I was sorry to hear of the death of one of Ireland’s most distinguished correspondence players, Desmond Taylor, in August, aged 80. He earned the correspondence chess International Master title in 1998 and the correspondence chess Senior International Master title in 2002.
The Lisburn C.C. Facebook page had a post on October 24, with the news, plus some details of his life and chess career, including a recent photograph.
One of his most notable wins was against Tõnu Õim of Estonia, twice World Correspondence Chess Champion (1977-1983 and 1994-2000), during the preliminary round of the 13th Correspondence Chess Olympiad in 1998. His annotation of the game appears on the ICCA web pages. A crucial moment is shown in the diagrammed position:
Topalov had suggested 16. Nbc7 Bxd5! 17. Nxd5 Rfe8 here, in notes on the game Adams – Topalov, Wijk aan Zee 1996. Õim instead played the novelty 16. Ndc7, presumably to avoid this possibility, but it did not work out, and Taylor took control and won well.
Intriguingly, the ICCA notes say “In Tallinn shortly after this game ended, the world champion told Tim Harding he would never had played this move had he owned a computer to check it.” The game of correspondence chess has changed out of all recognition.
The Ulster Masters took place last weekend, in Lisburn C.C.’s new premises, attracting 40 players across two sections. The top section was won by Peter Carroll, for the second year in a row. A full report has been added here.
An unusual ending cropped up in the round two game between David Hill (Strand) and Stephen Scannell (Lisburn). Hill, though heavily outrated, had earlier been three pawns up, but missed several opportunities to close the game out. Finally the game simplified to the diagrammed position. Knight plus two pawns versus knight is normally easily winning. This position is winning, but it turns out to be very tricky indeed, with themes of mutual zugzwang. It’s not easy to understand what’s going on, even with the aid of the Nalimov tablebases; I would find it impossible without them.
Hill – Scannell, Ulster Masters 2022
54. ?
White now played the natural 54. Kg2?, but it turns out that this should throw away the win. According to the tablebases, 54. Kg1! and 54. Nc5 are the only moves that win.
Scannell erred in turn with 54… Ke5? (only 54… Kf5 and 54… Ng5 draw). After the further 55. Kf2 Ng5 56. Nc5 Kf5 57. Kg2, a mutual zugzwang position was reached.
There followed 57… Kg4 58. e4, again a mutual zugzwang, 58… Nf3, and now White made the final error with 59. Nd7?, letting the win slip: 59. Nd3! is the only move that wins (though this is still far from obvious). Best play then goes 59… Nd2 60. Nf2+! (only move) Kg5 60. Kh2 Nc4 61. Kh3 Ne3 62. Nd3 Kh5 63. Ne5 Kg5 64. Kh2 Kf6 65. Nf3, and White has consolidated.
Michael Basman played some tournaments last year, including the 1st EJCOA Forest Hall Invitational in Northumbria, England, a 10-player all-play-all in which Tarun Kanyamarala earned his first IM norm. The 75-year-old Basman scored 2½/9. A photo of round 7 shows him on the far board.
He scored 0/3 against Irish players. His first round loss against David Fitzsimons saw him lost out of the opening, but he should have drawn his second round game against Tarun Kanyamarala (which commenced 1. b4 e5 2. a3). By far the most interesting of these games, though, was his fourth round game against Trisha Kanyamarala, a game he could have won.
This one opened with the Grob, 1. g4.
Basman – Tr. Kanyamarala, 1st EJCOA Invitational 2022
Position after 25… Qe7
The position after move 25 was no advertisement for this eccentric opening. White has two bad bishops, and two bad knights; the one on h3 has particularly poor prospects. Or so it seems.
Same game
35. ?
Nine moves later, the second diagram was reached. Now Basman could have won with the shot 35. Ng6+!! hxg6 36. Qb4, since 36… Bf6 37. hxg6+ Kg8 38. Qf4 is crushing. The change in fortunes for the formerly forlorn knight is startling. (The more prosaic 35. Qb4 also wins; the difference is that it allows the extra defence 35… Rxf4.)
