Some more photos from the last round of the 2015/6 Leinster Chess League:
Congratulations!
Congratulations to David Fitzsimons in achieving an IM Norm at the recent 4NCL weekend tournament in England.
There is a picture of David at the board here: https://twitter.com/4NCL/status/726776778879078402
Congratulations also to Shane Melaugh on defeating many-time Irish Champion and current Leinster champion Colm Daly while representing Elm Mount in the National Club Championships.
Last Round of the Leagues
The last round of the Leinster League took place on Sunday 17th April. None of the Elm Mount teams got promoted this year – and our Ennis (Division 3) team was relegated to the O’ Hanlon (Division 4) after losing their last round match.
Karol Marzec from the Armstrong (Division 1) team won a board prize with a score of 8.5/11.
Below are some pictures from the afternoon matches.
League Report
The leagues are well underway at this stage. So far, the most likely medal winners are the Heidenfeld team who are well in contention in Division 2. Full league tables can be seen on the LCU website here.
Some photos from a recent league night in Elm Mount featuring the Heidenfeld and Bodley teams:-
Updates
The 2015-15 Leinster League league season starts tomorrow, 14th September. The Armstrong team (at home on the 14th) and the Bodley team (away on the 18th) are in action the first week with the Heidenfeld team and the Ennis team kicking off their seasons the following week. The O’Hanlon team’s first match is on 1st October.
A new item has been added to Chess Pieces – Prodigy (submitted by Oliver Dunne).
Stokes Cup Representative
Congratulations are due to our club mate Gavin Melaugh who played on the Irish under 12 team in the Stokes Cup competition last week against teams from England, Scotland and Wales. Gavin acquitted himself very well during the event with 1 win, 4 draws and just one loss in his 6 games.
2014 Player of the Year
The 2014 Player of the Year award was given jointly to Shane Melaugh and Gavin Melaugh. They are pictured below receiving the award from Club President, Victor Murray.
Irish Junior Championships
Five of Elm Mount’s players competed in this year’s Irish Junior Championships which were held in Blanchardstown recently. Philip Grehan and Gavin Melaugh played in the under 12s event, while Shane Melaugh, Luke Keenan and Alex Goss played in the under 14 section.
All of the players aquitted themselves well, with pride of place going to Gavin who finished as runner up in the under 12s Section on a score of 5/6. Photos of some the Elm Mount players taken at the championships are set out below.
Philip Grehan
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Gavin receiving his prize for finishing as runner up in the under 12s Section of the Irish Junior championships with from left (Michael Gordon, Director of Marketing New Ireland Assurance, Joe Higgins TD and Pat Fitzsimons, Chairperson of the Irish Chess Union.
League Update
The 2014-15 Leinster League season is now over.
The club had 2 teams in the Armstrong Cup (Div 1). The Armstrong A team scored 54 points and finished in 3rd place by just half a point. Joint top scorers were Zygis Jakubauskas and Alan McDonagh who each scored 8/11. The Armstrong B team finished in 12th place with 26.5 points and was relegated to the Heidenfeld for next season. Top scorer was Pat Fitzsimons with 5/11.
The Ennis Shield (Div 3) team finished in 9th place with 26.5 points. Top scorer was Eugene McMorrow with 7.5/11.
The O’Hanlon Cup (Div 4) team scored 32 points and finished in 8th place out of 12 teams. 4th to 8th place in this division were separated by only 1.5 points in the end. The top scorer was Peter Scott with 6.5/11.
The Bodley Cup (Div 6) team finished in 6th place with 24 points. Alex Goss, Sean MacGowan and Colm Mooney were joint top scorers with 5.5 points.
2014 Elm Mount Christmas Blitz!
The 2014 Elm Mount Christmas Blitz was held in on Monday 22nd December. The players were divided into 3 sections of 8 players each with the top 2 plus the 2 best 3rd-placed players to qualify for the quarter-finals. The traditional handicap system was used with time varying from 5 minutes each to 2 minutes v 8 minutes depending on rating.
David Fitzsimons, Shane Melaugh and Gedas Jakubauskas were the section winners with Karol Marzec, William French and Gavin Melaugh the three runners-up. Eugene Donohue and Zygis Jakubauskas were the best 3rd-place finishers.
The quarter-final draw was:-
David Fitzsimons v William Ffrench
Eugene Donohue v Gavin Melaugh
Shane Melaugh v Karol Marzec
Gedas Jakubauskas v Zygis Jakubauskas
After a break for food, the knockout stage began:
The results were: Zygis beat Gedas, Karol beat Shane, Eugene beat Gavin and David beat William.
The semi-final pairings were David v Eugene and Zygis v Karol.
The winners were David and Zygis (after a replay) and the final began …
Eventually Zygis triumphed to become the 2014 Christmas Blitz champion!
The prizes were presented by Pat Fitzsimons:-
There were 2 extra prizes for those at the opposite end of the table awarded to Peter McGrath and Alan McDonagh
