With the League season having drawn to its conclusion, the summer opens the door to the return of the ever-popular Shrewsbury Town Championship. Only 4 Shrewsbury Club members have entered so far, let’s see if we can get a few more! The link for details is here.

The final league fixture of Shrewsbury Chess Club’s 2013-2014 season was completed on Friday night as Shewsbury B – already safe from both promotion and relegation – hosted big hitters Ludlow – already promoted, but gunning for the title. The visitors enjoyed a grading advantage on all 5 boards and had recorded wins over the Shrewsbury club in their last two meetings. This time, though, the only item on the agenda for Matt Best’s B team was pride, rather than any pressure to stay up/in the cup, and it meant that all the games were fairly interesting. The first game to finish came on board 2, where Dan Lockett was…

It seems to have been a regular occurrence this season that when two Shrewsbury teams both play on the same night, only one of them comes away with a positive result. This proved to be the case yet again on Friday as the A and C Teams were both in action. The A team – who, fortunately, had already secured their first division safety with a 4-1 win over Priorslee Lions B to end a run of 5 straight defeats – were at home to Telford A, fighting for their lives and requiring to draw or win the match to stay up. There was a slight technical hitch as the…

After the haywire events of last night’s title decider were distributed to the world via the medium of the Shrewsbury Club website, tomorrow (Friday 4th) is also set to see the final league fixture of the season broadcast live – on the same page as yesterday, in case you were wondering. Shrewsbury A host Telford A with the hosts having assured their first division survival with an emphatic win over Priorslee Lions B recently. Things, however, are very different for the visitors who will be relegated if they lose. Draw or win, however, and Condover and Church Stretton A will slip into the murky mire of the Second Division, where…

Tonight (Wednesday) sees the crunch match for the first Division title take place as surprise package Wellington A take on Telepost at the Wrekin housing trust in the final round of league fixtures. For the first time in Shropshire Chess history, the whole match is being broadcast live and is available to watch through our website on the “LIVE chess” page from around 7:30. A quick round-up of the situation for you: TEAMS PLAYED WON DRAWN LOST FOR AGAINST POINTS Newport A 14 9 2 3 47.5 22.5 20 Telepost A 13 9 1 3 43 22 19 Wellington A 13 8 3 2 39 26 19 Remember that it…

It’s a while since Shrewsbury’s A team has been in danger of relegation but this season’s shortage of players, coupled with a few results going the wrong way, meant that the A team had to win against Priorslee Lions B on Monday in order to be safe.  Although on paper the Shrewsbury team was favourite, Priorslee can punch above their weight and Francis Best’s team was not going to take anything for granted. Indeed, with only three of the core players available, regular reserves Norman O’Connor and Ian Davies were standing in on boards 4 and 5.  Certainly this season, the reserves from other teams have been invaluable in fielding…

Shrewsbury A’s drop from Christmas table-toppers to battling relegation continued as Francis Best’s side suffered a sixth consecutive defeat at the hands of the season’s surprise package Wellington A. The visitors, who have benefitted from excellent form from their top three boards to propel them to title contention so far this season, have been boosted by the timely arrival of former Church Stretton star Tiago Faustino for their crucial final two fixtures, although this was, at least, partly counteracted by Shrewsbury being boosted by the availability of Ed Goodwin on board two. There were several wild openings on show, with Tiago’s choice to deploy an aggressive Bird’s set-up against David Everington…

Shrewsbury’s B and C teams both inched closer to their season’s targets with hard fought victories within a day of each other. Both opposition teams had their parallels, too, with Telepost C (against whom the B team played) and Newport Juniors both rooted to the bottom of their divisions having lost all their games so far this season. However, despite this, and the fact that they enjoyed a considerable grading advantage on all boards, Matt Best’s B team were made to work very hard for the victory. Things started badly as Ivor Salter went wrong in the opening against Shane Sweeney on board 5. After losing a Rook in return…

Shrewsbury’s A team were at Newport on Monday 3rd March, seeking to break a losing streak and trying to ensure they were clear from the relegation zone of division 1.  This was always going to be a tall order, as Newport remain, on paper at least, the strongest side in Shropshire’s league, despite not having always dominated this season. To add to the challenge, Shrewsbury had to call upon two reserves in the shape of Norman O’Connor and Andrew Lewis.  To be fair, recent results from A team reserves have been very creditable and the B and C team players thus called upon have certainly tended to punch above their…

Controller Matt Best has published the draw for the fourth round of this year’s Club Championship. The cross table is below, and the pairings are available on the Club Championship page of the site. The deadline for games to be played in this round is Friday 25th April.