Essex vs KEGS vs Suffolk

A match took place today between Essex, King Edwards Grammar School (Chelmsford) and Suffolk in a Team Battle Blitz on Lichess.  It was a great event and played with a great spirit.  With three strong teams playing each other, we were in for a treat.  The contest remained tight for the first half an hour, before KEGS pulled out a lead.  Being in a strong position, a couple of their players very kindly paused for a cup of tea, before re-joining the battle in the last 15 minutes.  Suffolk took full advantage of the opportunity and took the lead with about ten minutes to go.  It was then neck and neck all the way to the finish, with Suffolk taking victory by a single point.  The match finished as follows:

1st: Suffolk - 125 points
2nd: KEGS - 124 points
3rd: Essex - 99 points

What a close contest - who would have imagined that we would have such a tight finish? I would like to say a big thank you to all the players from all three teams.  This was the first time Suffolk has competed in this arena, and we are very grateful to Essex and KEGS for playing us, and to Robin Slade for setting up the event and organising the Essex and KEGS teams - very much appreciated.  I would also like to thank every single player in the Suffolk team.   We had a truly fantastic turn out - 25 players represented Suffolk and we are grateful to all of them.  It is always tempting to look at the highest graded players, but what we consistently find in tournaments is that it matters much more how strong the team is as a whole than whether you have the best two or three players.  Congratulations to the whole Suffolk team - and thank you.

If you have a Lichess account, you can see the full results and all the games here: lichess.org/tournament/P1cSD2Vm

Game of the Day
The game below is taken from one of the games today, and earned HarryOscar the "Game of the Day" award, chosen by Ed Player - see awards list below for further details.  Ed has analysed and made notes in the game - this is well worth a look and is shown below.  Thanks Ed!
You can also find this analysis here: lichess.org/study/9tbsYAXq/UBTw9RFG

​​Suffolk Awards
We were very lucky to have had both Adam Hunt and Ed Player following the Suffolk players.  Both are titled chess players and we are very lucky to have them helping chess in Suffolk.  Ed Player very kindly looked through a lot of games and followed the event and has made the following awards and special mentions:

​Player of the Day
"Best player has to go to Midnight17. He managed to take out the Essex no.1 seed SYM_Lak2Splashy and only lost two games.  Very well played Midnight17."

Performance of the Day
"Meapearson gets my vote for best performance, performing at 1444 with a rating of just 1223 . He played really steady chess and if he can play a bit more actively and confidently against higher rated opponents, he'll be even tougher to beat.  Very well played Meaperson."

Game of the Day
HarryOscar - "For best game prize, I found this game: lichess.org/lTPcx5I2/ - the standard is really high for two 1500s and HarryOscar had some amazing vision (or perhaps a bit of luck - who knows, it's blitz) to come out of a complicated tactical combination in the middle game."

Mentioned in Dispatches
"There were some great team performances from the likes of Rafandros, RowanKent, and Meancactus, who used the berserk options regularly to try and help the team score more points."

Final Thoughts...
Don't be carried away by the event.  If you are too desperate to win and gain points for the team, you may well not do as well as you would like.  The thing is to focus on playing the best chess you can while managing your time effectively.  If you can do that, you will get the points anyway.

Oh - much more important than that - enjoy it - otherwise there is no point...