19-08-2012, 09:03 PM
Rather better news to report today!
The joke early in the morning was that Alice's bye and Ian and Nihad's fixture meant that today was already our highest-scoring day, but we surpassed that mark with considerable ease. Liam and Kai won very smoothly to get off the mark, while Vagif played well and had much the better of his draw. Andrew was all set to get his grind on when his opponent flung a piece in a queen and knight ending (one of those Nd4 Qxd4 Qxd4 Nxe2+ thank you very much efforts). Murad continued his excellent form with a very good win. Third round in a row when one of the girls drew an opposite-coloured bishop ending, which Ali achieved from the numerically inferior side with considerable ease. Carl did very well to hold out in the day's longest game with some neat tricks in the end, despite being under pressure almost throughout. Nihad and Ian played out a complex game, with Ian sharper at the critical moment. Hamish played a decent game, with the unfortunate exception of a couple of tactical slips which cost him the point, while Anna was ground down over a difficult few hours. Alexander had the better of his opponent throughout much of the game and has been producing some good stuff here. Everyone seems to have settled well into the tournament now and spirits are high.
Yesterday's morale-boosting game of football in the dark (seriously, actually in the dark: got quite difficult to tell who everyone was; Alexander and Murad in particular are indistinguishable from 10 yards in poor lighting, which would have been fine if they hadn't been on different teams) obviously did the trick. In case anyone's wondering, Alan's team beat mine 12-11, and it turned out that my RVP-like striking, Alice Lampard's committed bustling and the Beckenbauer-like authority of Alexander's dad James was no match for Nihad's incredibly greedy but extremely effective poaching, Alexander 'The Cat' Bond's Gianluigi Buffon impression and Ian 'Paul Scholes' McDonald's late long-range winner.
All having a good time. So far we still haven't really had anything go wrong, which presumably means that when it does it will be utterly disastrous, but I live in hope. (Presumably we're going to end up flying into Murmansk on Sunday night or something.)
The joke early in the morning was that Alice's bye and Ian and Nihad's fixture meant that today was already our highest-scoring day, but we surpassed that mark with considerable ease. Liam and Kai won very smoothly to get off the mark, while Vagif played well and had much the better of his draw. Andrew was all set to get his grind on when his opponent flung a piece in a queen and knight ending (one of those Nd4 Qxd4 Qxd4 Nxe2+ thank you very much efforts). Murad continued his excellent form with a very good win. Third round in a row when one of the girls drew an opposite-coloured bishop ending, which Ali achieved from the numerically inferior side with considerable ease. Carl did very well to hold out in the day's longest game with some neat tricks in the end, despite being under pressure almost throughout. Nihad and Ian played out a complex game, with Ian sharper at the critical moment. Hamish played a decent game, with the unfortunate exception of a couple of tactical slips which cost him the point, while Anna was ground down over a difficult few hours. Alexander had the better of his opponent throughout much of the game and has been producing some good stuff here. Everyone seems to have settled well into the tournament now and spirits are high.
Yesterday's morale-boosting game of football in the dark (seriously, actually in the dark: got quite difficult to tell who everyone was; Alexander and Murad in particular are indistinguishable from 10 yards in poor lighting, which would have been fine if they hadn't been on different teams) obviously did the trick. In case anyone's wondering, Alan's team beat mine 12-11, and it turned out that my RVP-like striking, Alice Lampard's committed bustling and the Beckenbauer-like authority of Alexander's dad James was no match for Nihad's incredibly greedy but extremely effective poaching, Alexander 'The Cat' Bond's Gianluigi Buffon impression and Ian 'Paul Scholes' McDonald's late long-range winner.
All having a good time. So far we still haven't really had anything go wrong, which presumably means that when it does it will be utterly disastrous, but I live in hope. (Presumably we're going to end up flying into Murmansk on Sunday night or something.)