Bulgarian Team Championships 2
This was a hard moment for our team, and I had to cheer them up. The karaoke bar at night sounded like a good idea given my intentions... I still constantly discover the wisdom that the classics used to have. Nimtsovitsch’s thesis of “the threat is stronger than the execution” seemed applicable to our team in the next round. Probably they had that fear that I was going to sing again if they lost another match…
Anyway, in the next two rounds we lost 2.5 points in total, while CSKA lost only 1.5, and took the lead. The novelty of the tournament was played in round four:
Georgiev though missed a sure win at least twice later:
And a move later:
Here is another bright sample by our Israeli GM:
As a whole, the foreign reinforcements did great. Lupulescu scored 6.5/7 for CSKA, Kogan-3.5/4.
The penultimate round had to give a definite answer as to who would win. CSKA were facing the third ranked Lokomotiv Plovdiv and we- Lokomotiv 2000, both of these teams composed entirely of titled players. Our match started devastatingly, with two losses for us. Any lost point now would mean that we would already be out of the competition, but we managed to concentrate, and took the maximum-- 4-2. In the meanwhile CSKA were suffering after five draws, but finally managed to take the overall success-- 3.5-2.5. Thus we were level before the final round. In the final round, we were slated to play against a slightly worse opponent. And despite the fact that CSKA won their match 6-0, we also managed to do so, and claim the title on tiebreaks for the first time in the history of the club. We did well on all the boards, including the reserve player, H. Velchev, who made 3/3. CSKA in its turn did not use their substitutes, even though they have two players rated around 2350 each. Bronze medals went to the Lokomotiv –Plovdiv team.
The happiest man of us all was our president- Evtim Stefanov. Eddie, who has been in the chess society for a very short time risked a lot with our team. The municipality provided the funds at the very last minute and he was shaking till then, ready to spend the money from his own pocket. Now he is ready with his next project- an amateur open (up to 2250 rated) tournament in September (5-12), with a 7500 euro prize fund. The tournament will take place in one of the most picturesque towns in Bulgaria-Belogradchik. More info can be found at www.belchess.com
As a dessert I would like to show you some curious moments from the tournament battle. First a nice combination:
