U2 vs Eastbourne4

On Friday 31st Jan the second team travelled to Eastbourne to play their team 4:- unusually my game on Board 3 was the quickest, as my opponent allowed through a discovered attack on his queen the capture of a bishop, at which point he then had two sets of doubled pawns, and it was relatively easy to pick off pawns – however even at a piece and three pawns down he fought on for another thirty minutes;  Artur on Board 2 also unusually fell a piece down and although he fought on with typical verve and a solid attack, for him the material loss paid off for his opponent;  Ian A on Board 5 also fought bravely, but pawn structure was the key in this game and when he fell at first the exchange down his opponent played sensibly for the advantage to fall to Eastbourne; Michael on Board 1 had an interesting knights and pawns ending, but having acquired a passed pawn he manouevred his knights really well to secure the win; so the pressure all fell to Ian P on Board 4 and from early on his well-placed bishops saw a massive positional and tactical advantage – it was a longer finish than perhaps those easily watching at the sides expected, but Ian was never in trouble and his eventual win saw us gain full match points with a 3-2 win.