.
In Y Ddraig at the time (for those who don’t know this was a WCU magazine produced a few times a year by T. Llew and Iolo Jones) only the board results were given, as follows, with the “hope to give more …… in our next issue”. Nothing more did appear as the next issue was taken up with a very comprehensive 1972 Olympiad report. Wales had Black on the odd boards in round 1.
| Wales |
|
England |
| Board |
Name |
Round 1 Result |
Round 2 Result |
Name |
| 1. |
S. J. Hutchings |
0 – 1 |
0.5 – 0.5 |
W. R. Hartston |
| 2. |
M. Gavrilovic |
0.5 – 0.5 |
0 – 1 |
J. J. Carleton |
| 3. |
I. C Jones |
0.5 – 0.5 |
1-0 |
M. J. Haygarth |
| 4. |
G. T. Haigh |
0 – 1 |
0 – 1 |
O. M. Hindle |
| 5. |
D. J. James |
0 – 1 |
0 – 1 |
P. S Milner-Barry |
| 6. |
M. G Lexton |
0.5 – 0.5 |
0 – 1 |
D. B Pritchard |
| 7. |
J. K. Whitcutt |
0 – 1 |
0 – 1 |
Mrs. J. Hartston |
| 8. |
R. G. Taylor |
1-0 |
0.5 – 0.5 |
Mrs. E. Pritchard |
| |
|
|
|
|
| Round 1 Total |
Round 2 Total |
| 2.5 – 5.5 |
2 – 6 |
| Final Total |
| 4.5 – 11.5 |
|
Although the English team was not truly representative of its strength at the time, it was nevertheless an experienced team which made it clear to Wales that there would be tough times ahead. Wales were missing top board Howard Williams who was putting in a very impressive performance at Caorle, Italy by finishing 4th in a star studded 18 player World Championship European Zonal tournament.
He and boards 1 – 5 above were selected as the team to represent Wales in its first ever Olympiad at Skopje in (then) Yugoslavia. Our first match was against a strong Italian side on 19th September 1972 in which Howard, myself and Iolo, the backbone of the Welsh team along with John Cooper for many Olympiads to come, all drew. We won our next 3 matches, and the journey was well and truly underway!
And now here we are 50 years later (!) …… good luck to Wales’ Open and Ladies teams in the 2022 Olympiad.
Email: stuart.j.hutchings@gmail.com
Dyfed Chess has lost another stalwart. David Pinch, who passed away on Sunday 17 July, only moved to the area a few years ago but in that short period had become responsible for all that was good about chess in the Zone.
Having initially been very active just as a player he went further and took over Dyfed chess in the Covid period. He was wholly responsible for organising and controlling a whole series of on-line events including two individual championships, the Dyfed league team championship and numerous other events at various rates of play. He also took over the Zone’s on-line ratings and more recently became secretary and match-captain of Pembrokeshire’s only chess club, finding it a new venue in Haverfordwest. Before that he was even a frequent weekly visitor to Cardigan Chess Club and also found time, together with a number of friends, to play in more than one weekend Swiss event over the border. He was open and hugely positive about the illness which led to his untimely death. It is hard to express how much he will be missed.
The Welsh Chess Union wishes to express our condolences to David’s family and friends at this very sad time.
Funeral arrangements to follow shortly.
The results were as follows:
1st Peter Wells 8/9
2nd Keith Arkell 7/9
=3rd Jose Camacho Collados, John Richardson, Jack Rudd, Hugh Murphy and Andrei Maksimenko 6/9
48 competed.
Wales fielded two teams in this event – Wales Silures and Wales Cymru.
The Wales Silures team consisted of Sven Zeidler, Charles Morris, John Fletcher, Mark Adams and Anthony Hughes.
The Wales Cymru team consisted of Charles Higgie, Gary Thomas, Lynda Smith and Gary Slegg.
The Wales Silures team finished on 16.5 points in 12th place (they were seeded 16th).
Individual results were Sven Zeidler 3/8, Charles Morris 5/8, John Fletcher 1/4, Mark Adams 3/8 and Anthony Hughes 4/8.
