Lichess4545 Season 47 Week 6 Update – The Hunt for Perfection

Lichess4545 is slowly but surely approaching the crucial stretch of the season, with final rounds 7 and 8. Last time we blogged about the league, it was before round 5. And going into that round, there were only two perfect teams remaining.

Essence of Sahkal and the Fragrances of the 7 (aka The Fragrances) faced off against Blunder? I hardly know her (aka The Blunderers) in a match that would determine the last perfect team. Fragrances went up 1-0 in the match, but it was all downhill from there. 6 unanswered wins from Blunderers put the match in a stranglehold.

One of the more interesting games of this battle was the meeting between @Gronen and @tommeketoch, which also saw 3 pawns promote to queens. After 67...Qxh5??, White got an opportunity to find a winning continuation and they did, prompting resignation just two moves later.

After all was said and done, Blunderers won the match 6-2 and were firmly in control of their destiny, the last team with a spotless record after round 5.

Which brings us to round 6, where they put it all on the line against Think Like a Grandpatzer (aka The Grandpatzers), a team with 4 wins and 1 loss.

In the first game, @yaminejamal1 continued their domination on board 1 and put the Blunderers in the lead. @rpcx then tied it at 1-1, an early sign that this was not gonna be a walk in the park for the Blunderers. One of the most entertaining games of the match followed, a wild draw with missed chances for both sides between @ziggurwat and @seandcosta. A fun game, but it did not put us any closer to the match resolution.

The next game also ended in a draw, so it was 2-2 going into @IckyDemon meeting @Crazysicilliano. A nice attacking game from the Demon put the Blunderers up 3-2 once again.

Is this the team of destiny? We've had few perfect teams in Lichess4545 league history, can it happen again? Well, first things first. Grandpatzers refused to go quietly, tying the match at 3-3, setting up a pivotal game between @PhilippBrandenbrett (Blunderers) and @hoover2 (Grandpatzers). White had a nice position set up, until the cool-looking but slightly premature 22.h5??

Black pounced on this and was eventually able to defuse the attack and win the game! It was clear that this season, there would not be a perfect team as The Grandpatzers led 4-3 coming into game 8. It was another epic one, between @kygreek playing for the Grandpatzers and @Zanderqfb trying to tie the match for the Blunderers (which would still keep them firmly in the overall league lead). There were a few missed shots by both players in this game, but eventually, it came down to an endgame where White pushed for the win. Black got their chance to draw the game on move 81. Can you see it?

It was missed though and kygreek was able to complete the victory for the Grandpatzers, making sure all teams had a loss to their name after round 6.

While Blunderers are probably not thrilled about this, a neutral viewer has to love it because we now have 5 teams tied on 5W–1L record going into week 7, setting up a very exciting finish. The current leader by virtue of tiebreaker is Elo from the other side. Their grip on the league throne is anything but firm.

In other league news

We had a smothered mate in 9 moves! Courtesy of @PetersBJ delivering it against @gpetris.

We had a tragic ending in a long endgame between @STCLion and @Laval18 which just showcases the brutality of chess.

And we had this insanity between @Mizrab and @Lotus_62 where it's White to move...and believe it or not, Black is going to win this game by checkmate.

Endgame study from @guitarspider

Some people like endgames. It's a weird thing. Some people like to study them! We have such an example in our league and for fellow endgame enthusiasts, there is a study about a round 4 endgame from the meeting between @guitarspider and @Grizzzly1000. Enjoy, if you dare.

Lichess4545 is an online chess league for people who like playing long time control games online. Players are assigned to teams and play one game per week with a 45+45 time control. For more information visit our league home page.
LoneWolf is a side league of the Lichess4545 league. It is an 11-round Swiss tournament where players play one game per week with a 30+30 time control. For more information about the LoneWolf tournament visit the LoneWolf homepage.
Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC-SA).
Contributions to this edition by @Tranzoo and @guitarspider