Latest MCCU News

County quarter final and preliminary round results
Seven Midlands teams through to semi-finals.

18 May. Another three Midlands teams go to semi-finals. Worcestershire u140 beat Herts, but Notts u140 fall to Kent. Staffs had double victories over Norfolk in the u120 and the u100 matches. Notts beat Essex in the u100 competition.
11 May, Neil Graham and ECF report. Three teams go to semi finals.In the Open competition, GreaterManchester beat Sussex in their quarter final match, but Leics were knocked out by Middlesex. Notts lost to Devon in the Minor Counties quarter final, but in the Devon-Notts u160 match Notts squeezed through on the second tie-break after an 8-8 result. Manchester u160 lost to Suffolk. In the u120, Notts beat Kent, Derbys lost to Yorks.

Midland counties correspondence teams

1 May, Phil Morgan reports. Notts currently lead Division 2 of the Counties and District Correspondence Chess Club competition with 8½ points from 11 completed games, but Essex B have 7/7 points and seem likely to win the Sinclair Trophy. Warks B - on 5½/9 - and Worcs - on 3½/11 - also compete in the same division. Warks A compete in Division 1 (5/8 so far). Lincs (7½/9) lead Division 3 in the fight for the Butler-Thomas Trophy and Staffs (5½/10) also play in Division 3.

Derbyshire u120 through to quarter final

27 Apr. Derbys won their match against Herts and play Yorkshire next round.

MCCU AGM

24 Apr, Ray Dolan reports. The MCCU Annual Meeting will be held Saturday 15 June at Rolls Royce Derby. Papers will be sent to county secretaries, delegates and officers nearer the meeting.

IM Joseph McPhillips wins Bolton Easter congress

McPhillips (Bolton, GMC) had a clean sweep and was 1½ points ahead of the field in the Open. Martin Burns (Stockport, GMC) won the Major with 5 points and Arpad Busznyak (Bolton, GMC) the Minor with 4½ points. The Busy Person’s Blitz was a tie between GM Stephen Gordon and Joseph McPhillips with 7 points from 8 games. The tournaments were organised by Rod Middleton and attracted 140 entries.

Midlands Junior Champions

21 Apr. Kishan Modi (Leics Jun) was U18 champion with 6 points, The U14 prize was shared by Jason Lv (Leics Jun) and Pavel Marowski ((Oxen Jun) 4 points. The U11 winner was Jude Shearsby (Coventry Chess Acad) 4 points and the U9 champion was Elis Dicen (St Patrick’s Birmigham) Winners took home up to £300 in prize money. Full prize list and link to cross-tables..

Midland masters success in Rhodes

17 Apr. IM Robert Bellin (Walsall, Staffs) played board 1 in England 65+’s Silver Medal team placed behind Russia. In the Senior 50 team competition, GM Keith Arkell (Halesowen, Worcs) won an individual silver medal. See Stewart Reuben’s report..

Cannock & District League celebrate 20th Birthday

2 Apr, Ray Dolan reports. The league was founded in 1999 by Robert Mayne, Brian Lynam, Robin Lewis and Ray Dolan. It now has twelve clubs competing in three divisions and competitions for the Chase and Robert Ward trophies. Visit CDCL website.

Click "News" on the menu bar above for other recent items.

Next in the Midlands

Fri Jul 19 – Sun Jul 21. 4NCL FIDE Rated Congress @ Ramada Hotel Telford Ironbridge Forge Gate Telford. FIDE Open, FIDE U2000 (ECF U175), ECF U135. Five rounds

Next Midlands & national junior events

Sat & Sun 6 & 7 Jul. Delancey UK Schools Chess Challenge Midlands Gigafinal at Grace Academy, Chapelhouse Road, Solihull. Entry by qualification from Megafinals.

Next National Event

Sat 18 May. ECF County Championship quarter finals. Various locations.

The "chess counties" forming the MCCU

Eleven "Chess Counties" form the Midland Counties Chess Union and cover the areas shown in the map on the right. A small Board of volunteer directors currently led by Chief Executive Ray Dolan (Staffs) is elected annually by delegates from member chess counties. The Board organises regional competitions based on policies agreed annually by delegates from member chess counties.

By playing in the competitions hosted on this website you agree that your name, chess grade and your membership status with the English Chess Federation (ECF) may be published on this website for the purposes of recording the results of the competitions. You also agree that such information will be passed to the ECF, the governing body, for grading purposes, and published on their website.

The MCCU

The current webmaster is Ray Collett (Worcs). The website's policy is to report results of the MCCU competitions, principally the MCCU county team tournaments and congresses. Brief results of other chess congresses held in the MCCU area and and links to organisers' websites are on the "News" pages. A calendar of upcoming chess congresses is on the "Congresses" pages. Some important national and international chess events will also be reported if there is a "Midlands" interest. In the menu bar above: "About" gives more information about the MCCU and has links to rules and administrative papers; "Guide" explains the site's organisation and provides links to most of the site's key pages.

Please send news of Midlands chess events, corrections, notifications of broken links, and suggestions to improve the website to Ray Collett.