Club Championship 2006

The Rooty Hill Club Championship commenced on Monday, October 9 with 26 players in four divisions—three round robins and a Swiss. Tony Bouchaaya is the only player above 2000 and, at 2126, is about 250 points higher than Peter Cassettari, his nearest rival.

Several newer players find themselves scattered through the grades. Noel Mangrobang has been with us for most of this year but is still unrated. He will have no trouble justifying his place in the top division. John Yao, following his good form in the Rooty Hill Open, has been given a provisional rating of 1700 and will be one of the threats in Division B. He is joined there by Armando Magallanes whose first night at the club was Round 1 of this tournament. Armando is also unrated and may find this division challenging first up. Another first timer is Don Belleza who will play in Division D. Welcome to Armando and Don—good luck to both of you in the tournament.

There were some entertaining games in Round 2 and when Tony Bouchaaya persuaded Jeff Cabillin's king to do an impromptu strip-tease the result was well worth seeing: Click here to play through it.
With an early finish (my opponent missed an early pawn fork and his game never got back into stride) I had time to walk around the boards for a while and look at some positions. Peter Cassettari overcame the double handicap of being club president as well as DOP to beat Leo Tenorio; George Smit's rook and three pawns were too hot for Allen Robinson's lone rook; Eddie Quesada mounted an all-out attack on Vince Zalac's trapped bishop; and Michael Jansen's knight sacrifice looked good but failed when Shane Burgess's rook was doubly defended.
It's not unusual to sacrifice a piece to queen a pawn but the reverse rarely works, as was seen by Allan Butler's involuntary king sacrifice which effectively stopped Munir Anjum's d-pawn from taking the final step to the eighth rank.
Congrats to Ross Smith who scored his first-ever tournament win in tonight's game. There'll be lots more around the corner, Ross.

Round 3 saw all four Division A games drawn after Tony Bouchaaya missed a win in a complicated position against Noel Mangrobang. Noel and Tony share the lead on 2½. Leo Tenorio did some flip-flops in his game with Hans Muller. First, Leo lost a piece, later he won it back, then in an endgame where Hans had a knight and three pawns against Leo's knight and two, Leo exchanged his remaining knight for two pawns before forcing off Hans's last pawn. Entertaining stuff!
Rick Carballo beat Chris Rust to lead Division B with 3/3, just half a point ahead of Levi Descallar. Rick and Levi play next week and that game may well decide the ultimate winner.
Munir Anjum uncharacteristically forfeited his Division C game, and with it the lead. He remains on 2 points just half a point behind joint leaders Joshua Christensen and David Evans.
In Division D only Yama Mahmoodi and Shane Burgess have 3/3 and play each other next week to find the outright leader.

Round 4: John Yao v Armando Magallanes
Armando played Qxg1 with mate next move.

Round 5: Vince Zalac v Ross Smith
An entertaining finish from Division D

Round 4, and the pecking order is already being established. Tony Bouchaaya picked up a forfeit and leads Division A on 3.5/4 ahead of Noel Mangrobang and Hans Muller each on 3. Leo Tenorio, three pawns down, re-defined what we mean by "minority attack" when he forced a draw with Jeff Cabilin in the longest game of the night. Peter Cassettari and Noel Mangrobang drew a rook-and-pawn ending.
Levi Descallar defeated Rick Carballo to take the Division B lead by half a point. Rick remains in second place. The two interesting games from this division were Norrie Tique v. Stevan Jovanovic and John Yao v Armando Magallanes. Stevan was able to mount a heavy attack with queen, rook and knight against Norrie's exposed king, while Armando, down a piece for two pawns and faced with John's advancing g-pawn, found time to queen first—see the diagram. Armando was thrown in the deep end because, unrated, his first night at the club was the first night of the Championship and he found himself in Division B. Congrats on the win, Armando.
In Division C Peter Barreca, already a knight in arrears to Joshua Christensen, lost his rook to a discovered attack. Joshua's position at the top of the table is no surprise—he won the Doeberl Minor at Easter before winning this year's City of Sydney Under 1700. I was a little surprised to see Allan Butler and George Smit each with 45 minutes on their clock, then realised Allan's was actually 45 seconds. He worked hard to stay ahead of the increments but had only eleven seconds left when George's unstoppable a-pawn reached the seventh rank.
Yama Mahmoodi and Shane Burgess share the lead in Division D after drawing their game. They are on 3.5 but have to stay ahead of Steven Stipic who didn't start playing till Round 2. At the moment one of those three seems likely to emerge as the winner, though Ken MacGillivray, always dangerous, isn't far behind.

