Look Behind You!

 2011-12 Season Journal  1 Response »
Mar 312012
 

Hebden 'A' were red-faced for a different reason on Monday night!

It is without shame that I begin this post with a hefty chunk of text originally drafted for another article on this site just over two years ago: “Memento Mori” (10th of March, 2010). Back then this blog was more of a personal diary than a club website but the events of this week gave me good reason to recall those two latin words.

In ancient Rome when a conquering General returned to the capital after a successful campaign he was often voted the honour of a “triumph” by the senate. This was essentially a ceremonial victory parade through the streets of the city with his army following in his wake. The General would drive in his chariot, the roads lined with jubilant citizens, to the senate house where he would be received by his peers and become the subject of various obsequies.

However, to ensure all this adoration didn’t give him too inflated an opinion of himself, behind him, in the chariot, would be one of his slaves who would murmur again and again in his ear the words “Look behind you! Remember that you are but a man!” It is this phrase that the classic epitaph “Memento mori” (Remember you must die) originates from. I also like to believe that it is the origin of the famous pantomime catch phrase “Look behind you!” but I admit that might be stretching reality a little bit too far!

Over the last few months I’ve been reminded of this lesson from antiquity on several occasions as I’ve seen and experienced life at the chess board deliver some reality checks (no pun intended!) When you are on a good run of form, whether this be at chess, or in any competitive situation, it is easy to get overconfident and start to feel like a Roman General enjoying his moment in the spotlight. Victories are easy to come by, your luck is in and you feel unstoppable. It is at this moment that the game tends to hand you a timely reminder that all good things must come to an end.”

Hebden Bridge ‘A’ have been on an excellent run of form this season. Before Monday’s match at Belgrave they were unbeaten and 3 points clear at the top of League 1 They seemed to have hurdled the most serious barriers between them and the title. However, if they were feeling complacent and comfortable then their opponents on Monday played, most effectively, the part of  the whispering chariot passenger to their Roman General and reminded them that they aren’t champions yet.

Belgrave's men (backs to the camera) in deep thought as they contrived Hebden Bridge 'A's downfall

Dave Shapland’s men ultimately went down in flames despite getting off to an excellent start when Matthew Parsons won nicely against Malcolm Corbett on board 2. Matthew is fast becoming an expert on his preferred “Sniper” system and although Malcolm won a pawn his pieces were uncoordinated and one oversight was all it took for Matthew to secure the win.

Next to finish was Darwin “Draw-Win” Ursal who’s inspirational form this season and rapidly rising live grade  totally justified his promotion to board 1. However, he was perhaps surprised by Gordon Farrar’s cunning deployment of the Classical Variation against his Sicilian Dragon and, although the opening went well enough for him, he then made a few uncharacteristic errors to hand his opponent a pawn’s advantage. As usual when faced with adversity, Darwin knuckled down and found a way to acheive a draw but, by his high standards, it wasn’t one of his best efforts.

A draw on top board is not an unusual outcome. Matches in the Calderdale League are usually decided on the lower boards and this was where it all started to go wrong for Hebden Bridge. First of all Pete Leonard blundered whilst in full control of proceedings against Mike Barnett and was quickly and clinically punished for his sins – he was right to point out afterwards that this was probably a just outcome baring in mind his win against the same opponent in the reverse fixture was obtained in very similar fashion.

Shortly after this Dave Shapland also succumbed of a sudden to Richard Bowman who has been a new and very useful addition to the Belgrave line up in the last few matches. The position seemed to be about equal until Dave tried, over-optimistically, to play for a win, underestimated his opponents attacking potential and resigned in the face of a mating attack.

That left poor old Nick Sykes to try and rescue his team yet again. He has managed to do so on several occasions this season – at home to Hebden Bridge ‘B’, away at Brighouse and at home to Huddersfield ‘A’ all spring readily to mind. This time he had to win to secure a draw and, as the rest of the players gathered around his game against Les Johnson, all seemed well. In a double rook and pawn ending Nick had two extra pawns. Rook endings are never easy however and the clock was not on Nick’s side. In his haste he overlooked a couple of winning opportunities and was ultimately forced to offer his opponent a draw as both men had only moments left on their clocks.

