An exhilarating day of chess was had by the Antonine College Chess Team. We travelled to Kolbe College and things were looking bright; it was gloriously sunny yet refreshingly chilly. During the bus ride, students spoke fervently about their favoured chess strategies and admitted feeling a bit nervous, but they were primed.
Seven rounds were played. Our junior division including Marwan Diab, Thomas Jerjees, Daniel Boulos, Dominic Kadamani, Jamil Choucair, Teresia El Fakhry and Mark Samaan played very strongly. The Intermediate Division including Isaac Hurmiz, Charbel Abboud, George Nasr, Jacob Chalhoub, Mehsen Tasihouri, Anthony Chalhoub, Fadi Kaholee, and Joud Rustom all started off well.
By the fifth round Antonine gained first place in the junior division with a score of 17.
In the sixth round, Marwan Diab demonstrated a feat of concentration and skill playing against his opponent for an arduous 28 minutes, drawing an enormous crowd and finished with a draw! It was exhausting to watch.
In the end Marwan came 7th out of 106 players and Antonine finished 5th out of 16 schools for the junior division.
Our intermediate team came 9th and Isaac Hurmiz came 16th out of 93 players.
The Antonine Chess team played very competitively and did very well to employ the Sicilian move, English openings and Isaac’s strategy to learn unpopular moves to catch opponent off guard. Congratulations TEAM!
- Ms Josie Rovetto and Ms Mikayla Sala