CHESS
Black knight
Raymond Keene
Unfortunately, I missed this year's Oxford-Cambridge match; it was arranged at short notice and clashed with an impor- tant meeting of the Hastings Tournament committee. I therefore have to rely for information on the eighth consecutive de- feat of my old university on an excellent handout from Lloyds Bank, who sponsor the series.
This time Oxford beat Cambridge 41/z- 31/2. Excluding doubtful wartime matches, Cambridge now lead 45-44 with 17 draws. Lloyds Bank best game trophies went to
1988 University Match Board Oxford Cambridge
1 Peter Wells 1-0 Harsha Aturupane (Nuffield) (Trinity) 2 David Lawson lh-1/2 Jeremy Sharp (Trinity) (Downing) 3 Martin Hazelton 1-0 David Watts (St Anne's) (Sidney Sussex) 4 Frank van Hasselt 1/2-1/2 Andrew Harley (New College) (Selwyn) 5 Julian Way 0-1 Sukh Dave Singh (Keble) (Queens') 6 Neil Crabb 0-1 Graham Burgess (St Edmund Hall) (Downing) 7 Tom Brown 1-0 Gerard Thompson (Queen's) (Trinity) 8 Jane Riley 1/2-1/2 Alison Franklin (St Hugh's) (Downing)
Martin Hazelton of Oxford and Sukh Dave Singh of Cambridge. Runners-up awards were presented to Peter Wells of Oxford and Graham Burgess of Cambridge. Cam- bridge looked likely to break their losing sequence after three hours play, but missed chances in all three drawn games enabling Oxford to recover for a narrow victory. GM Harry Golombek and IM Bob Wade refereed the match.
In my day, the future columnist of The Spectator defeated the future columnist of the New Statesman and the team result more or less followed suit. Now it seems things are different and with Oxford due to be reinforced next season by David Nor- wood (who just tied first at Lugano with Korchnoi) I do not see much joy on the horizon for Cambridge.
D.J. Watts (Cambridge)-M. Hazelton (Ox- ford): Sicilian, Pelikan.
1 e4 c5 2 Nf3 Nc6 3 d4 cxd4 4 Nxd4 Nf6 5 Nc3 e5 6 NdbS d6 7 Bg5 a6 8 Na3 b5 9 Bxf6 gxf6 10 Nd5 f5
11 Bd3 Be6 12 Qh5 Bg7 13 0-0 f4 14 Nbl 0-0 15 Nd2 Ne7 16 g4 Re8 17 a4 NxdS 18 exd5 Bxd5 19 axb5 axb5 20 Qxh7+ Kf8 21 Bxb5 Re6 22 Qd3 Bbl 23 13 Qb6+ 24 Kg2 Rxal 25 Rxal d5 26 c4 e4 27 Qa3+ Kg8 28 exd5 exf3+ 29 Nxf3 Bxd5 30 Qa5 Bxf3+ 31 Kxf3 Qe3+ 32 Kg2 Qe4+ 33 Kh3 Rh6 Mate.
The first-stage problem has been issued for the Lloyds Bank British Problem Solv- ing Championship. Here it is: White to play and mate in two moves, against any defence. To solve the problem, simply send White's first move in any recognised nota- tion to Lloyds Bank Chess, 76 Lambscroft Avenue, Mottingham, London SE9 4PB, marking the solution The Spectator.'
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