22 April 2020
We took on our first external online opponents tonight – Limewood United played Skegness Athletic.
Skegness proved to be the more athletic and won the match 9½ to 4½.
The format was Rapidplay, 30 minutes per player on the clock, each ‘pair’ playing each other twice, once as White, once as Black.
Tom Leah and Paul May both won both their games at Boards 1 and 2. Alas their success did not carry along the boards. The only other score for Limewood came from Board 6 where ‘Mproines’ put up a spirited and prolonged resistance in both games, long after the others had all finished, and extracted a draw from the final game.
Some teething problems still presented themselves. The Chess.com system threw a wobbly at John Grasham being a signed-up member of both clubs. The resulting re-set meant that some intending players fell off the end of the pier and were not able to have a game. A few Limewood members suffered technical problems [Lumpy Kustud: Are you accusing them of having dodgy connections?] that led to them being defaulted in 3 games.
Technical hazards apart, it was a good evening – the first, perhaps, of more inter-club internet battles to come.
Next Wed 29 April: Online clubnight starting at 7pm: 15 minute, 6-round Swiss competition – maybe with some Skegness members taking part as well.