Saturday - the tournament
This year the tournament was back to "only" 12 teams and the quadruple round robin, which gives the underdogs more chances of winning at least one point against one of the top teams. And well, everyone was a clear underdog when playing either Quirinius Van Dorp and Marten Wortel (Cranith-wortel), Philippe Morath and Jochem Snuverink (zola-Ishamael) or Maarten Aronsson and Martin Werner (Firefly-ludeo). A curiosity was Sergiy Vasylkevych's (fermy's) three-headed team, where players alternated playing and the third player was allowed to act as a intervening coach. This was of course because we found ourselves an odd number of players.
Since we were again to play semi-finals and finals, the first battle revolved around the fourth place. One round before the end, Laurent Bartholdi and me (bartholdi-nabla) were two points clear of the French team of Lionel Belin and Matthias Carno (clanelle-pagloppaglop), and three points clear of Rodolphe Francey and Alexeï Komonov (Tjeulesbetes-Comonova). That sounded pretty good until we got cleanly wiped 4-0 by Tjeulesbetes-Comonova, who still didn't make it to the top four since the French scored an easy 4-0 against a lower ranked team (Vincent Berger and Eelse-Jan Stutvoet).
The semi-finals were played in four total games, with the best ranked team in the regular tournament going through in case of a tie. This actually happened in the most suspenseful match, zola-Ishamael against Firefly-ludeo. The latter team was leading 2-1 and also took the first edge in the last game, but zola and Ishamael are really tough nuts to crack, were able to rescue the game and win the match altogether. Meanwhile the favourites Cranith and wortel did not suffer too much in their own semi-final. Neither have there been too much doubt about the final match (eight games), that they won on a very convincing 4-1 score.
Following : Sunday and Monday at the Parc des Bastions
| tjeulesbetes | 24.08.2008, 00:20:49 |
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| heard at 6.50am sunday morning : "we could call it a day. but just before ending it, let's make a final best-of-21 match !" |
| Ishamael | 27.08.2008, 19:16:08 |
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Hmm, yes Philippe intended it as a joke, but the rest took it serious.. :-) .. I think the final score was 11-9..
very good way for a good but short night rest.. ;-) |
| Ishamael | 27.08.2008, 19:27:04 |
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My semifinal was actually a repetition of last year's final:
Last year in the final game of the final, Nathalie blundered in a completely winning position (trading 2Q's which killed her partner) ..
This year in the final game of the semis, Martin (ludeo) made an illegal move in again a winning position.
Both times the very unlucky partner was.. Maarten (Firefly) |
| Ishamael | 27.08.2008, 19:51:05 |
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unfortunately, Cranith and wortel had better nerves and stamina..
already in the first game of the final, wortel played a mean trick on me (playing c6-c5 uncovering his bishop on b7, threatening mate in 1.. on g2!) .. of course, i was baffled by this unsportsmanlike behaviour and resigned the game the next move.. ;-) |
| Ishamael | 27.08.2008, 20:03:58 |
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Speaking of illegal moves, in one of the last games of the best of 21 match Thomas(KingOfBug) made one of the most strangest illegal moves I have ever seen: Nf6xc6+ (jumping over pieces at e6 and d6)
I guess there were many more illegal moves in these games, but I was only just enough awake to notice this one.. :-)
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| nabla | 27.08.2008, 21:06:04 |
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| Oh yes I remember that wortel trick now ! I also remember him explaining that it wasn't a trick but a super-clever move, with the idea that Bg2xb7 would be answered by Nxb7 covering the crucial d6 pawn which was under attack - which is true although if my memory is correct the knight might then have been his last piece against a little army. |
| Cranith | 01.09.2008, 16:56:17 |
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| Speaking of strange illegal moves: During my black game against Rodolphe (Tjeulesbetes) in the preliminaries after #... Nxe5 # Nxe5 ... it was my move and as I had intended the perfectly logical Qxe5+ I grabbed the piece on e8 only to find that it was my king. I instantly realised that I must have misplaced the king and queen at the start of the game, and (a bit embarrassed at making such an elementary mistake) I quickly swapped king and queen and played # ... Qxe5+!. At this point, I was not the only one left confused. I realised my mistake when some noobs were staring at me in disbelief identifying ME as the noob, and resigned the game. Rodolphe would not stand for that, and offered me a takeback istead, which I accepted after some persuasion. So you see, it takes more than skill to win the preliminaries (we beat Ishamael and Zola by a mere half point). |
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