Belgrave are to be congratulated on their excellent play and result. They have thrown a title race that seemed decided wide-open once again. Here is the full match score card:

Belgrave vs. Hebden Bridge ‘A’
G. Farrar ½ – ½ D.Ursal
M.Corbett 0 — 1 M.Parsons
R.Bowman 1 — 0 D.Shapland
M.Barnett 1 — 0 P.Leonard
L.Johnson ½ – ½ N.Sykes
3 – 2

Of course such a traumatising defeat resulted in some self-flagellation by the losers in the aftermath. However, now that some water has passed under the bridge, the ‘A’ team players should reflect that they have done exceptionally well to have got as far as they did through the season without losing when all the other teams in the league have lost at least three times. They now need to show the same fighting spirit that has taken them to the top of the table in order to finish the job off against Brighouse at home on Monday and then away to Courier ‘A’ on the last day of the season. They now once again have a baying pack of hounds at their heels in the form of : Todmorden ‘A’ who closed the gap at the top to a single point by dispatching  Brighouse away 1 – 4; Courier ‘A’ who now lie 2 points off the leaders having beaten Huddersfield ‘B’ by the same score; and Huddersfield ‘A’ who won 4½ – ½ at home against Hebden Bridge ‘B’ on Thursday night.

Sadly, the ‘A’ team’s slip up combined with the ‘B’ teams defeat means that Hebden Bridge ‘B’ will be relegated at the end of the season. I’ll amend this post with their scorecard once it is available to me. In the meantime here are the ‘A’ team games against Belgrave.

Murrays’ Double Sustains Promotion Hopes

 2011-12 Season Journal  2 Responses »
Mar 302012
 

Danny Crampton was one of the heroes in Hebden 'C's draw with Halifax

It’s high time readers had an update on the progress of our League 2 teams. While all the excitement in League 1 has been continuing unabated (more on this tomorrow!) Hebden Bridge ‘C’ have been going about their business in a most efficient manor. They lie in second spot behind Todmorden ‘B’ and, whilst they may not catch up with the leaders, they still have a chance to gain promotion by finishing second. To succeed they must hold off a strenuous competitive effort from Halifax ‘A’ who are themselves desperate to get back into the top flight. Last Monday the two sides met (at Halifax although it was a Hebden Bridge home fixture) with Hebden holding a just a single point’s advantage over their rivals. ‘C’ team Captain, John Kerrane, reports for us:

Hebden Bridge ‘C’ set off for a tough match against Halifax ‘A’ last Monday night. Heavily outgraded on all boards, the ‘C’ team players expected a difficult match, and by the end of the opening, they were in trouble on all five boards. However, Dan Crampton and Ray Deravairere on boards 4 and 5 fought back to snatch win, and when Steve Priest secured a draw on board 2 in the last game to finish, they were relieved to find that they had drawn the match 2½-2½. The result means that Hebden Bridge ‘C’ is still in contention at the top of the second division, while promotion is by no means certain for Halifax ‘A’.”

The individual results were:

Hebden Bridge ‘C’ vs. Halifax ‘A’
J. Kerrane 0 — 1 W. Somerset
S. Priest ½ – ½ A. Ibbitson
N. Bamford 0 — 1 C. Velosa
D. Crampton 1 — 0 P. Moss
R. Deravairere 1 — 0 A. Dawson
2½ – 2½

This was a truly inspiring result from John’s team especially from Danny and Ray on the two bottom boards. Ray has only just started playing for the club and only recently learned how to record the moves so a win against a seasoned campaigner like Adrian Dawson is really very creditable. Sadly, I only have John’s game from the top board of this match but, despite his loss, John played well and held out well into the endgame against a player rated over 180! This game is in the viewer at the foot of this post.

All of these heroics meant that when Todmorden ‘C’ came to visit Hebden Bridge this last Monday night confidence was high. Our ‘B’ and ‘C’ teams have really struggled to fill their line-ups on occasion this season and John was forced to field two different players on boards 4 and 5 for this match. Interestingly he selected brother and sister combination Robert and Robina Murray, both very promising juniors. Here is his report from Monday’s match:

On Monday evening, Hebden Bridge ‘C’ took on Todmorden ‘C’ at the Trades Club, Holme Street, and managed to extend their recent run of good form with a 4-1 victory.

The foundations of the result were laid by the team’s two young players, brother and sister Robert and Robina Murray on boards 4 and 5, with two early and emphatic wins. When Steve Priest seized on a mistake by his opponent to win his queen, the match was decided, and finished when Todmorden’s capain, Dave Milton, resigned in a difficult position and desperate time trouble.”

