IRLchess

The ICU web site has a recent post discussing the history of Dublin C.C.. The major work on this is of course the outstanding history compiled by Dr. A. A. Luce around 1967, at the time of the club’s centenary. This is now available on the Dublin C.C. web site, and is highly recommended if you haven’t seen it before.

I wasn’t aware until I saw the ICU post, though, that there is an additional document on Dublin C.C.’s site, covering the club history from 1967 to the present day, compiled by Denis Dempsey, very much in the same style as Dr. Luce’s booklet and also highly recommended.

One of the players mentioned in the update is Gerry O’Nolan, a member of the club from (approximately) 1934 to his death in 1984. Though the update doesn’t mention it, I understand he was a brother of Brian O’Nolan, a.k.a. Myles na gCopaleen, a.k.a. Flann O’Brien, the celebrated journalist/author.

The ICU games archive has none of his games, and I have never seen any anywhere else either. However we can now rectify this gap with two games, both of which featured O’Nolan with the Black pieces against J. J. Walsh. Both games are from a scorebook of 100 of J. J. Walsh’s games from 1949 to 1961, which J. J. has kindly lent me.

In Walsh-O’Nolan, Club tournament 1951, Black dropped a pawn early in the opening and White had no difficulties converting. (It’s not clear which club this was. J. J. switched from Eogahn Ruadh to Clontarf in 1951, and did not join Dublin until 1957.)

The second game is from the 1954 Leinster championship, the first of two occasions on which J. J. won the championship. In round 5, a Trompowsky led to the diagrammed position with Black to move. J. J.’s notes point out that 13 … 0-0 loses quickly to 14. Bxd6 Bxd6 15. e5 Be7 16. Rh3, while 13. … 0-0-0 is met by 14. b4 with an attack. In the game, O’Nolan tried 13. … g5, but after 14. Bxd6 Bxd6 15. e5 Be7 16. Rh3 Qg4 17. Rh6 with h3 to follow, the black queen had to be given up.

Does anyone know of any other games of Gerry O’Nolan, and in particular any wins?

Early this year I heard the sad news of the very untimely passing of Ivan Gormally. He was a clubmate of mine from our very earliest days at Dundrum C.C. and would have been a couple of years older than me.

He was one of the Dundrum team that played MTK Budapest in the European Club Championship in 1985, as previously recounted here. Dundrum had qualified by winning the Armstrong Cup in 1984-85, for the first and only time, but I couldn’t recall whether Ivan had played on the Armstrong team. And that particular season is one of the most mysterious of all Armstrong seasons, with essentially no records previously available. Furthermore the ICU games archive had none of his games.

During my last trip to Dublin, however, I visited John Gibson, who turns out to have a treasure trove of records. One item is the complete set of player records from the 1984-85 Armstrong season. From this it is clear not only that Ivan played, he was a key factor in Dundrum’s victory, with a score of 7/9, mostly on board 8:

As for games, one fortuitously showed up. Oliver Dunne showed me the tournament booklet for the 1981 Irish championship. At the back there are selected games from the supporting events, including the decisive last round game in the Irish intermediate championship (1500-1900), annotated by the winner of the game and the event.

Ivan was White against Ann Delaney, and in response to 15 … Qc7-e7? he has just played 16. Nh4-f5. After 16. … gxf5 17. Qxh5 Qg5 18. Qxg5 hxg5 19. exf5 Bxf5 20. Ne4 Black had either to lose a pawn or make the concession 20. … Bxe4 21. Bxe4 when Black has no counterplay and suffers major weaknesses on the light squares. Ivan managed to convert his advantage without further problems. [Click to replay the full game.] Final scores: 1. Ivan Gormally; 2-4. “Dillon, Hassan, Thomson” [no first names given; probably Andrew Thomson?] 5/6; 69 played.