4NCL Rapidplay, 28-29 June 2008

The second 4NCL rapidplay was held over the weekend of June 28 & 29 and retained the same venue as last year; Harben House in Newport Pagnell but suffered a drop in entries, from 15 to 10. After some consultation with team captains this lead to the schedule being revised from a 10 round swiss to a 9 round all play all. The time limit was 20 minutes per player with an additional 10 seconds per move.

Last year the event was deservedly won by Barbican who defeated their nearest rivals Hilsmark Kingfisher in their individual match in round 4. Although there was no Hilsmark team this year the NACCPO (National Alliance of Childhood Cancer Parents Organisation) team bore an uncanny resemblance to the 2006-2007 Hilsmark 4NCL squad and was also captained by a former Hilsmark captain, who is responsible for writing this article.

My association with the NACCPO charity is due to a friend of mine, Rachael Olley, (who I used to work with) whose son Connor developed leukaemia. Thankfully, Connor recovered after several years’ treatment and although he still has to have certain tests is basically okay. As Rachael became involved with the charity I became a supporter and have raised money through simultaneous displays as best I can. NACCPO supports children and young adults with cancer and their families from all over the UK and receives no Government funding so every penny raised is vital.

The idea to name my teams in the rapidplay after the charity were to give the charity some free publicity and I was therefore conscious that winning the event would be the best way to maximise the coverage. Therefore I invited players who I considered would give us a good chance of winning the event although in view of the difficulties and cost of getting the players to the venue I tried to ask people who either drive or at least had minimal travel expenses. I have to say I was more than happy with the players I ended up with; Grandmasters Gawain Jones and Keith Arkell, International Master & Woman Grandmaster Jovanka Houska and finally Ameet Ghasi the former British Rapidplay Champion. Ideally I would be first reserve and only play when they wanted a rest but as it turned out I was pressed into action in the second team alongside Martin Burrows, Arne Hagesaether and Sean Hewitt.

Our main rivals were Barbican, the defending champions, who like last year had a strong squad of five players who could play in any order and 3Cs, who despite being forced to drop out of the 4NCL due to the southern location of the venues have at least appeared in both rapidplays. There were two teams making their debut; Metropolitan Police (who included retired Grandmaster William Watson on board 1) and The Welsh Old Boys.

Effectively the event was decided by the matches between the three favourites. The first clash came in round 2 when wins for Stephen Gordon and Alan Walton gave 3Cs a slightly surprising victory against Barbican. Then in round four 3CS faced NACCPO knowing a match victory would give them a great chance of winning the entire event. Ultimately, NACCPO’s strength in depth told as Jovanka defeated John Bentley and Ameet defeated Alan Walton in a mind boggling game when a draw would have won the match but he eventually found his way through a maze of complications to force a winning ending.

The last of the three clashes came on Sunday morning, a slight concern to me as my teams generally struggle with the early morning rounds. At the start of the match I would have happily settled for 2-2 and the likelihood of a subsequent tournament triumph. My pre match nerves weren’t helped when I received a phone call to say my board four was still on the M1 as the match was due to start but thankfully Ameet arrived and a close looking match was under way. I still can’t explain the final score, all boards were fiercely fought and I have to confess I was somewhat concerned by Jovanka’s two pawn deficit as I was by Keith appearing to have one less. Somehow we ended up winning 4-0, which I still can’t quite believe.

Although that effectively decided the tournament NACCPO had a scare in the following round against Guildford where possibly complacency set in or it was just one of those matches. In any case, the loss of 6 minutes time on my clock to locate our board 2 proved a good investment as a surprise loss by Gawain against Ian Thompson and a draw by Jovanka meant Keith was required to grind out an endgame to win the match.
The last two rounds didn’t change the final placings with the exception of a surprise victory by NACCPO B over Bristol which allowed them to leapfrog into 4th place.

The final placings then were NACCPO first with 9 match wins out of 9 and individual scores of Gawain with 7.5, Keith with 8 and Jovanka and Ameet with 8.5 all out of 9. 3Cs, led by Stephen Gordon on board 1 who scored 7.5/9 (to add to his 8/8 from last year), finished second thanks to their win against Barbican who finished third. My thanks to David Welch and Neville Belinfante for organising and controlling the event and to all the players and captains who supported the event. I hope to see far more of you next year, it really is a fun event and I said that last year even though my team didn’t win!
If anyone is interested in finding out more about the charity then you can view their website at www.naccpo.org.uk. The easiest way to help them is to make www.everyclick.com/rachaelolley your homepage and then you make money for them every time you carry out a search. NACCPO is also registered with ebay (user ID naccpo) - so people can elect to donate a % of their auction fees to the charity (and benefit from having the ebay for charity symbol on their auction, thus attracting more buyers) and get a % of their listing/auction fees re-credited by ebay.