The individual results were:

Hebden Bridge ‘C’ vs Todmorden ‘C’
J. Kerrane 1 — 0 D. Milton
S. Priest 1 — 0 T. Webster
N. Bamford 0 — 1 R. Stoelman
R. P. D. Murray 1 — 0 R. Pratt
R. J. Murray 1 — 0 B. Joyce
4 — 1

The game viewer below contains both of the Murray siblings’ victories as well as John Kerrane’s nice win against Dave Milton. Robina’s effort was particularly interesting as she exchanged her queen for excellent positional and material compensation before propelling her passed b-pawn over the line to finish the job.

The ‘C’s re-scheduled fixture against Halifax ‘A’ will take place on April the 30th and that is likely to decide who goes up with Todmorden ‘B’ who surely can’t be denied at this stage. It should be a fascinating and tense finale.

Ursal and Leonard Take the Plaudits

 2011-12 Season Journal  No Responses »
Mar 202012
 

A postcard from St. Anton, where your webmaster has been conspicuously avoiding chess. This wonderful image was sourced from clinstedt's Flickr photostream.

Apologies to our regular visitors for last week’s radio silence. Your webmaster has been taking his recreation in the Austrian Tirol and has returned refreshed and invigorated. Despite being in foreign parts word never-the-less reached our ears about the final round of this season’s Calderdale Individual Chess Championship. John Kerrane organised and managed the final round in the absence of Paul Edwards (who has done an excellent job in his first year in charge of the competition) and he reports on the proceedings. 

Twenty players gathered for the fifth and last round of the Calderdale Individual Chess Championships, hosted by Hebden Bridge Chess Club at the Trades Club, Holme Street, on Monday evening.

The contest for the top prizes depended on the results on the top two boards, where Mitchell Burke of Huddersfield and Hebden Bridge’s Darwin Ursal agreed a draw, while Pete Leonard, also of Hebden Bridge, beat off an attack from Robert Clegg of the Courier, to force a win. This left Darwin Ursal with first prize on 4½/5, while Pete Leonard also on 4½/5 was edged into second prize on a tie-break. Grading prizes went to M. Burke (4/5), A. Leatherbarrow (Hebden Bridge, 3½/5), M. Barnett (Belgrave, 3/5) and John Aldridge (Halifax, 2½/5)”

The individual results were:

M. Burke ½-½ D. Ursal
R. Clegg 0-1 P. Leonard
R. Sutcliffe ½-½ A. Leatherbarrow
J. Blinkhorn 1-0 J. Aldridge
A. Dawson 0-1 J. Morgan
M. Syrett 0-1 M. Barnett
D. Milton 0-1 A. Gonzalez
C. Velosa 1-0 T. Webster
S. Priest 1-0 J. Nicholson
B. Joyce ½-½ J. Nicholson

Darwin "Draw-win" Ursal

Let us offer round some congratulations to the performers of note. Of course we should begin with the new champion. Darwin has so far had the kind of year John Morgan enjoyed last season. He is unbeaten in the league and cup competitions and tops the list of individual point scorers in league 1. He is a worthy champion. Well done Darwin!

The second placed contestant, Pete Leonard, also deserves a hearty “Congratulations” for an excellent performance. He beat last season’s champion in round 3, drew with the top seed in round 4 and scored an excellent win with Black against the ever-competitive Robert Clegg in the last round. Pete was only beaten in to second place by virtue of Darwin’s marginally swifter pace in reaching 4 points. Pete has annotatedhis game with Robert in the game viewer at the bottom of this post. As always his commentary is honest, elucidating and even handed. Thanks to Pete for sending this. I’ll add more games to the viewer when I can get hold of them.

Pete Leonard

Mitchell Burke was also undefeated and finished on 4 points having drawn with both of the two players above him. Mitchell certainly has the potential to win this tournament in years to come.

Finally I’d also like to congratulate the 3 players who finished on 3½ points. Huddersfield’s Robert Sutcliffe had a good showing in last years championship too and this year he beat reigning champion John Morgan in round 4 losing only to Mitchell in round 2. Former champion Andy Leatherbarrow was typically resiliant with his display although he managed to stay slightly below the radar this year. He beat both Nick Sykes and Adrian Dawson (in fine style too!) and was unbeaten with those two wins and three further draws. Josh also managed to bounce back from a first round defeat to John Morgan with 3½ from his last 4 games. Well done to all of these three and the grading prize winners.

