Newport A swelled their already bulging trophy cabinet by being the class of the field in the Shropshire chess summer team rapidplay tournament.
With International Master Lawrence Cooper on top board and Nick Rutter, whose rapidplay grading almost matches Cooper's, on board two, the opposition were always going to find them tough to beat.
Newport topped the league stages in the competition, held at The Wrekin Housing Trust offices in Telford, and then thumped Maddocks 4-1 to progress to the final.
Trying to halt the Newport juggernaut were the other finalists, a composite team called the Mad Wolves, comprising players from the Oakengates based Maddocks club and players from the Wolverhampton league.
Result: Newport 5, Mad Wolves 0 - L Cooper 1, N Walker 0; N Rutter 1, E Angelov 0; N Paul 1, P Bull 0; C Lewis 1, S Tarr 0; I Jamieson 1, T Preece 0.
Maddocks beat Telepost A in the play-off for third place.
Players had 20 minutes to complete all their moves in each round and as the clocks ran down there were some comic incidents, with some blatant illegal moves being missed in the melee, and Telepost's Kate Walker, playing white, queened a pawn and immediately picked up a black queen and started playing with it until, amid laughter, a white queen was substituted.
The victorious Newport team in the Shropshire chess summer team quick play.
From left, Lawrence Cooper, Chris Lewis, Ian Jamieson, Nathanael Paul, Nick Rutter.
The 2019 Shropshire Quickplay team tournament has been fixed for Sunday, June 9, at Wrekin Housing Trust, Telford, with games starting promptly at 10am.
Controller - Toby Neil - 07/05/2019
2019 SUMMER TEAM QUICKPLAY SCHEDULE
Seven teams have entered the Shropshire 2019 summer team quickplay being held at the Wrekin Housing Trust, Colliers Way, Old Park, Telford, TF3 4AW on Sunday, June 9.
They are: Telepost A, Telepost B, Maddocks, Mad Wolves (a combined Maddocks and Wolverhampton team), Shrewsbury, Newport A, and Newport B.
With an odd number of entries, it means one team will have a bye in each round. (However, if there are ‘spare' players on the day, it may be possible to form an ad-hoc eighth team to avoid that.)
The competition will be run as a seven-match league, followed by knockout stages. Time control: 20 minutes.
If necessary (i.e. with teams on equal points and equal ‘goal difference'), blitz deciders will determine teams to go through to the knockout stages. Drawn matches in the semi final/final will similarly be decided by blitz deciders. If the blitz result is still a draw, board count will be used.
ROUND ONE: 10am to 10.40am.
ROUND TWO: 10.50am to 11.30am.
ROUND THREE: 11.35am to 12.15pm.
ROUND FOUR: 12.20pm to 1pm.
LUNCH 1pm to 2pm
(n.b. Wrekin Housing Trust restaurant will be open on the day to provide breakfast, roast lunch, snacks and drinks).
ROUND FIVE: 2pm to 2.40pm.
ROUND SIX: 2.45pm to 3.25pm.
ROUND SEVEN: 3.30pm to 4.10pm.
SEMI FINALS (1 st v 4 th , 2 nd v 3 rd ): 4.15pm to 4.55pm.
FINAL and 3 rd /4 th place playoff: 5pm to 5.40pm followed by presentation of trophy.
1 Teams will be of FIVE players.
2 Unless the competition is run with matches on a ‘home' and ‘away' basis, in each round team captains will toss for choice of having the white pieces on board one.
3 Players can only play for ONE team in the competition.
4 Subject to the above rule, teams can play substitutes from their club ranks during the competition. The intention of this is that if, say, a club has six or seven players interested in playing, those ‘extras' will have, at their captain's discretion, a chance to play in later rounds.
5 In the case of time control disputes, the arbiters in the first instance will be the two team captains. If they are actually involved in the dispute, the arbiter will be the competition organiser, consulting and taking advice as necessary from experienced players. (My default interpretation of the rules will be that a player whose flag falls automatically loses unless: 1. The opponent does not have mating material – and a pawn is mating material as it could promote; 2. The opponent is not trying to win i.e. is just messing about running the clock down).
6 Draws are permitted in the league/group matches (i.e. no need for board count tiebreaker). If necessary to determine which team progresses to the knockout stages, ‘goal difference' will be used to separate teams on equal points. If points and goal difference are identical, the teams will play a five minute blitz decider.
7 In the semi final and final, if the match result is a draw, the result on the bottom board will be discounted, repeatedly if necessary, until a decisive result is achieved. If all the games are drawn, the team which played black on board one will be declared winner .
8 Team names should reflect the strength of the team. If, for instance, a club enters a C team, but in practice intends to play A team players in that C team (because its A team has not entered), then the C team should be redesignated as the A team.
9 There may be some players who would like to take part, but whose clubs have not entered a team. To ensure that they are not denied the opportunity to join in, they may arrange to play for a different club as a guest player. The rule of thumb will be that they are not fielded in such a way as to bring the competition into disrepute. For example, a strong A team player should not be fielded in a D team as a guest.
10 If a team turns up unexpectedly short-handed, sympathetic consideration will be given to ad hoc arrangements on the day in which they rope in any grade-appropriate “spares” from another club, or to create a mixed or scratch team from various spare players to ensure an even number of teams are taking part – and so avoiding byes. The intention of this is to avoid the disappointment to opponents of defaulted boards and to ensure everyone who wants to play, can play, the rule of thumb again being that such arrangements do not bring the competition into disrepute.