Six Nations Braille Chess Tournament 2011
By Philip Doyle
The Six Nations Tournament took place from 5th to 9th May in the Old Swan Hotel in Harrogate, inthe north of England. This is a biennial friendship event which is hosted in turn by the participating countries. The nations which usually contest the tournament are Belgium, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. Due to the withdrawal of Switzerland, Ireland was asked to provide a team to take their place. Having had the great pleasure of participating on two previous occasions, we had no hesitation in answering the call. The team selected was Michael Delaney, Philip Doyle, Ernie McElroy and Eamonn Casey.
In the first of two matches on Friday our opponents were France, who appeared to be stronger than usual and here we had a share of the spoils. Michael lost on board one to Olivier Deville. After that there were draws for myself and Ernie. Ernie’s was a long, grueling game with Andre Schmeisser, in which he was materially better but wisely offered a draw when in time trouble. Eamonn won his game against Laurent Peignien. This result placed us in joint third, behind Germany and the Netherlands.
In the afternoon we came up against the Netherlands. After some hard games Michael and myself came away with credible draws against Sergio Harnandan and Jan Boer. After a round with the UK on Saturday we were in joint third place with France behind Germany and the UK. We played the last two rounds Sunday. First we came up against the bottom team Belgium and had a satisfying 4-0 victory, consolidating third place with five match points. With a round to go Germany was already guaranteed first place but there was still a slight chance that we could cause an upset and pip the UK for second place.
In the final round the UK made no mistakes and defeated the Netherlands. Meantime, Ireland was putting it up to our more powerful German opponents. Our 2-all draw with the Germans was Six Nations Braille Chess Tournament 2011 By Philip Doyle undoubtedly the surprise of the tournament and our party was elated with the outcome. Final scores: Germany: 9 match points; United Kingdom: 8; Ireland: 6; France: 5; Netherlands: 2; Belgium: 0.