The Wales Cymru team finished on 11.5 points in 22nd place (they were seeded 23rd).
Individually, Charles Higgie 3/8, Gary Thomas 0/8, Lynda Smith 4/8 and Gary Slegg 2.5/8.
Both teams exceeded their expectations and are to be congratulat4ed for their performances.
Wales has 2 teams in the 50+ years World Team Championships. (We could not also raise a team for the 65+ years team.) These are being held in Italy at Aqui Terme 19-30 June.
Live games on the higher boards:
Note: The downloadable PGN of all games is input manually and so is usually a day behind. At the end of the tournament the PGN of all games will only be available for a few days before being deleted.
25 players attended on the day, 6 less than 2020, which was probably to be expected, 14 players were from WWCL & 11 from East Glamorgan.
Open Section (14 players)
1st= Ian Jones (Nidum), Moss McCarthy (Morriston) & Sam Jukes (Cardiff), 4/5 (£32.50 each)
Ian Jones & Moss McCarthy shared the AO Jones trophy, awarded to the joint highest placed WWCL members. This was a second win for Moss who previously won the event in 1987, the gap of 35 years being the longest period between two wins by the same person! Ian has hands on the trophy for the 13th time.
U-1800 prize, Guy Wagner (Cardiff) 3/5 (£10)
U-1500 Section (11 players)
1st Ken Wardle (Bridgend) 4.5/5 (£35)
2nd Suliaman Nasir (Morriston) 4/5 (£20)
3rd Ethan Jenkins (Rhondda) 3/5 (£15)
4th= Bill Davies (Rhondda), Andrew Powell (Castell Nedd), Mike Hollyman (Rhondda), David Reid (Caerphilly) & Darston Beetson (Morriston) (£2 each)
My thanks to Ian Eustis for controlling the event, also Les Philpin & Moss McCarthy for arranging the venue and the buffet. Thanks also to WWCL President Ralph Cook for a very generous donation towards the prize fund.
UEGENT EXPRESSION OF INTEREST DEADLINE 3rd July 2022
Dear chess friends,
We are delighted to be inviting you to this years European Senior Team
Chess Championship taking place in Dresden, Germany.
In past years we’ve welcomed participants from your federation to our
seniors’ tournaments in Dresden and in Radebeul and we would be pleased
to have some of your players join us again. This years tournament will
see us return to the venue of the 2008 Dresden Chess Olympiad, with the
playing hall being at the International Congress Centre Dresden, right
beside the Elbe.
Attached to this email you can find the regulations, including the
registration form. Feel free to forward the information to interested
players. Up to date information can be also obtained on our website
https://www.schachfestival.de/aktuelles/24th-european-senior-team-championship-2022.html,
which will be updated regularly.
Should you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact the
organisers – we will respond to any queries as soon as possible.
We are looking forward to hopefully welcoming players from Wales.
The 2022 Olympiad will take place at Chennai, India between 27th July and 10th Augyst,
The Welsh teams have just been announced.
The Open team is as follows:
Board 1 Grzegorz Toczek
Board 2 Jonathan Blackburn
Board 3 Tim Kett
Board 4 Alex Bullen
Board 5 Allan Pleasants
Captain Adam Hunt (England)
The Womens team is as follows:
Board 1 Olivia Smith
Board 2 Kimberly Chong
Board 3 Hiya Ray
Board 4 Khushi Bagga
Board 5 Sarah Kett
Captain Michael Healey (England)
Chief of Delegation Sarah Kett
FIDE Delegate Bill Harle
We wish them well!
The 3rd weekend of the J4NCL took place in Mercure Hotel, Daventry from 9th of April to 10th of April. Welsh Dragons Red were represented by Yuxuan Wu, Milo Davies, Tom Davies, Joe Conway-Lees and Oliver Sapsford who played in division 1.
Out of the 12 teams in the division they finished at a very impressive 4th place narrowly missing out on the third place in the league.
The Welsh Dragons Green were represented by Ethan Challoner, Benjamin Jaberansari, Ashika Shahameeran, Emma Kong, William Roberts and Louise Davies who competed in division 2. The team played very well and finished at a respectable mid table position. There was some brilliant individual performances.
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