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Sheffield & District Chess Association Established 1883 |
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05/05/2025 4NCL Rounds 9, 10 & 11
The 4NCL has not been covered hitherto on the S&DCA website, as there are no “Sheffield” teams participating, or are there? Whereas the captaincy of the Chessable White Rose teams had earlier fallen to Rupert Jones of Pool in Wharfdale and Leeds, the captaincy has recently been in the hands of Sheffield’s Jonathan Arnott. The CWR A team benefits from sponsorship and comprises mainly players with no major connection with Yorkshire, let alone Sheffield, though there is of course the glaring exception of Yorkshire-born, Sheffield-resident Gawain Jones (not playing this weekend). As is so often the case, the teams in lower divisions tend to be drawn more from the captain’s own immediate connections, and consequently Sheffield & District players do tend to feature in significant numbers in Chessable White Rose 4NCL teams.
Another Sheffield connection with the 4NCL is that it was founded by Chris Dunworth in around 1993. Christopher Noel Dunworth, to give him his full name, was born at Nether Edge Hospital, Sheffield, on 12/10/1967. Father, Arthur Dunworth, was Lord Mayor of Sheffield for a year in 2007.
Usually, a 4NCL weekend has two rounds, one on Saturday and one on Saturday, but the final three rounds (9, 10 and 11) are usually, as here, played in a single long weekend. Ideally, all divisions would play on a given weekend at the same venue, but arranging venues for the 4NCL is clearly a logistical nightmare, and usually not all divisions can play at a single venue at the same time, leading to split venues and split weekends. This time Divisions 1 (featuring CRW1), 2 (featuring CWR2) and Division 3 Knights were being held at Mercure Daventry Court Hotel, while Division 2 Bishops (featuring CWR3) and Division 4 were being held at Holiday Inn Coventry M6 Jct. 2.
Promotion and relegation team numbers are as follows, (with no provision for refusal of promotion):
On this final weekend, none of the Chessable White Rose teams were in with a chance of winning their divisions. CWR1 was not at risk of relegation. On the other hand, both CWR2 and CWR3 were fighting to avoid relegation.
Sheffield & DCA players in the Chessable White Rose teams this weekend were Thomas Carroll, Peter Gayson, Jonathan Arnott, Daniel Sullivan and Seth Woozeer. Games in Divisions 1 & 2 were broadcast live, and some have been captured and made accessible below. (PS The Div 3B games were made available later after transcriptions were posted as pgn files on the 4NCL website, allowing more games to be added here.)
Round 9 saw match wins for both CWR1 and CWR2, but CWR3 were well beaten, results being as follows: (Click on an underlined game result to play through the game on screen.)
Round 10 again saw match wins for both CWR1 and CWR2, and CWR3 again lost, results being as follows. (Click on an underlined game result to play through the game on screen.)
Round 11 saw won matches for CWR1 and CWR2, while CWR3 drew its match: (Click on an underlined game result to play through the game on screen.)
It turns out that CWR2 just got nudged into the bottom 4 teams by half a game point and are therefore relegated, while CWR3 finished a whole match point above the bottom 2 and so avoided relegation.
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