We entered 2 Teams in the Edinburgh 2020 Team Rapid event at Edinburgh University Teviot Hall on Saturday. The 1st Team came first on tiebreak from Glasgow University, with a strong Strathclyde University Team in 3rd. Individual scores (5 games): Neil Berry 3.5, Alastair White 2.5, Willie Rutherford 4, Andre Antunes 5. Both Willie and Andre won individual board prizes too.

A critical moment in our 2-2 draw with Edinburgh University. After 1.Na4?, my queenside initiative developed smoothly with …Qa5, …Ba6, …Rfc8, …Nf6-e4v and so on. Fortunately my opponent missed the shot 1.Nxd5!, when after 1…exd5 2.Qxd5 White exploits my lack of coordination to regain the material with interest.

A big change to the schedule on 20th Nov. Instead of the planned 10 second buzzer lightning event (which will be rescheduled) we are extremely fortunate to have a visit from the Israeli GM Emil Sutovsky , who will give a 2 hour talk.

He is renowned as a ferocious attacking player so his talk is sure to be hugely entertaining.  If you aren’t familiar with his play then check out his win against English GM Danny Gormally at the Gibraltar Chess Festival in 2005.

Among his notable successes: he was World Junior Champion in 1996, won the Hoogeveen Tournament in 1997, won the Aeroflot Open in Moscow in 2005, won the gold medal for the best individual performance on board two at the 2010 Olympiad,  and won the Biel Masters as recently as 2015. He has been the president of the Association of Chess Professionals since 2012.

There will also be a short talk at the start of the evening by new FIDE President Arkady Dvorkovich.

Please arrive for a 7.30 pm start.

We’re delighted to announce that we’ve received a cheque for £1000 from the Post Office’s CommonUnity competition to help us to support junior and senior chess activities. Our sincere thanks to Lynsey Shovlin for spotting the competition and entering us into it – an excellent piece of initiative!

And of course our thanks to the Post Office – one of the few organisations that are even older than us 😉

Cheque for £1000

We’ll be considering how best to use the prize for maximum benefit in the near future.

#commonunity

Congratulations to Edinburgh 1 who finished the season with a 3 – 2 win against Dundee A and took the national league title with seven wins out of 7. The second team drew with North Ayrshire Crusaders to finish safely above the relegation places. In the team lightning the first team finished third behind Hamilton and Dundee A, the second team eighth out of eighteen teams. My thanks to all who have taken part in the national league this season