Saturday 24th January, the ESPCA U11 Zonal was upon us, as a team of 12 did battle with other counties in the North West. Could we do any better than last year?
Format was slightly different this year, so we had some hope. However, these were dashed at the start when we learned that Derbyshire has pulled out. This meant there would be a BYE round for each team, and the maximum they could score would be 6 game points. We felt it would be highly likely we would be a team getting a bye, and it turned out this way for Round 3.
Round 1 – put it against one of the top teams, Cheshire and North Wales (who finished 2nd in the end). We lost the match 11-1, a bit of a disappointing start. However, apart from Board 1, all our players were playing stronger players. Leon was the only player with a stronger rating than his opponent, and he duly brought home the point.
Round 2 – a match up against a weaker team, so a chance for the team. We are paired against Wirral B. The ratings match up looked a bit over the place, but we held our own and won the match up 7-5. A great performance by the team, and their first match win. It would now all depend on the draw for Round 3.
Alas, we were given a bye, and that meant 6 points maximum. At this stage, I have calculated that we would end up with Manchester A in round 4, as Manchester has already played Cheshire and Wirral A – and beaten them comprehensively.
Round 4 went as expected, and Manchester A beat us 12-0. There were however, some very good games, we came close in at least 3 games that I saw. Leon just made a positional misjudgment in his game against Shlok.
We had a team of 4 reserves and they all got to play for the main team. However, the results don’t match up properly on chess.results.
In the end, last place, although we did win a match. Alas, the tables are based on number of boards won.
Congratulations to Manchester A, 43.5 out of a maximum 48.
Final table
| Rk. | SNo | Team | Games | + | = | – | TB1 | TB2 | TB3 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 | Manchester A | 4 | 4 | 0 | 0 | 43,5 | 4 | 8 |
| 2 | 2 | Cheshire & North Wales | 4 | 3 | 0 | 1 | 34,5 | 3 | 6 |
| 3 | 4 | Wirral A | 4 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 19,5 | 2 | 4 |
| 4 | 6 | Manchester B | 3 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 19,5 | 1 | 3 |
| 5 | 7 | Oldham | 3 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 19 | 1 | 3 |
| 6 | 5 | Wirral B | 3 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 18 | 0 | 1 |
| 7 | 3 | Lancashire | 3 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 14 | 1 | 3 |
Thank you to all the parents for supporting your child and getting them to the event.
Special thanks to Colin and Gordan for their help on the day, and car lift duties.