The game’s 35. Qc1? was thus a missed opportunity, but Basman was still slightly better, and (after some further twists and turns) was still equal ten moves later, when he blundered a piece, ultimately losing.
I was sorry to hear the news that Michael Basman, ‘by a very long way, the most creative chess player of his generation’ (William Hartston), has died.
He tied for first in the 1973 British championship, though lost the playoff match, played for England in the 1968 Olympiad, and became an IM in 1980, when opportunities for titles were much harder to come by. A comprehensive tribute (forwarded by John Griffin, for which many thanks) appeared at Chess.com, which had also recently featured a collection of his most notable games. These include his draws against Botvinnik, earning his praise, and Tal, in a game he could have won, and his ‘Immortal Waiting Game’ win against Ulf Andersson at Hastings 1974-75.
But he stood out for the extraordinarily provocative and eccentric openings he played. The St. George (1… a6) is perhaps the most famous, but more generally he pioneered what he called the ‘Creepy Crawly Opening’, avoiding the centre in favour of rook-pawn moves, e.g., 1. h3 and 2. a3. Examples of this with an Irish connection include his wins against Colm Daly and Niall Carton (British Championship 1990) and Mark Quinn (British Championship 1992).
These openings are far from double-edged, and usually did not lead to spectacular games. One exception was his win against Mel Ó Cinnéide in the Lloyds Bank Masters in 1993. This has come to light only relatively recently: it appeared in one of Basman’s opening books, and was added to the BritBase report on the event in July of last year, appearing in the games collection here shortly afterwards.
Basman – Ó Cinnéide, Lloyds Bank Masters 1993
Position after 22… Qxc3
After a sharper then usual opening in these lines, Mel lost time with 12… Qa5?, and was lost a few moves later. In the diagrammed position, he has just played Q(d2)xc3, capturing a knight. The finish was 23. Rd7 Ng8 24. Rxb7 Qc1+ 25. Kh2 Qd2 26. Rb8+ Qd8 27. Rxd8+ Kxd8 28. Qf7 1-0.
The chess world is abuzz with news of the 10-move win of Leinier Domínguez Pérez against Elshan Moradiabadi in the US Championship in St. Louis earlier this month.
After 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nf6 3. Nxe5 d6 4. Nf3 Nxe4 5. d4 d5 6. Bd3 Be7 7. O-O Bf5 8. c4 O-O? 9. cxd5 Qxd5??, the diagrammed position was reached.
Domínguez Pérez – Moradiabadi, US Championship, St. Louis 2022
Position after 9… Qxd5??
After 10. Bxe4!, Black resigned: the bishop at e7 is lost in all variations.
Much of the commentary described this as a well-known trap that has occurred before. Indeed it has, but what is the first example of it in a competitive game? As discussed here some time ago (see Irish Junior Championship 2016), the same position appeared in the game Coffey – McHugh, Irish Schoolboys’ Championship 1980. That game continued 10. Bxe4 Bxe4 11. Nc3 Bxf3 12. Nxd5 Bxd1 13. Nxe7+ and Kevin resigned. (Click to replay.)
The databases I checked have no examples of the diagrammed position before the turn of the millennium, and the game Matsuo – Al Badani, Japan v. Yemen, Istanbul Olympiad 2000, is the first with 10. Bxe4.
Over five years ago, a report on the Target Recruitment Masters 2001 was added to the tournament pages here. The overall event, held at Queen’s University Belfast, attracted 86 players across three sections. The top section was won jointly by Alexander Baburin and Bogdan Lalić, each on an undefeated 5/6, ahead of the Dutch players Harmen Jonkman and Yge Visser on 4½, and the quintet of Keith Allen, Tom Clarke, Colm Daly, Stephen Gillen, and Mark Orr on 4. In all, 92 of the 98 games are available.
For some reason that escapes me, there was no associated cover post when the report was first posted here. Just recently, it emerged that one of the players was wrongly identified in that report, as well as in essentially all databases: the “John Cooper” who finished joint 10th-15th on 3½ was not the Welsh IM John Grantley Cooper, rated 2341 at the time, but rather John G. Cooper, then and now of Lytham in Lancashire, b. 1942, FIDE ID 416096. The report has been updated to correct this misidentification.
