Annual General Meeting
The club’s AGM was held prior to the Prize Night. Details of the meeting are available in the AGM 2014 minutes.
Prize Night Tournament - Handicap Lightning
Prize Night
The night commenced with the presentation of prizes to tournament and trophy winner for 2014.
Tonight’s prizes included were organised by John, and included individual trophies for winners as well as the engraved perpetual trophies.
Handicap Lightning Tournament
This year’s Handicap Lightning tournament was ably administered by Shane Mather, who first drew the 12 participants into two group of six.
The groups were drawn at random, and played a round-robin with the top two in each group progressing to the semi-finals.
The handicap system is based on a system of handicaps awarded on playing strength. The handicaps were determined based on performance in the club’s recent Lightning Tournament. Before each game the difference between the 2 players’ handicaps is calculated, with the lower rated player having 5 minutes in the game to make all moves. The higher rated player is allocated 5 minutes minus the handicap difference (but must have at least one minute). For example, if the difference is 2.0 then the higher rated player will receive three minutes to make their moves.
Group stage
Results in the group stage were as follows.
|
Group A |
POINTS |
Handicap |
|
Metin Ozaslan |
4.0 |
1.0 |
|
John Ryland |
4.0 |
4.0 |
|
Tony Howes |
4.0 |
1.0 |
|
Andrew Mather |
2.0 |
0.0 |
|
Brian Willcock |
1.0 |
3.0 |
|
Adam Morris |
0.0 |
5.0 |
The big surprise of this group was the poor form of the winner of the past two editions of this tournament, Andrew Mather, perhaps suffering a hangover from receiving the bulk of the trophies and prizes awarded for last year.
Metin’s loss in the last round against John (who had a second left on his clock when he won) meant there was a three-way tie for first. To avoid a long drawn-out three-way set of play-off matches, the first place winner was decided by the drawing of lots, with Metin being the lucky winner. John and Tony played off for second place, and John’s good play ensured an even contest which counted against Tony who (playing with two minutes against five minutes) succumbed to a loss on time.
|
Group B |
POINTS |
Handicap |
|
Marcus Porter |
3.5 |
0.0 |
|
Tony Morris |
3.5 |
2.0 |
|
Andrew Robinson |
3.0 |
1.0 |
|
Joshua Morris |
2.5 |
1.0 |
|
Peter Hiller |
1.5 |
3.0 |
|
Nick Petrie |
1.0 |
5.0 |
Marcus had a slow start, being held to a draw by Andrew in an endgame where he couldn’t force his advantage due to opposite coloured bishops, and then a loss to Joshua, but recovered to win the group.
Andrew lost the crucial last round game to Tony, which saw Marcus and Tony progress to the Semi-Final round.
Semi-Finals
Metin Ozaslan – Tony Morris 1-0
Marcus Porter – John Ryland 1-0
Third Place Match
John Ryland – Tony Morris 1-0
Final
Metin Ozaslan – Marcus Porter 0-1
The semi-finals saw the two group winners who played with white victorious, Marcus’ victory over John being particularly comprehensive.
John fought back to win third place, achieving his best final finish position in this tournament.
Marcus won a closely fought match against Metin to decide the tournament, a game worthy of the final.
The achievements of Marcus and Metin in tonight’s tournament replicated their respective first and second positions in last week’s Lightning Tournament.
CONSOLATION MATCHES
5-8 Classification
Semi-F Andrew Robinson – Andrew Mather 1-0
Semi-F Tony Howes – Joshua Morris 0-1
5-6 Match Andrew Robinson – Joshua Morris 0-1
7-8 Match Andrew Mather – Tony Howes 1-0
9-12 Classification
Semi-F Brian Willcock – Nick Petrie 1-0
Semi-F Peter Hiller – Adam Morris 1-0
9-10 Match Brian Willcock – Peter Hiller 0-1
11-12 Match Nick Petrie – Adam Morris 0-1
Further information:
Past winners of the Handicap Lightning tournament (with index to past tournaments)
Results of tonight’s tournament in are presented here in detail.