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Wimbledon II won the toss and were white on odds.

Final score: London Deaf  3.5 – 6.5   Wimbledon II

For the first time we tried out the Plumbers Arms Gambit, using the function room upstairs of our 'local' pub. Again we only just beat time trouble to set everything up – huge thanks here goes to Barry David for driving down with a lot of the chess stuff and saved us a lot of time by avoiding the need to carry so many things from Grosvenor Gardens to the pub. Thanks also goes to Richard Willson for helping out as well.

There were mixed reactions about using this room – whilst there was a bit more room available, the temperature did rise a little with so many people in the room. £5 goes to the person who can find us the perfect room in Central London :–) Good luck there looking for it, as rooms that cost next to nowt are very rare!

Anyway, let's get on with the chess.........

On paper, we knew that Wimbledon II would be slightly stronger than us overall but we had a solid bunch of players so there were hopes of getting a result here. Alas we started with a setback on board 3 where Ilan lost quickly, overlooking the threats to his kingside on h7. On board 6, Barry got a solid draw against his opponent graded 15 points higher. On board 8, Richard W. was a pawn up in a double rook and pawn endgame but his rooks and king weren't active enough and as it was impossible to improve his position, a draw was agreed.

James on board 7 fought hard but had to succumb to defeat after too much pressure down the c file and on f7. On boards 9 and 10, both David and Gian found the going tough and went down fighting after long games. On board 2, I either blundered or sacrificed a pawn (take your pick!) in order to open up my bishops and create doubled pawns for my opponent. Later on I managed to get the pawn back and agreed a draw soon afterwards.

Chris on board 1 had to go through a some hairy moments while defending his kingside to a barrage of sacrifices but cooly mopped up and held on easily to win. Richard D. on board 4 was fighting hard for a draw a pawn down in a double bishop endgame but his opponent played well to win. Neil got a bit of pride back for LDCC when he won a nice game on board 5, proving that his bishop and knight were better than his opponent's rook amongst the pawns.