Some tough and challenging matches for many of the team in this round but overall good results which definitely keep the teams in the running.

Dorset Juniors 1

In Division 3, Dorset Juniors 1 did extremely well against Warwickshire Bears E clocking up a 7.5 to 0.5 point win.

Whilst on paper it appeared that we outrated the opposition quite significantly, it wasn’t that clear cut when comparing actual Lichess ratings and the way the Warwickshire Bears team played. But our Dorset juniors 1 team played exceptionally well and calmly took the victory. Well done to Zander, Jason and Sam for 2-0 wins.

Hugo, having already won his first match, had an interesting end game in his second match which ended in a stalemate.

Zander, playing from warm South Africa, ground his opponent down over a mammoth 93 moves, during most of which – from around move 27 – his opponent had around a minute or less on his clock.

The result keeps Dorset Juniors 1 on top of table A, with 9 points, on equal match points with Suffolk Juniors (last round’s opponents) but with a higher game point score. 4nclresults.co.uk/2023-24/media/kids/8th/prog-div3.html

Two more rounds remain before the semi-final, so let’s hope we can keep it up.

Dorset Juniors 2

In Division 4, our Dorset Juniors 2 scored a 4-4 draw.

It was a hard match for Jack and Arthur who came up against strong opponents. Arthur’s opponent appeared to be rated under 1000 based on the team list but his Lichess rating was well over 1600.  Only Jack’s opponent at 1790 was higher rated. Bad luck both of you, you fought really hard. Jack’s games were 89 and then 64 moves respectively.

Meanwhile, there were good 2-0 wins for both Michal and Ollie Sharp, Ollie living up to his surname with wins in 42 and then 26 moves. After a steady first match win in 63 moves, Michal then proceeded to win in just 13 moves with a nice checkmate.

This draw puts Dorset Juniors 2 in 6th place out of 34 in Division 4, with 7 points, just a couple of points behind the leaders.