| Philip Fallon (185) [B] | 0.5 - 0.5 | Martyn Goodger (188) |
| Stephen Pride (160) | 0 - 1 | Richard Donaghay (158) |
| Richard Newman (151) | 0 - 1 | Mike Bradley (151) |
| Philip Hoffman (150) | 0.5 - 0.5 | Mike Angel (133) |
Ely bounced back from defeat in the opening fixture of the season, to record a convincing victory against a decent Cambridge side. The scoreline should have been even more convincing, had Martyn not missed a mate in 4 against Phil Fallon.
On board 3, Mike continued his fine start to the season with a positional pawn sacrifice against Richard Newman that soon netted first a piece and then a rook. On board 2, Stephen Pride walked into a tactic that dropped a pawn in front of his king. Most of the watching crowd thought that Richard would have to settle for the pawn, but he had a further devastating tactic up his sleeve that forced Stephen's resignation on the spot.
On board 4, Michael had bravely stepped up from the second team to cover for the missing Mark. He never looked in any danger, and a draw was a fair result in an endgame with opposite coloured bishops.
On top board, Martyn and Philip went down a line in the Philidor defence in which they have traded blows on four previous occasions. In their previous game in this line, Philip had produced a theoretical novelty on move 22, managing eventually to win from an inferior position. Martyn had an improvement ready for tonight's game, but Philip produced a different novelty in the same position on move 22. Shortly afterwards, Martyn had to choose between winning the exchange whilst handing over the initiative; or himself sacrificing a pawn to force Philip's king to march into the opposite side of the board. He chose the second option, and with time running short was soon desperately looking for the killer blow with his queen, rook and knight in the hunt. But he missed a forced mate in 4 moves (spotted by Richard, in the crowd), and had to accept Philip's offer of a draw a few minutes later, to avoid a loss on time.