Round 5 saw Tony Bouchaaya get another forfeit—his second in two weeks—at the top of the table. Robert Ambalong picked up his first full point at Peter Cassettari's expense. Peter missed 33 ...Bf6+ which probably won while Robert's cheeky b5 bishop was safe because of the threatened back rank mate. Play through the game HERE. Tony leads by a point from Hans Muller and Noel Mangrobang on 3½.
Division B boasted the longest game of the night and both players were in time trouble. Chris Rust with rook and pawns vs Levi Descallar's knight and bishop was unable to prevent Levi sacrificing the knight for his last pawn and the game was drawn. Chris had to do it the hard way after making an illegal move when both players had just under a minute on the clock, and being forced to concede Levi a two minute penalty. Armando Margallanes continued his good form from last week with a victory over the always tough-to-beat Norrie Tique. Levi leads by half a point from Rick Carballo who drew with John Yao.
Division C is becoming predictable—Joshua Christensen won, I drew, and Allan Butler got into time trouble! Joshua's game (with Allen Robinson) was played ahead of time, George Smit offered an early draw which I declined, but he found a perpetual check with a queen against my two rooks, and Peter Barreca had built up a strong position when Allan Butler ran out of time and made a few poor choices with only seconds left on the clock. Iliya Dzukic's results in this tournament don't reflect his ability but his opponent this week, Munir Anjum is always difficult to beat. Joshua leads on 4½ from three players on 3½.
I watched a couple of entertaining games from Division D: Ross Smith developed a tasty attack against Vince Zalac (see the diagram) and Ken MacGillivray had an, "Oops!" at the end of a long game with Yama Mahmoodi when he dropped a rook while in a strong position. If we were handing out awards for courageous innovations, though, the prize would go to Steven Stipic for his 1. e3 followed by 2. Qh5. Shane Burgess's response was both leisurely and effective, even taking time for a lazy zwischenzug (zwischenshah?) before reaping the harvest of a pawn fork. Play through it HERE. Yama Mahmoodi and Shane Burgess have skipped away to a comfortable 1½ point lead, ahead of Steven Stipic and Bill Herreros.

Round 6: What would you have played? Sometimes we become so involved in winning material that it's possible to overlook the far more rewarding king hunt. In my Round 6 game with Allan Butler I didn't realise that I'd missed a mate in the first of the following positions, or that there was far more than the win of the e7 bishop in the second, until my little German friend pointed it out. See how quickly you can find them.
Round 6: David Evans v Allan Butler Move 45: White to play and mate in 2		Round 6: David Evans v Allan Butler Move 47: White to play and mate in 3

Round 6 saw Chris Rust defeat Stevan Jovanovic in their postponed Round 1 game while three more games were postponed: Anjum/Christensen and Barreca/Robinson in Div C and Jansen/Smith in Div D.
In Div A Joe Ymalay got a big plus in development against Peter Cassettari and forced Peter's king out into a mating net, while Tony Bouchaaya had a long game before he finally overcame Hans Muller. The other two games were drawn.
In Div B Armando Margallanes had a pawn advantage in a rook and pawn ending and was able to force it through. Norrie Tique's king was comfortable hiding behind Rick Carballo's advanced g2 pawn and Norrie finally won their game. Levi Descallar already has this division in the bag—he's 1½ points in front with one round left to play.
Only two games were decided in Div C. David Evans beat Allan Butler in a game where both players made mistakes, and Iliya Dzukic beat George Smit in the fastest game of the night. After eighteen moves Iliya had used only three minutes, and George only four. CLICK HERE to play through it.
There was plenty of excitement in Div D. Eddie Quesada's advanced a-pawn set Peter Watts too many problems. Don Belleza had lots of chances in his game with Vince Zalac but Vince's experience and one pawn advantage were enough to win. Ken MacGillivray, two pawns down to Rolando Gonzales, managed to win one of them and swap rooks to gain the opposition for his draw. Yama Mahmoodi showed why he is joint leader in a convincing win from Steven Stipic: he had an array of connected passed pawns on the f, g, and h files that Garry Kasparov wouldn't have been able to stop. Not to be outdone, the other joint leader, Shane Burgess, fought back from the exchange down and Bill Herreros had no effective response to the threat of 60...f2+ with mate to follow. To view the game CLICK HERE

Mating Solutions from Round 6 Diagrams:
In the first diagram white has 45. Rg8+ Kf6, 46. Kh6#.
In the second position black can run but he can't hide: 46. g5+ Kxg5, 47. Rg8+ Kf4, 48. Rg4#.
But if they were so easy, how come I didn't find them?

