Norman Richards

It's a little more than halfway through the month, and the league is going well.  B group is pretty tough again, but there are more players that I can give a solid game to, unlike last month where most of of the league players were clearly better than me.  

So far I am 2-8, which is not a great record.  But, I'm really happy with that.  If it weren't for a stunningly bad endgame mistake I'd be 3-7, and I felt I kept my last two games close despite playing stronger players.  Although I'm not yet winning these games, I'm definitely not losing them as spectacularly as before.  As an example, here's a game I played this morning against a new league player maronscan.  She's been doing well in the group and will likely be promoted to A group at the end.  Her style is fairly aggressive, and I don't often do as well in heavy fighting games.  

In this game, I made a good stand, keeping it close until around move 177, where I crumbled.  After this exchange, I'm losing by about 15 points.  I'm rattled enough that later I make a silly mistake in the lower right corner and resign rather than playing it and scoring.  Despite the poor endgame, I'm very happy with this game.  I think it shows the great progress I'm making.  I'm hoping to get this game reviewed later to see what I could have done to turn this game into a win.

Right now I'm sitting in the 9th spot in the group, which puts me at risk of being demoted to C group at the end of month.  However, the 3 players directly above me are all players who I am capable of winning against.  Assuming I can get some games in with them, I shouldn't have a big problem getting a win or two to boost my percentage enough to not risk demotion.