Leicestershire & Rutland Chess Association is the body recognised by the English Chess Federation as being responsible for chess in the city of Leicester and the counties of Leicestershire and Rutland. The Association is affiliated to the Midland Counties Chess Union.
I recently heard of the passing of Terry Clay of the former Hinckley club, which was formerly a part of the Leicestershire Chess League when I first started playing in 2010.
I knew Terry as a tough opponent when I played him and many of you will have the same thoughts as me! Our thoughts are of course with his friends and family. He was 87 years old.
His funeral will be at Nuneaton Crematorium on Monday 23rd February at 2pm.
Leicestershire players finished top of the Open, Major and Intermediate sections at Sunday's Nottingham RapidPlay.
The event, held at Nottingham High School, saw Syston’s Mark Hebden score 4.5/6 in a three-way tie for first place in the Open section.
Meanwhile, Wigston’s Arav Ajaykumar finished outright first in the Major section with 5/6, ahead of runner up Anstey’s Matt Connor on 4.5/6.
Leicester University’s Nicolas Rojas scored a perfect 6/6 to take the Intermediate section.
Congratulations to Rene Butler for finishing joint first in the Northampton FIDE Congress, U1600 section.
Rene scored a crucial win in the last round, giving him a total of 4/5, three wins and two draws.
COUNTY INDIVIDUAL TOURNAMENTS 2026
Entries are now invited for the 2026 County Individual tournaments which will be held at the Wigston Chess club and the Anstey Chess club during the summer. The Tournament controller is Andy Morley, with Ben Vaughan managing the events being held at Anstey
The deadline for entries is April 26th
ALL PLAYERS MUST BE ECF REGISTERED BRONZE MEMBERS (Minimum)
There are 4 sections:
* The Championship. This will be 5 rounds, open to all.
* The Challengers. This will be 5 rounds, for players graded below 1850
* The Major. This will be 5 rounds, for players graded below 1650
* The Minor. This will be 5 rounds, for players graded below 1450
The grades used will be the APRIL 2026 STANDARD PLAY ECF grades, not the ones used for the 2025/26 league season.
The time control in all events will be 80 minutes for all moves + a 10 second increment throughout
The CHAMPIONSHIP will be played at WIGSTON. The CHALLENGERS, MAJOR and MINOR tournaments will be held at ANSTEY. If it is more convenient, and if both players agree, games may be played at other venues.
All rounds are on THURSDAY EVENINGS. Mostly every 4 weeks:
Round 1 21st May
Round 2 4th June (NB ONLY 2 WEEKS AFTER ROUND 1)
Round 3 2nd July
Round 4 6th August ( 5 weeks after round 3)
Round 5 3rd September
It is expected that all games will be played on the scheduled dates. There will inevitably be some dates which players cannot make, in which case every effort should be made to play the match BEFORE the scheduled date. Players may request no more than 1 half point bye, if they anticipate it will be difficult for them to complete a round in time.
Entries should be submitted to ANDY MORLEY stating your name, the tournament you wish to enter, your ECF Membership number, your contact phone numbers (mobile or landline, and work if applicable), and your e-mail address if you have one. Players in the Challengers, Major and Minor sections will be requested to join a tournament Whatsapp group to improve communications during the tournaments
Please give any of the scheduled dates for which you already know you will be unavailable (eg due to holiday bookings)
Send your entry: Online to a.morley953@btinternet.com
Or text or ring mobile phone: 07769721980
Brian Slater writes:
David Arthur Pyke passed away on the 14th December 2025.
Dave’s funeral will take place on Tuesday 13th January 2026 at 2:30 at Great Glen Crematorium.
Dave was 94 when he passed away. He had 2 passions in life; one was playing his double bass and the other was his chess.
I cannot say anything about his playing the double bass only that he was good enough to play in a Jaz Ouartet around the country but as for his chess playing, I always found him a difficult person to play against.