Invincible Spirit of the Sole Surviviors

 2011-12 Season Journal  No Responses »
Mar 102012
 

Hebden 'A' are top of the heap and remain unbeaten - just! This wonderul photo is from Da Beez's Flickr photostream

During the struggle
They will pull us down
But please, please
Let’s use this chance
To turn things around
And tonight
We can truly say
Together we’re invincible”
(Muse – Invincible)

On Monday night Hebden Bridge ‘A’ cleared another big hurdle on the road to what looks increasingly likely to be the road to the Calderdale League 1 title. They scrapped their way to draw against last year’s champions, Huddersfield ‘A’ as the Trades Club played host to the second Hebden vs. Huddersfield double header of the season with the two ‘B’ teams also squared up.

At the start of the night Hebden ‘A’ looked down on their nearest rivals from the vantage of a 4-point lead but they knew that the Champions (one of two teams occupying second spot) would be gunning for them and would bring a ferociously strong side in a final bid to retain their title. Nothing less than a win would do for Huddersfield which is why it was somewhat surprising that two of their contingent agreed relatively quick draws in positions that still seemed to have plenty of play in them.

On board 1 Huddersfield’s Mitchell Burke is beginning to develop a reputation for being an advocate of the good old fashioned “Grandmaster” draw as he and Matthew Parsons banged out 15-odd moves of theory in the London System and then agreed terms shortly after the first new moves. Matthew was about to gain a pawn in a Benko-type position which offered Mitchell some activity in compensation. It seemed however that Mitchell didn’t have complete confidence in his set-up for he offered a draw and Matthew knowing he would have to play very accurately to convert his material advantage and not without risk, decided to accept.

It wasn’t too much later in the evening when board 3 also finished. Here Hebden’s “The-Man-Who-Drew-With-Mikhail-Tal”, a.k.a Pete Leonard, also drew with Huddersfield’s David Firth. Pete had deployed a new system for him against David’s French Defence. However, it didn’t turn out quite as he’d planned and David seemed to have a decent space advantage. Never-the-less once all the heavy pieces had been traded on the open c-file it looked like the extra space would be difficult to convert into a full point and David wasted no unnecessary energy trying to do so. Pete had absolutely no winning chances and so accepting the draw offer was perfectly understandable.

Subsequent events seemed to completely justify the early Huddersfield draw offers as Dave Tooley beat Dave Shapland on board 4 to put the visitors in front. Shapland spent far too long in the opening trying to find the best way to meet his opponent’s unusual Scandinavian variant and, although he obtained a perfectly acceptable Panov-Botvinnik type position, he started to play more and more loosely as he began to run short of time. A progressively serious string of inaccuracies were followed by the blundering of a rook and Shapland resigned before he lost on time.

It now looked like a very tight spot but Hebden have been in tight spots before this season and it seems to galvanise them into iron-willed intransigence. As the crisis loomed Nick Sykes seemed to be about to calm the storm as it appeared he was overrunning Tony Aguirre’s position. There had to be a win there somewhere (and as you’ll see in the game in the viewer below, there were several!) but, amidst all the complexity, Nick couldn’t find it and Tony hit him hard on the counter attack.

What happened next was most unusual. With zeintot at it’s most acute and the players totally focused on the board, Nick suddenly pointed out that both flags had dropped! Neither player had reached time control. What should happen next? A couple of amused bystanders observed that Nick’s flag had dropped first but Tony had either not seen it or sportingly chosen to overlook it until his flag had also fallen. After a brief discussion the players agreed to keep playing and the clocks were turned back 15 minutes.

At this point Tony seemed to have obtained a decisive advantage. He had two bishops and a rook against two rooks with a handful of pawns each. Victory for Huddersfield seemed inevitable but Nick fought valiantly to scrounge a draw. First of all he won a pawn and exchanged off a pair of rooks and then he managed to manouevre his last rook and king into a position where they could trade off Tony’s last pawn on f2 and one of his bishops leaving him with insufficient material to checkmate Nick. The too shook hands to confirm it was a draw and Hebden had once again escaped defeat by the narrowest of margins.

There was still work to be done however. Hebden were still a point down and there was just one board left in play. Fortunately Hebden’s stand out player of the season, Darwin Ursal, was at the controls. His captain has started to call him “Drawin” because those are the only two results on his record in Calderdale this season — and there haven’t been many draws!

Darwin was facing Huddersfield’s Dave Keddie and early on in the game Black seemed to have gained at least equality if not a bit more. However, as has been the case on so many occasions this year, Darwin stabilized the situation and then took the initiative. By the time Nick and Tony’s game had finished he had a couple of pawns advantage in a complicated minor piece ending. Dave did everything he could to create complications but Darwin snuffed out any counter-chances mercilessly and started to hoover up the rest of Dave’s pawns.