David McAlister, who was one of the co-organisers, provided invaluable help in clearing this up, and he has also provided a great deal more information, including details of time forfeits and incomplete games, clubs for more than half the players and links to assorted photos, for which many thanks.
Here is an excerpt from John G. Cooper’s first round game against Stephen Gillen. The databases break off here with “½-½”, which I had assumed meant that the players agreed a draw. David’s information clarifies that the game continued. Perhaps the players stopped recording moves here due to time trouble. We must assume, though, that White did not find the best move here. What did he miss?
Cooper – S. Gillen, Target Recruitment Masters, Belfast 2001
Position after 46… Rg6
This is based on joint work with David McAlister, to whom many thanks; we have been trading versions back and forth and adding details sporadically for five years or so on this.
To celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the founding of the ICU and the tenth anniversary of the founding of the City of Derry C.C., the championship was awarded to Derry for the first time. After the all-play-all championships of the two preceding years, the format returned to the Swiss system, to be played over 8 rounds.
The field of sixteen included the defending Irish champion John Reid of Adare, who was also Munster champion; the champion of 1959 and 1960 Brian Reilly; and Ulster champion Eugene O’Hare of the host club. There were also the future Irish champions Eamon Keogh, 18 years old and playing in his first Irish championship, and 17-year-old Hugh MacGrillen, playing in his second, along with a representative selection of top players from the Leinster and Ulster leagues.
A month before the event, there was an incident that may have had a major bearing on the eventual outcome. The incident made national news, including a front page story in the Irish Press (June 16, 1962):
“Sergeant hurt in spade attack: man berserk
A Garda Sergeant was injured in Mungret, Co. Limerick, yesterday, when he successfully brought under control a 28-year-old six-foot Limerick man who went berserk with a spade.
Sgt. John Reid of Patrickswell — he was Irish chess champion last year and is a well-known rugby player — had an artery in his right arm severed in the struggle. …”
The championship opened on July 14, and the shock of the first round was the loss Brian Reilly suffered at the hands of the local player Larry Finlay. John Reid won a pawn against Maurice Hughes but had to settle for a draw after a bishops of opposite colour ending was reached.
In round 2, the local player Matt O’Leary forged into the sole lead by defeating Donal Déiseach, in what seems to have been a surprise: Déiseach had been tipped prior to the event as one of the leading contenders. Michael Littleton drew against Larry Finlay and Alex Montwill drew against Ulster’s Noel Mulholland, leaving each ½ point off the lead. Brian Reilly recovered from his opening round setback with a win against Eugene O’Hare. On the other hand, John Reid drew again, this time against Eamon Keogh.
In round 3, Matt O’Leary continued his run of successes with a win against his clubmate Larry Finlay to reach 3/3. Alex Montwill won against Ulster’s David Kerr to reach clear second on 2½, ahead of five players on 2, including Littleton, who drew again, and Reilly, who won again. Once again, for the third successive game, John Reid drew, this time against Hubert Boyd of Derry. Was this slow start due to the aftereffects of his unpleasant experience a month earlier?
In round 4, Montwill beat O’Leary, to lead with 3½ to O’Leary’s 3. Keogh and Littleton drew, as did Mulholland and Reilly, while Reid finally won, against MacGrillen. This left five players tied for third place on 2½: Keogh, Littleton, Mulholland, Reid, and Reilly.
In round 5, Montwill lost to Keogh, leaving five players tied for first on 3½/5: Keogh, Montwill, O’Leary, Reid, and Reilly. Littleton, who drew for the fourth consecutive round, fell to joint 6th on 3.
In round 6, Keogh lost in turn to O’Leary. Reid beat Reilly, and both Montwill and Littleton won, leaving Montwill, O’Leary, and Reid joint first on 4½/6, with Littleton clear fourth on 4.
In round 7, O’Leary and Reid drew on top board; Eugene O’Hare’s report says that O’Leary missed a win. Littleton beat Montwill, and Reilly beat Keogh. This left Littleton, O’Leary, and Reid joint first with 5/7, with Montwill and Reilly joint fourth on 4½, and all others out of contention.
