2 December 2015
Philip May was our winner in the 2nd round of the Appleby Trophy at Alwoodley. He is now the only member of our squad there who is still on full points.
He was playing with white against Rose Forgrove’s Helmut Auer (grade 110). This time Philip opted for a smothering technique – his pieces creeping inexorably forward like a slow-moving lava flow. At one stage, with lots of pieces still on the board, his first 3 ranks were completely empty – everything, pawns and all, was either on rank 4 or further forward still while his opponent was confined to a smaller and smaller space.
Eventually Helmut managed to break out and briefly made some counterplay but it was too late – he was fast running out of time and Philip was on the point of queening a pawn or two.
Our other point-scorer (in the Ellis Trophy) was Paul M, who collected a half point for being on holiday in New Zealand. While our other two members there had to work hard to score nothing at all. Life can be so unfair!