In the end it was futile to resist the inevitable and Dave resigned handing Darwin another win and Hebden Bridge a draw which may very well be decisive in the final league standings. Darwin and Nick had been the heroes this time round but all members of the team have produced critical results for the team at one time or another and there is a strong spirit and determination about them. Can they finish the season unbeaten?

The match scorecard was:

Hebden Bridge ‘A’ vs. Huddersfield ‘A’
M.Parsons ½ – ½ M.Burke
D.Ursal 1 — 0 D.Keddie
P.Leonard ½ – ½ D.Firth
D.Shapland 0 — 1 D.Tooley
N.Sykes ½ – ½ A.Aguirre
2½ – 2½

The ‘A’ team’s draw gave some of the other title chasers a rare opportunity to narrow the gap and both Todmorden ‘A’ and Courier ‘A’ took full advantage. Todmorden beat Belgrave 3½ – 1½ at home and Courier beat Brighouse by the same margin, helped thought they were by Brighouse dropping two defaults.

The last match of the round was the bottom of the table clash between Hebden Bridge ‘B’ and Huddersfield ‘B’. In the previous round of fixtures Huddersfield had hauled themselves level with their fellow relegation prospects by gleaning a draw with Brighouse. Both teams started the night with just 3 points and, with Belgrave the closest side to them in the table, on 9, it seemed unlikely that either side could get themselves out of trouble. As it was, Hebden ‘B’ kept their slim hopes alive with a resounding win.

Huddersfield ‘B’ were stronger than they had been for the reverse fixture before Christmas, but Hebden’s home advantage was put to good use as Andy Leatherbarrow, Martin Syrett, Dave Sugden and Neil Bamford beat Robert Sutcliffe, Stuart Oliver, Chris Stratford and Dave Tyfa respectively. On board 4 John Kerrane took the opportunity to staunch the flow of adverse results he has been struggling with by cruising to a straightforward draw with Brian Corner. Congratulations to Martin Syrett and his team on their first victory of the season. The result means that Hebden can still dream of catching Belgrave but they’ll need to beat both Belgrave and Brighouse in their last two fixtures and hope Belgrave get beaten in their remaining fixtures as well.

The final match score card was:

Hebden Bridge ‘B’ vs. Huddersfield ‘B’
A.Leatherbarrow 1 – 0 R.Sutcliffe
M.Syrett 1 — 0 S.Oliver
D.Sugden 1 – 0 C.Stratford
J.Kerrane ½ – ½ B.Corner
N.Bamford 1 – 0 D.Tyfa
4½ – ½

All 10 of the games from Monday night can be played through or downloaded form the game viewer below. I’ve also added in 3 stray games from the previous week’s match between Courier ‘B’ and Hebden Bridge ‘C’. If you are interested in taking a look at the league tables then you can go to the “Calderdale League 2011-12” page link at the top of the page.

Shapland’s Men Show Rivals a Clean Pair of Heels

 2011-12 Season Journal  2 Responses »
Mar 022012
 
Hebden Bridge ‘A’ are showing a clean pair of heels as they pull clear at the top of League 1. Image sourced from gothick_matt’s Flickr photostream

It’s been another busy week of League chess in Calderdale with both divisions marching into combat.

In League 1 the leaders, Hebden Bridge ‘A’ have developed an apparently plump 4 point cushion at the top of the table after a string of favourable results in this round of fixtures. They began the round 2 points clear of Todmorden ‘A’ and 3 points ahead of Courier ‘A’. Both those teams lost their matches this week. Courier went down 3½-1½ at Belgrave who have turned their season on it’s head after a terrible pre-Christmas campaign. Meanwhile the reigning champions, Huddersfield ‘A’, showed they still have the stomach for a fight by beating Todmorden, also by 3½-1½, at home.

All this meant that Hebden ‘A’ could pull further ahead in the title race by beating their ‘B’ team colleagues. This they duly did by a margin of 4-1. This score line re-asserted the ‘A’ team’s ascendency after the ‘B’s had earned a surprising draw in the corresponding fixture before Christmas. On the night however Dave Shapland’s men gave their relegation colleagues no quarter as they ruthlessly took them apart.

Dave was the first to finish his game on board 4 against John Kerrane. He equalised in the opening fairly swiftly and then found ways to exploit some positional weaknesses that John had created. Sensing he was getting into deep water John tried to create complications but these backfired and Dave tightened the thumbscrews before a tactical oversight on John’s part handed Dave a free knight and he resigned.