In the last round, Reid and Littleton drew in 18 moves in a King’s Indian. This seems strange: in light of what followed, it seems as if one or the other, probably Littleton, should have been inclined to play on. O’Leary could have secured the Irish championship by winning against Reilly. As it was, he lost fairly quickly with the black pieces. Montwill won against Hubert Boyd, after an adjournment.
This left four players in joint first with the low score of 5½/8, the only time in the history of the Irish championship that there has been a four-way tie. The tiebreak system was Sonneborn-Berger, which had been used to break three ties in the 1950’s (1953, 1955, and 1957) and was to be used again in 1967. Reid was adjudged the winner, and the shield duly presented. It was a remarkable comeback after his slow start.
However, it was soon discovered that there was a snag: Reid and Littleton had the same Sonneborn-Berger score (Montwill was third and Reilly fourth). What next? There seems to have been no provision for this possibility, but in the entire history of the Irish championship, all ties had been broken in one way or another to produce a single champion. In this case, it was initially assumed that there would be a playoff match for the title, of 4 or 6 games. It was announced two months later, though, that there would be no playoff match and that they would share the title.
Strangely, the four players who eventually tied for first had not met each other at all up to the end of round 5, and there was only one game between players of this set in each of the last three rounds. On the other hand, Matt O’Leary played all other players who finished in the top 7, plus one of those who finished joint 8th, while Eamon Keogh, who finished in clear 7th, one point off joint first, played all six players who finished above him.
Only one game survives, featuring an imaginative sacrifice by Donal Déiseach against David Kerr in round 4.
Kerr – Déiseach, Irish Championship, Derry 1962
Position after 11. Nd5
In the diagrammed position, Déiseach played the startling 11… Nd4!!??. He deserves full credit for creativity, but was this sound, as contemporary sources assumed?
The page here on FIDE title norms by Irish players, and progress of Irish players towards titles, has been updated. There has been so much activity on this front that it has been hard to keep up, and the update includes all of Tarun Kanyamarala’s norms and his application for the IM title, Conor Murphy’s GM norm at the Olympiad, Tom O’Gorman’s norm at the European Individual Championship in March, and Alice O’Gorman’s qualification for a direct WFM title at the Women’s Olympiad.
The norms now cover 2007 onwards. More detail has been added to descriptions of norms, and links to the applicable FIDE rules over the years have been added.
Where possible, links to certificates of title results and title applications have been added. This is not as straightforward as it was until relatively recently: FIDE now provides links to norms and applications from the FIDE titles page only for a limited time before and after a pending application, though often/usually the link to the norm or application itself is still active.
Ireland’s record at Women’s Olympiads had an outstanding start at the first such event, Emmen 1957, when the team of Hilda Chater and Beth Cassidy finished equal 14th-15th out of 21, ahead of France, Austria, Finland, Norway, Belgium, and Luxembourg.
Ireland sent no team to the following two events, in 1963 and 1966, but in 1969 the team of Mai Branagan (Rathmines), Aileen Noonan (Collegians), and Elizabeth Shaughnessy (Collegians) travelled to Lublin, Poland for the fourth Women’s Olympiad. Contemporary newspaper reports record that they paid for their own travel and hotels; I hope this has changed since then.
The event was organised as a 15-team all-play-all, with matches over two boards. The runaway winners were the Soviet Union, whose squad comprised the reigning Women’s Word Champion Nona Gaprindashvili (of Georgia); her challenger in 1965, 1969, and 1972 Alla Kushnir; and future challenger Nana Alexandria (also of Georgia).The next seven places were filled by the remaining Eastern European countries: Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Bulgaria, East Germany, Romania, and Poland. The Western European countries followed: England, West Germany, Denmark, Austria, and Belgium, with Ireland finishing in last place.
All of the countries that finished ahead of Ireland in 1969 also did so this year. (Or their main analogies did, in the case of the countries that have split or merged since then.)
No games from the event appear in the ICU games archive as of the date of this post, but all games have long been available at OlimpBase. The Irish games have been uploaded here.
