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British Chess Federation

English Deaf Chess Association 32nd Annual Chess Congress, Romford, 30-31 October 2004

The winner of the Premier Section and 2004 EDCA Champion with an unbeaten score of 4/5 was Alasdair MacLeod of London. He is the first “new face” to win the title for 10 years.

2nd place was very close with 3 players on 3.5 points but after applying the tie-break system, Phillip Gardner was given 2nd place with Chris Kreuzer 3rd and Lewis Martin 4th.

The key moment in the Premier was the 4th round where Alasdair MacLeod finally beat the 7 times EDCA Champion Phillip Gardner for the first time ever in 8 years. In the final round, Lewis Martin needed to beat Alasdair to become champion while Alasdair needed only at least a draw to claim the title. After a long hard game, Alasdair won a pawn and so with a better position offered a draw which Lewis had little option but to accept.

Lewis’ performance was the most eye-catching of all where the 13 year old was making his debut as the no.8 seed out of 10 players in the Premier. Two of his scalps, the no.2 and no.3 seeds, were members of the England Deaf team who competed in the last World Deaf Chess Team Championship back in 2002. He only lost one game - to the no.1 seed, Phillip Gardner. This is a fantastic achievement where Lewis clearly has a great future both as a junior and in deaf chess. He is the most exciting new talent to emerge onto the English Deaf Chess scene for a long time and has huge potential to achieve a lot more.

Special mention should also be made of Sheffield’s David Whiston who won the Major last year and so was promoted to the Premier this year. He produced some giant-killing wins against the no. 3 and no.7 seeds. He finished with a very creditable 50 % score despite being the bottom seed.

The Major section saw plenty of action due to the change to an all-play-all format with a reduced time control. The experienced Chris Williamson from Birmingham won the John Brown trophy where the key moment was his win against Lou Nardi in the penultimate round. John Brown himself made a comeback to the EDCA Congress scene to claim 2nd place.

The EDCA are indebted to Romford Deaf Club for letting us have the use of their premises for the whole weekend.

Results:

Chess book prizes were also given out.