Round 6 Rogues' Gallery
Armando Margallanes	John Yao	Vince Zalac	Peter Cassettari
Ken MacGillivray	Munir Anjum	Eddie Quesada	Muhammed Buza
Bill Herreros	Rick Carballo	Yama Mahmoodi	Hans Muller

Division C: Round 6: Joshua Christensen v. Munir Anjum
See text for conclusion of game. Play through it here using Chess Genie

Round 7 and it's all over. Well, except for Division C, which will be decided when Munir Anjum and Joshua Christensen play their postponed game on Saturday. Although it's a little unusual for the final round of a competition, every game in all divisions was fought out to a result with only one game (Magallanes/Buza) ending in a draw. It's good to see the killer instinct is thriving at Rooty Hill!

Division A: Congratulations to Tony Bouchaaya, once again the Rooty Hill Club Champion, and to runner-up Hans Muller who has lost nothing during his two year absence from the game. He beat Noel Mangrobang in this round to take second spot. It was Noel's only loss. Leo Tenorio had an entertaining sacrificial win against Joe Ymalay. You can play through the game HERE.
Division B went to Levi Descallar 6/7 who conceded only two draws (to Stevan Jovanovic and Chris Rust). Rick Carballo had five wins for his win. Armando Magallanes was an interesting player in this division. An unrated newcomer to the club he lost his first three games before finding his feet, then took 3½ from his last four games. Well done, Armando!
Division C ended in a three-way dead-heat between Munir Anjum, Joshua Christensen and David Evans. The decisive game, the postponed Round 6 clash between Munir and Joshua, was played on the Saturday following Round 7 and resulted in each of the winners scoring 5.5/7.
The Christensen/Anjum clash was an entertaining game and about move 37 the position at right was reached. The game continued:
1. Bc1 f4 2. Qe6 Nf6 3. Rxe5 Bxf2+ 4. Kxf2 Qxe5 5. Qxe5 Ng4+ 6. Kf3 Nxe5+ 7. Ke4 Nd7 8. Bxf4 Nc5+ 9. Kf3 Kg7 10. Ke3 Re8+ 11. Kd4 Re2 12. Be5+ Kf7 13. Bd1 Rd2+ 0-1.
You can play through it using Chess Genie. Just hit the RESET button to go back to the diagrammed position.
Munir was probably the unlucky player of the competition having won all his games except a draw with David, but being forced to concede a forfeit to George Smit; Joshua lost only one game, and David lost none but conceded three draws—to Munir, Joshua and George.
Division D was shared by Yama Mahmoodi and Shane Burgess who both scored 6.5/7, drawing only with each other. Bill Herreros and Steven Stipic were next on 4/7.

Many thanks to DOP Peter Cassettari for yet another top performance in running the tournament.

—Report: David Evans

Players

Rnd 1
Oct 9

Rnd 2
Oct 16

Rnd 3
Oct 23

Rnd 4
Oct 30

Rnd 5
Nov 6

Rnd 6
Nov 13

Rnd 7
Nov 20

Score

Division A

1 Tony Bouchaaya

2126

6½

2 Peter Cassettari

1874

3 Leo Tenorio

1833

4 Jeff Cabillin

1821

5 Noel Mangrobang

1820p

6 Robert Ambalong

1808

3½

7 Joe Ymalay

1773

1½

8 Hans Muller

1752

4½

Division B

1 Levi Descallar

1723

2 John Yao

1700p

3½

3 Norrie Tique

1681

2½

4 Stevan Jovanovic

1662

5 Rick Carballo

1642

4½

6 Chris Rust

1626

7 Muhamed Buza

1613

8 Armando Margallanes

1650p

3½

Division C

1 Allen Robinson

1572

2 David Evans

1565

5½

3 Iliya Dzukic

1558

4 Joshua Christensen

1535

5½?

5 Peter Barreca

1520

6 Munir Anjum

1498

4½?

7 George Smit

1484

3½

8 Allan Butler

1465

Division D

1 Yama Mahmoodi

1450

W10

6½

2 Bill Herreros

1423

B11

3 Shane Burgess

1405

6½

4 Rolando Gonzales

1402

B10

W12

W11

3½

5 Ken MacGillivray

1398

W12

6 Eddie Quesada

1320

W10

W11

7 Steven Stipic*

1457

Bye

8 Michael Jansen

1251

B11

3½

9 Peter Watts

1136

B11

W10

B12

10 Vince Zalac

1031

W12

W11

W12

11 Ross Smith

unr

B12

B10

12 Don Belleza

unr

W11

B10

*Please note: A nominated player forfeited at #7 in Round 1. Steven Stipic substituted in that position from Round 2.

Click on submitted games to see them:

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