Ireland’s only win came in a dramatic game by Aileen Noonan against the then-three-times Austrian Women’s Champion Ingeborg Kattinger. The twists and turns must largely be attributable to time trouble. Earlier Noonan had had a nominal advantage but no viable way of making progress. After breaking open the position, she was objectively lost; was this an error or a gamble based on her opponent’s time trouble?
Here 37. Qc8 would have left Black with nothing better than taking the perpetual. Instead Noonan erred with 37. Rxf4?. After 37… Rd1+ 38. Ke2, 38… Qd3 would have been mate, but Kattinger instead played 38… Qd2+. After 39. Kf3 Qxf4+ 40. Ke2, Kattinger, on the last move before the time control, missed 40… Qf1+ and mate next move, instead playing 40… Rd2+.
This should still have been enough to win, and with the time control met should have been no problem. The game continued 41. Ke1 Rd8 42. Ke2 Qd2+ 43. Kf3 Rd3+?, throwing away the win (43… Qf4+ 44. Ke2 Rd2+ 45. Ke1 Qf2+ 46. Qxf2 Rxf2 wins easily) 44. Kg4 Qf4+? (44… Qh6 was now essential to survive) 45. Kh5 Rd8 46. Qe7 and Black resigned.
The Irish Championship is in progress in Dublin, and reaches the halfway stage today. A report has been added to the tournament pages here; updates will be added round by round until the conclusion.
Numbers are down from the past several championships, which saw an extraordinary run, but the event has still attracted a good-sized field of 24 (starting) players, with 6-7 strong contenders for the title.
After four rounds, Tarun Kanyamarala has set a blistering pace, with successive wins against Colm Daly, Alexander Baburin, and Henry Li, to lead by a clear point. His opponent today, Conor O’Donnell, is one point back, along with Tom O’Gorman, and a group of seven players lie joint fourth on 2½/4.
Update, July 7: Tarun Kanyamarala and Conor O’Donnell drew on the top board in round 5. Tom O’Gorman won against Cathal Keenan, and Alexander Baburin won against Joe Ryan on board 3, in an interesting game where Ryan earlier had seemed better. Colm Daly won convincingly against Gerard O’Connell. Kanyamarala now leads by ½ point over O’Gorman, against whom he has Black in round 6, with Baburin, Daly, and O’Donnell a further half point back.
Update, July 8 (round 6): O’Gorman and Kanyamarala drew on the top board, and likewise Baburin and O’Donnell on board 2. Colm Daly surprisingly lost to Oisín O’Cuilleanain on board 3, and must now be out of contention. Peter Carroll defeated Jacob Flynn on board 4, and Henry Li beat Joe Ryan on board 5.
Eamon Keogh, who seemed well out of form throughout, played his last game of the tournament. It’s worth noting that this year marks the 60th anniversary of his first Irish championship, Derry 1962, where he scored 4½/8 to finish in 7th place, 1 point short of joint first. This year was his 30th Irish championship.
Update, July 9 (round 7): Tarun Kanyamarala had his easiest game of the tournament on board 1 against Oisín O’Cuilleanain, while there were draws on the next three boards: Carroll – O’Gorman, O’Donnell – Li, and Daly – Baburin, the last of these by far the most interesting. The upshot is that Kanyamarala leads by a clear point from O’Gorman with two rounds to play, with four players a further half point behind. Is it all over? Last year, O’Gorman seemed in an equally strong position at the same stage, and the last two rounds scrambled everything.
Update, July 11 (final rounds): Tarun Kanyamarala won his last two games to record a resounding victory, a point and a half ahead of the field, for his first Irish Championship, two weeks after his sister Trisha won her first Irish Women’s championship. The report has been updated. In round 8, he recorded a spectacular win in a very interesting game against Peter Carroll, while on the next board, Tom O’Gorman maintained the pressure by also winning as Black, against Henry Li, using the now-rare Polugaevsky variation of the Najdorf.
This left Tarun a point clear heading into the final round, and needing only a draw. In the event, he won fairly easily against Joe Ryan, while O’Gorman lost as Black against the always-dangerous Colm Daly. The latter pair shared thrid and fourth places, while Alexander Baburin finished in clear second, with 6½/8.
