It all started well enough. We had a decent second team out, although nothing of the strength of Wigston - hopefully we could give them a game. The games all looked quite close and interesting early on. After about 45 minutes of play Alan Byron and I had rattled out 20 moves of a closed Ruy Lopez (I did joke that Alan must have picked up the wrong piece when playing e4) whilst Pete Harrison and Martin Burrows had played 4 moves each! First to finish was Dave Bray drawing with Walter Dehnen. Then Mike Cowley drew with Andy Morley. At this stage I was level with Alan Byron, Pete was struggling against Martin but Graham Booley was duffing up ex County Champion Alan Ward.
Then came the controvesy. Both Alan and Graham were short of time (3 minutes and a bit vs 5 minutes and a bit). Alan played a move and Graham instantly played his reply when a Wigston player stepped in to tell Graham that he had to write Alans move down before playing his own. This intervention didnt go down well with either player but they carried on, only for the watching Wigston player to do it again! This was embarrassing for him on two counts - firstly spectators should never interrupt a game in progress for any reason and secondly because he was completely wrong about the laws of chess (it's perfectly legal to play your move and then write down your move and your opponents afterwards). Hacked off at the destraction, and despite the fact that he was completely winning Graham had had enough at this point and offered Alan Ward a draw who of course accepted.
In fairness to Alan, he was just as disturbed by all this as Graham, and in fact afterwards offered to resign the game (I dont know if this was accepted by Graham who has gone on holiday to recover!). Why does it always have to happen against Wigston? Pete eventually succumbed to Martin and Alan Byron got the better of me at the end after a great struggle but events on Board 5 left a bitter taste - again.
| Littlethorpe 2 | Wigston 1 | ||
| 1 | Sean Hewitt | 0-1 | Alan Byron |
| 2 | Dave Bray | ½-½ | Walter Dehnen |
| 3 | Pete Harrison | 0-1 | Martin Burrows |
| 4 | Mike Cowley | ½-½ | Andy Morley |
| 5 | Graham Booley | 1-0* | Alan Ward |
| 2-3 | |||
| * Maybe! Or it might be a draw. | |||
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