11th February, 2003

THE inaugural GibTelecom Masters in Gibraltar was won jointly by Cypriot GM Vasilios Kotronias and his Athens neighbour GM Nigel Short, who both won £3,250 after finishing joint first on 7.5/10.

Good fortune (at long last!) finally shone on IM John Shaw from Kilmarnock, who not only took home £1,250 for his share of equal third with Croatian Mladen Palac on a score of 7, but also achieved his first GM norm in the strangest of circumstances. Needing a win in the final round with black against Jim Plaskett, Shaw was comprehensively lost come the time control.

Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately), after move 40, Plaskett decided to compose himself after a frantic time scramble with a break, came back to the board to decide on his next move, only to be interrupted by the arbiter to inform him that heíd lost on time! Even after playing ten rounds, Plaskett had managed to forget that the time control for the tournament was all the moves in 2 hours, with a 30 seconds increment for each move from the first.

Regardless of the circumstances, no other players richly deserve some good fortune than Shaw, who has had his fair share of bad luck in the past to narrowly miss out on his ëelusiveí first norm. He is now set to become Scotlandís fourth Grandmaster behind Motwani, McNab and Rowson, and only requires a further two norms to attain the hallowed title. His next big chance comes later this month in France, as he makes the annual pilgrimage to the Cappelle le Grande tournament.

J Plaskett ñ J Shaw
GibTelecom Masters, (10)
Retiís Opening
1 Nf3 d5 2 g3 Nf6 3 Bg2 c6 4 0-0 Bf5 5 d3 e6 6 Nbd2 h6 7 b3 Be7 8 Bb2 0-0 9 c4 a5 10 a3 Bh7 11 Bc3 Na6 12 Qc2 c5 13 e4 Nc7 14 Rae1 Nd7 15 Bb2 Bd6 16 cxd5 exd5 17 exd5 Nxd5 18 Ne5 N7b6 19 Ndc4 f6 20 Nxd6 Qxd6 21 Nc4 Qc7 22 Be4 f5 23 Be5 Qd7 24 Bh1 f4 25 Nxb6 Nxb6 26 Qxc5 Ra6 27 Bxf4 Rxf4 28 gxf4 Bxd3 29 f5 Bxf1 30 Kxf1 Qd3+ 31 Kg1 Nd7 32 Qd5+ Qxd5 33 Bxd5+ Kf8 34 Bxb7 Rd6 35 Re3 Rd1+ 36 Kg2 Ra1 37 Bc6 Nf6 38 b4 axb4 39 axb4 Rb1 40 b5 Rb2 41 Kf3 Kf7 0-1

JOHN B HENDERSON