I only knew Dave from 1977 when I joined Spinney Hill Chess Club, but Dave had been associated with the Leicester Chess Association, as I have been told, from the age of 16 when as a schoolboy he was regarded as a very good player.
Dave played for Spinney Hill and was instrumental in winning the Division 5 Trophy in 2010-11 season. Spinney Hill closed in 2011 and became Latimer Chess Club which he continued to play for.
All at Latimer Chess Club will remember Dave as a very good team player and we pass on our deepest sympathy to his wife and family.
John's funeral will take place on Thursday 18th December at 11am at Loughborough Crematorium
John Glover(1929-2025),who died peacefully, at the great age of 96, didn’t come to competitive chess until approaching middle age but compensated for it by embracing the game enthusiastically for the rest of his long life. In addition to taking part in hundreds of league matches for Loughborough, his one and only club, for 50 years, he quickly developed a taste for tournament play, unlike the majority of Leics players, and often entered congresses.
Quiet and unassuming, John’s calm and untroubled demeanour at the board, and in general, made him a well liked figure on the local scene. Outwardly, and I believe it reflected an inner peace, he revealed little stress or strain even in the most tense of situations nor did he become downcast and agitated in adversity, which set him apart from some other serious devotees. Although he expended time and effort on chess, he viewed it as a fascinating, stimulating hobby rather than a clash of egos, yet he was a determined opponent and had a good level of concentration. Jim Miller, who pre dated John at Loughborough, described him as “ courteous, gentle, kindly, helpful…” Arguably these very qualities, plus taking up chess late, held him back, to an extent, but, even so, he was a sound, solid, knowledgeable player who did well to reach a grading of around 150(1825) at his best and hold his own in meeting many of the better Leics players, throughout several decades.
The trigger to stimulate John’s interest occurred in 1972. Not the Fischer-Spassky match, rather a simultaneous display to be given by Karpov in Leicester came to his attention. Although only an occasional skittler, he applied for a board, was surprised to be allocated one, upon paying £4, and survived for 30+ moves. This encouraged him to think he might not be out of place in the company of regular players and, accordingly, he became a member of the Loughborough club, joining a number of his work colleagues from Loughborough University, where he was a lecturer in chemical engineering. Thereafter he turned out continuously for the club’s teams until 2023 and must surely be considered an ideal club man, serving Loughborough’s interests faithfully and with versatility.
John held a variety of offices – treasurer, auditor, secretary for 5 seasons in the 1980s, and, notably, team captain. He captained the 2nd team for 10 seasons, mainly in the 1990s, indicating he usually played for Loughborough 2 and it was often in the top division since, in a golden era, the club had 2 teams in Div.1, 6 times in the 90s, 4 times in the early 2000s, and 3 teams during season 2000/1!
The player details on the website show a record of almost 50% for John from 2010 onward, not bad for someone who was already an octogenarian in January 2010. Up to 2014, and beyond, he achieved praiseworthy results. Then in 2018/19, reaching his 90th year and, understandably, winding down, difficult circumstances at his club, no longer in Div.1 at all, compelled him to step into a breach as, in his own words, unofficial club secretary and 2nd team captain. Remarkably, he played a total of 25 games in that season, across all 3 teams, scoring 141/2 points, including 7/8 on top board in Div.5.
John took part in county matches, featuring in the U150(160) teams up to 2014, albeit somewhat irregularly. I guess he may have been in the county 2nd team prior to the introduction of the graded structure. His main contribution to the county though was in correspondence chess. Soon after I resurrected involvement in the BCF and MCCU team events, which had lapsed, I handed the job over and, after a further season or two, John stepped forward to captain the sides. In 1987/8 Leics gained promotion from the BCF 2nd division, the Sinclair trophy. I’m not certain whether John had taken charge for that season but he definitely led the team for the following six, during which it retained its status in the 1st division, the Ward Higgs trophy. This constituted a fine performance as, historically, postal play had rarely vitally interested many people in the county and assembling 30 keen, reliable individuals posed problems. John evidently found an effective way. In his last season, 1993/4, the team finished 5th, with 161/2 pts, from 30, outstanding in the face of strong opposition. He also got together a team of 20 for the BCF division 3 and ran the MCCU side for a shorter period.
