South Wales Winter Congress Jan 4-6 2008 Newport Games Tables Open Major Minor The Newport Congress this year seemed a strangely low key affair, with a total of only 69 playing, and two sections won with a score of 4/5. Tim Kett was the only player to reach this score in the Open Section, after taking a bye in round 1. There were many missed opportunities to win in the Open, which produced only 21 wins in 46 games. After 4 rounds of the Open, there were 4 players on 3 points, 12 on 2 points and 2 on 1½ points. The last round top pairings of Tim Kett – JD Turner and James Sherwin – David Sully resulted in an easy win for Tim against JD’s Elephant Gambit, and a drawn Dutch Defence on board 2. At one stage as many as 8 could have shared the grading prize, but Guy Wagner came out alone, after Chris Dixon sacrificed unsoundly from a strong position 1. 4 T Kett 2-3 3½ DJ Sully, J Sherwin 4-6 3 F Biancalana, JD Turner, G Wagner 7-15 2½ H Brockbank, EM White, N Beveridge, J Fathallah, D Jiles, E Tzimkas, M Abbott, C Davies, JM Thomas 16-17 2 C Dixon, P Tew 18-19 1½ K Downey, W Hunt Withdrawn T Brown 1½/3 Suzie Blackburn 1½/2 Alan Young ½/3 Brendan O’Gorman took charge of the Major early on , and was already at least joint winner by the end of round 4. A quick draw against Hugh Price ensured the outright win, and for Hugh (now in his 80’s, but still competitive at this level) a share of 3rd prize. 1. 4½ B O’Gorman 2. 4 S Bartlett 3-5 3½ YL Teng, S Horrell, WH Price 6-10 3 D Buttell, R Hurn, W Elworthy, D Cleverley, D Rogers 11-15 2½ R Dineen, A Papier, B Ross, S Vickery, F Trombley 16-21 2 N Granville, J Jones, M Probert, SW Howells, J Cox, M Emblem 22 1½ R Williams 23 1 L Davies Withdrawn JEW Blackburn ½/2 SG Blackburn ½/2 S Batmanghelich ½/4 The 4 highest graded players in the Minor seemed a class above the others, but John Llewelyn blundered in the ending to let in Vince Williams for joint 1st place after being an exchange ahead for almost the whole game. Earlier David Gilbert and Mark Francis had agreed a quick draw to ensure a share of first place, and Martin Jones duly also caught them by beating Phil Smith in a well fought game. 1-4 4 M Jones, D Gilbert, M Francis, V Williams 5-11 3 JD Llewelyn, PM Smith, MB Summers, S Tang, A Wills, A Gauci, S Los 12 2½ J Los 13-17 2 T Allen, J Clark, J Basterfield, R Lockyer, C Crowley 18-19 1½ J Los, B Thomas Withdrawn K O’Rourke ½/4 G Setner 0/2 | 
