Malitis Memorial Round 7

The final round of the Malitis Memorial saw Sylvester Urban take out the event after being on the right side of an opening disaster against Richard Voon. The battle for the minor placings saw a three-way tie for second between Garry Lycett, David Lacey & Justin Penrose after Lacey beat Lycett on the white side of an Exchange Queen's Gambit, while Penrose beat Richard McCart on the black side on an Alekhine's Defense. McCart was far enough in front that his 4/7 was enough to take the rating group prize.
As usual, results and final crosstable are available on ChessChat.
The next event at MCC is the Melbourne Chess Club Open, which starts in a fortnight (September 10) & is a 9 round swiss event.
The game of the round is a short one between Sylvester Urban & Richard Voon. You'll see what I mean by an opening disaster!

Malitis Memorial Round 6

Round 6 of the Malitis Memorial saw Sylvester Urban retain his lead after defeating John Dowling on the black side of a Modern Benoni. Garry Lycett continued his excellent tournament with a win over Ari Dale on the white side of a Grunfeld to remain half a point behind Sylvester. Richard Voon beat David Beaumont to move into outright third place, while Justin Penrose, David Lacey & Richard McCart are all a further half point behind on 4/6.
As usual, results are on ChessChat.
This week's game sees Garry Lycett continue his excellent tournament with a win over Ari Dale, when Ari underestimated the power of Garry's Passed d-pawn & bishop pair.

Malitis Memorial Round 5

Round 5 saw a change at the top of the leaderboard, with Sylvester Urban beating Garry Lycett to take over the lead of the event. David Lacey grimly defended an inferior position against Richard Voon, before finding a perpetual check in a queen and pawn ending to leave both a point behind Sylvester. Also joining them on 3.5/5 were Justin Penrose, Ari Dale and John Dowling, who all took very different routes to victory, with Justin winning a see-sawing battle against David Beaumont, Ari quickly drumming up a winning attack against Marcus Ogden's king & John Dowling avoiding a draw by repetition thanks to Jack Puccini's incorrect method of claiming (Jack played the move on the board and claimed, rather than writing it on his scoresheet without playing it on the board and claiming). This has left Sylvester half a point ahead of Garry, with five people a further half point behind. With two rounds to play, this leaves Sylvester and Garry as the most likely to win the event, but those chasing are still well and truly in contention!
As usual, results are on ChessChat.
This week's game sees Sylvester make quick work of Garry Lycett on board 1, when Garry's ambitious e5 break is ripped apart tactically.

 

Malitis Memorial Round 4

Round 4 of the Malitis Memorial saw Garry Lycett continue his winning ways to remain in the sole lead of the tournament on 4/4 after a grinding win over John Dowling. His opponent next week will be Sylvester Urban, who also had a grinding over Justin Penrose to move to 3.5/4. After joining the tournament late, David Beaumont has won all his games, and now finds himself on 3/4 after a win over Jim Papadinis, where his speculative double piece sacrifice was enough to win after Papdinis made mistakes in defense. Richard Voon & David Lacey also had wins to move to 3/4, and these five are in the best position for a top three finish. On other boards, Sarah Anton ensured Phillip Drew lived up to his surname, holding an ending an exchange down, while youth Olympiad team member Jack Puccini beat Felix Wyss. Young Kevin Zhao, playing in his first adult tournament, managed to hold Finley Dale to a draw, to score his first points on the board in the tournament.
As usual, results are on ChessChat.
This week's game sees Garry Lycett continue his winning streak in the event against John Dowling.

Malitis Memorial Round 3

Round 3 of the tournament saw an outright leader emerge, with Garry Lycett being the only player to move to 3/3 after beating Richard Voon. Sylvester Urban beat David Lacey to stay within half a point of the leader, while John Dowling also stayed in contention with a victory over Sarah Anton. Peter Fry held Ari Dale to a draw, while the Jager-Penrose clash is to be played later in the week. The other boards mostly went according to rating, although Richard McCart managed to beat Paul Kovacevic in a minor upset.
As usual, results are on ChessChat.
This week's game sees Sylvester Urban demonstrate what can happen to black when things don't go to plan in the Sicilian.

 

Malitis Memorial Round 2

Round 2 of the Malitis Memorial saw the first major upset of the tournament, with Ari Dale joining the infamous 'Richard Voon club' (yes, it even has its own Facebook group!), after going astray in a position where he appeared to have a clear edge. David Lacey & Garry Lycett also had wins to lead the tournament with Voon on 2/2. These players are followed by a large group of players on 1.5/2, which includes top seed Jesse Jager, as well as Sylvester Urban, John Dowling & Justin Penrose among others.
Richard McCart won the battle of brothers over Roger, even with Roger's birthday the following day!
As usual, results are available on ChessChat.
This week's game is Richard Voon's win over Ari Dale. After misplaying the opening, Ari obtains a clear edge, but Richard missed an golden opportunity to turn the tables with 33...Bg6. Ari then miscalculated the tactics, giving up his queen in the mistaken belief that he would promote a pawn & get a queen back. Richard then slowly pushed his advantage, finally checkmating Ari to seal the win.

Malitis Memorial Round 1

The first round of the next Monday night tournament at Melbourne Chess Club got underway last Monday, with 21 players in attendance, with quite a large number of players unable to make it to the first evening (and taking half-point byes as a result). The top seeds for the event are Jesse Jager, Ari Dale, Sylvester Urban & John Dowling.
Ari is looking to continue his recent run of good results, as well as extending his lead in the MCC Grand Prix (he plans to head overseas later in the year, so will miss some events), but Jesse will be leading the charge to try to stop Ari from winning another event!
As usual, results from round 1 are available on ChessChat.
This week's game is between Sylvester Urban & Jack Puccini, which sees Jack win a pawn in the early middlegame, but Sylvester plays the rook ending actively to turn the tables, with multiple exchanges leading the players to agree to a draw.

Monday - Chess - Amateur Game of the Week (coming soon)

Today I recorded the first episode of Amateur Game of the Week ... but it went much longer than I had imagined, so the uploading will take a bit longer than I had expected. I am expecting to have the video up (most likely in three parts) sometime tomorrow. Hopefully it will be worth the wait.
In other news, I finished equal thrid in the Malitis Memorial tournament at Melbourne Chess Club. I was somewhat criticised for my decision to accept an early draw offer in the final round, however I was happy enough with the result (a draw against top seed Jesse Jager), and happy to guarantee a share of the prizemoney (I was guaranteed at least equal thrid with a draw). The reason for the criticism was that going into the final round, Jager was on 5.5/6 & myself and two others (playing one another on board 2) were on 4.5/6, meaning if I won that I would finish in equal first on 5.5/7. Some people thought that with the potential of a draw practically always on the table, that I essentially had nothing to lose by playing on. As it turned out, the opening played was very quiet & there was very few obvious ways to make a winning attempt in the position. Ultimately I was happy with the result of the tournament & I'll wear the criticism levelled at me for taking the 'soft' final round draw.