At times John participated in the county championship tournaments. Probably a high point was in 1988/9 when, scoring 5/9, he finished 7th=, in a strong field of 20, ahead of, among others, Paul Madden, John Robinson, Roland Graf and a young Stephen Calderwood. The following season he managed 50%, again really creditable. Then the event declined considerably. In 1995 there were just for entrants – John, Andy Morley, Cyril Johnson and Roland. John didn’t win the title, yet had a significant part in Roland’s victory. Until Sean Hewitt revived it in 2005, only one further tournament was organised and John was there again, for a weekend Swiss at Syston, scoring 31/2 out of 5.
I know John liked to test himself at congresses. He entered the Atkins as early as 1973, in the Minor alongside a coterie of promising juniors, including Mark Hebden and Geoff Lawton. Subsequently he went to places like Nottingham and Hereford and, most likely, a lot of others. I encountered him once at Grantham. Two of his favourite events, not weekenders, were Guernsey and the Combined Services championship. Amazingly, he went, with his daughter’s family, to Guernsey in 2022 and in April 2023, aged 94, not long before becoming housebound, played 7 games in 4 days in the services tournament at RAF Wittering, with a score of 41/2 points. He supported the latter for many years because he did his national service in the RAF and greatly enjoyed it! He also played for RAF teams on line, and indulged generally in that newer, popular form of chess.
Clearly John devoted a good deal of energy to his chess activities and found much pleasure in them. At the same time he played plenty of bridge, possibly to a higher standard than chess, at the Loughborough Bridge club, and elsewhere, and was a committed amateur astronomer. Using massive databases, and in partnership with a computer scientist, he co-authored a study of quasars which was recently published in the Journal of the British Astronomical Association. I think at least one earlier project was accepted for publication. Fortunately, his mind remained firmly intact to the end.
John was a wise, practical man who will be much missed by his friends and acquaintances, both for his humanity and talents, and, of course, most of all, by his family.
The Loughborough club is sad to report the passing of long-time member John Glover at the age of 96. Our condolences go to his family.
We were all saddened by the recent passing of Kerry Kidd, one of our members and a strong player here at Melton and for the County. Returning to Chess after retirement a few years ago, his play was characterised by a system named after the great Belgian Master Edgard Colle (1887-1932) of whom it was said: "he was always in good humour and a boon companion in company; but at the board he was a relentless fighter guided by a ... sense of duty and sportsmanship". Those sentiments could readily be ascribed to Kerry.
On our Club's Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/groups/667012456447140 and website - search: 'Chess in Melton' or go to https://chessinmelton.weebly.com/videos-etc.html there are diagrams from four games where Kerry (to play in positions 1-3) had the White pieces. Please take a look. Can you spot the exciting continuation in each case? The fourth is a cool mate in three moves, where this time it's Black to play but again, White to win. Enjoy!
A few words from Alan Agnew:
A bit of success for us, the Midlands Team Champs took place at Nottingham High School this Saturday 15th, and Leicestershire came away with the titles of Girls Under 11 champions, and Under 9 champions. We beat Warwickshire on tie break in both of the these categories.
All results here - Results
Having beaten Warwickshire - please excuse Alan if he's walking around with a cheesy grin!
Huge congratulations to Stephen Holmes for finishing joint 1st at the Nottingham FIDE Rapid U1600. Stephen faced Marian Talmacel, who was on 5/5, in the final round of six and needed a win to tie for first. The Market Harborough player rose to the challenge, securing joint first alongside Talmacel and Shaheer Khorrum.
Many will be delighted for Stephen, as an adult improver, he’s worked hard on his chess over the past few years, often playing in higher sections as one of the bottom seeds. Countless books studied, many hours spent travelling by bus and train to events and now a well-earned win to show for it.