On board 2 Darwin Ursal faced the ‘B’ team Captain, Martin Syrett. Martin attempted to throw his adversary in the opening by deploying a different anti-Sicilian line then his usual Grand Prix Attack. He seemed to be doing perfectly well before he too made a tactical error and also lost a piece.

Pete Leonard ground out a very nice positional win against Dave Sugden on board 3. Something appeared to have gone awry in the opening for Dave and Pete made no mistake in punishing him clinically in a game he rightly claims to be one of his season’s “better efforts”.

The most interesting game of the night was played on board 5 where the ‘A’ team’s Nick Sykes deployed Bird’s Defence against Neil Bamford’s Ruy Lopez. This line is very interesting and leads to some highly entertaining and unusual play. Nick seemed to be doing very well as Neil struggled to come to terms with a line he knew little about, but just as the game seemed to be in the bag, Neil set up a cunning trap and Nick fell into it. After that Neil had no trouble claiming yet another scalp in a season where he has gathered a good handful of them.

The last board to finish was board 1 where Andy Leatherbarrow played Matthew Parsons. Andy has shown tremendous resilience on top board for the ‘B’s this season and his statisitcs alone do not accurately reflect the quality of his play against the best in the league. He made Matthew work very hard until, in a pawn and piece ending that seemed to be drawn, he ran out of time to hand Matthew the full point.

The final match score card was:

Hebden Bridge ‘B’ vs. Hebden Bridge ‘A’
A.Leatherbarrow 0 — 1 M.Parsons
M.Syrett 0 — 1 D.Ursal
D.Sugden 0 — 1 P.Leonard
J.Kerrane 0 — 1 D.Shapland
N.Bamford 1 — 0 N.Sykes
1 — 4

All of the games from the derby fixtures can be replayed and downloaded from the viewer at the end of this post. This new game viewer by Chess Tempo has undergone some user testing but seems to be working really well for everyone so I intend to use it henceforth. It’s easy to use, simply select a game from the drop down list above the board and then navigate through the moves using the arrow keys on your computer or the arrow buttons under the chess board. You can play through variations in the commentary by clicking on a move in the variation and then advancing through the moves in the same way as mentioned above. You can also download the games by selecting the command in orange below the moves and annotation area.

In League 2 Hebden Bridge ‘D’ sat out this round of fixtures as they had a bye generated when Wheatley withdrew from the league earlier this season. That just left Hebden Bridge ‘C’ to travel to Courier ‘B’ in this division. John Kerrane picks up the story of the tie.

On Monday evening, Hebden Bridge C travelled to the Belgrave Club, Claremount, Halifax for a match against Courier B in the second division of the Calderdale Chess league.
The match was notable mainly for the fact that all the games were over relatively quickly, and all led to decisive results. While Hebden Bridge C captain John Kerrane and Dan Crampton on board 4 both lost due to blunders, the rest of the team polished their opponents off in style, and the game ended in a 3-2 win for the Hebden Bridge side. The match featured the debut for the C team of Ray Deravairere, who won a pawn endgame on board 5, and looks set to become a regular member of the team.”

The individual results were:

Courier ‘B’ vs. Hebden Bridge ‘C’
P. Hughes 1 – 0  J. Kerrane
J. B. Smith 0 – 1 N. Bamford
J. Whitehead 0 – 1 S. Priest
P. Jacobs 1 – 0 D. Crampton
R. Bottomley 0 – 1 R. Deravairere
2 – 3

This result means that Hebden ‘C’ retain their second place spot in the division. They are 5 points behind the leaders  Todmorden ‘B’ – who thrashed Halifax ‘B’ for the loss of only half a point on Monday night – although they have two games in hand on them. Halifax ‘A’ are 1 point behind Hebden Bridge having played the same number of games as them. Halifax beat Todmorden ‘C’ on Monday. Hebden still have to play Halifax ‘A’ twice and so it seems certain that the result of these two matches will decide which of them gets promoted to League 1 next season.

Next week there is another round of League 1 action as Hebden Bridge and Huddersfield have the second round of their double match up at the Trades Club when Hebden ‘A’ host the champions with a chance to put themselves out of sight in this year’s title race and Hebden ‘B’ host Huddersfield ‘B’ in a match they absolutely must win to have even the remotest chance of staying up. It should be fascinating so stay tuned for more the reports and the games.