Perfect Pollock Scores 8/8 in Belfast

I've not had a very good time of it the past week-ish, so rather than continue my Winner's POV series, I thought I'd write about one more little thing that interests me within the context of chess history. It kinda keeps things in chronological order as well, so it's not a hugely out of place entry in my collection. Hopefully you'll humour me just a little today.

A perfect tournament is such a rare occurrence that it alone elevates most tournaments to be worth sharing. The first blog post I ever made featured a perfect performance, albeit in a club tournament (see here); the formidable Gustav Neumann reportedly won a tournament in Berlin, 1865 with a massive 34/34, though against significantly weaker opposition; we've also covered "perfect" tournament wins by the present world champion Wilhelm Steinitz, at Dublin 1865 (see here) and at London 1872 (see here; one of his "unrecorded" games was a forfeit). Today we will be taking a look at the next entry in this impressive list, a tournament win scored by one of the most promising up-and-comers of British chess, William Pollock.

Now if I were to just show the games from this tournament, the post would be quite short and rather lacking in content. Thus, let's set the stage a little bit by going back a year.

In 1865, Dublin hosted a chess congress for the first time (coverage linked above); by 1885, that remained the only time Ireland had hosted a chess event of any importance. The Irish #1, James Rynd, sought to change that, and organized a meeting in early 1885 with at least a hundred of the most prominent Irish players. This lead to more meetings, and by Easter of that year, a whole Irish Chess Association was born (again). Their first congress would be held in October of that year.

Now, despite being born in Cheltenham and living in Bath, Pollock had good reasons for participating in this congress: not only was there Irish blood on his mother's side, but Pollock had studied medicine in Dublin earlier in the decade. He was also a member of the Dublin Chess Club during his studies, so this tournament was an excellent opportunity to measure his growth against the talent of his old stomping grounds.

The main tournament, which we'll naturally be focusing on, featured six entrants: Pollock, Rynd, and four others. As the games will show, the overall quality isn't very high, with Pollock repeatedly gaining an advantage with a single tactical strike.

I have my doubts about the rounds, but they do seem to make some sense with the dates, so I leave them as-is. Regardless of the actual order, the British Chess Magazine confirmed that Pollock scored a perfect 5/5 in the first half of the tournament, while Rynd managed "only" 3.5/5. However, the start of the second half saw Pollock's lead nearly evaporate with a single game:

Rynd did what he had to do and won every game thereafter, matching Pollock's 5/5 performance from the first half. However, Pollock also won all of his remaining games, keeping their half point gap constant.

Thus Pollock won his first tournament outside of the Counties' Chess Association, Rynd upheld his position as the strongest native Irishman, and overall the ICA held a very successful congress. The members of its governing body wanted this congress to be an annual affair, and thus plans were made to hold a sequel next Autumn, in the city of Belfast.

1886 was a bit of a tumultuous year for Ireland, with Belfast in particular being affected quite seriously. A controversial bill introduced in the British Parliament lead to riots occurring in Belfast throughout the summer and into September (Wikipedia), with the ICA ultimately beginning its congress on September 20. Luckily, the riots had mostly died down in July, and no incidents were reported that affected the congress. In addition, the congress had attracted two more players of master strength: Joseph Blackburne and Amos Burn, the two most successful players of the year (excepting Steinitz, I suppose).

Few games survived, and I give the two which I would like to focus very little on. The first is business as usual for Pollock, while the second features a very interesting endgame that Pollock really shouldn't have won (until he should have, and did, as it so often goes).

The two games of the highest importance were both preserved as well, and what would my content be if I didn't do a little bit of a deeper dive into them?

vs. Joseph Blackburne

Blackburne's serious trouncing at Pollock's hand during the BCA congress earlier in the year brought their lifetime score to 2-1 in favour of Mr. Black Death. I don't know if you can really call this game revenge-worthy, but I'm sure the youngster would appreciate being able to even out his score against the English titan.

Although Blackburne atoned for one of his most chronic sins by playing 1... e5, he committed another by declining Pollock's Evans Gambit. Like in London, Pollock went for a less-popular continuation, forcing Blackburne's Knight to the sideline. While opportunities presented themselves for Blackburne to free his poor steed, he decided to forego them in exchange for starting an attack on the Kingside. This strategy had merit, as most of Blackburne's strategies tend to do, but the concept was very precarious.

While going through this game, one thing I couldn't figure out is why Blackburne refused to fully commit to the attack by breaking with f5 on moves 17-20. All he accomplished was effecting some exchanges on the Kingside, all of which freed Pollock's game and enabled him to even castle in that direction. Soon Blackburne lost a pawn, and ultimately his King was the one that got attacked, all the while his dumb donkey sat on the other edge of the world helplessly. This is Blackburne's wake-up call to stop playing cringey openings, I reckon.

vs. Amos Burn

Burn had toppled Pollock in both of their tournament games earlier in this year, so the dynamic here was much more cut-and-dry than with Blackburne. Pollock had quite the uphill battle in front of him if he wanted to bridge the apparent gap between him and Burn.

This game showed Pollock's capability of doing research, as he opened with the same nine moves that Burn's opponents in two formal matches had played against him earlier in the year. He deviated at move 10 with a move order shuffle, and it paid dividends as Burn's 12th move allowed for a brilliant tactical stroke. Pollock found the move (which is featured on the thumbnail) and the resulting attack earned him endless praise from contemporary commentators, and culminated in one of the best final games my blog has ever seen. Burn just did not get attacked like this, almost ever.

This post was a little more disjointed than usual, but hopefully the trivia contained within is sufficient compensation. The next post is going to be incredibly long (~30 games) so don't expect anything for a while. Hopefully it'll be worth the wait.