To keep in contention the chasing players had to ensure they won their games. Therefore it was not a surprise that the majority of the top boards were decisive, although the top board was drawn, not without drama though. 

Further down, my game against David Cordner was the last to finish, using all but a few seconds of the permitted time. After having an advantage, David then outplayed me leading up to he first time control.  I managed to hold onto the position though, making David find tough moves. I also started to claw back the time and was very relieved when David offered the draw (as was the controller Pat McEvoy, as he did not have to step in at the last moment). 

This enabled me to watch the Rugby Semi-Final highlights in a much better frame of mind than I would have been if I lost! Much more enjoyable than preparing for the last round!

Due to my mammoth game I did not catch much of the other games in this round. The top board was an interesting game with Michael Yeo building up a large advantage against Tony Corkett. In the position in Diagram One Michael has just played 17.Be7, which allowed Tony the exchange sacrifice 17...Rxf3 which got him back into the game. 

If 17.dxc5 was played instead this would have given Michael a big advantage. A likely continuation is 17.dxc5 Na6 18.Qc2 Rf5 19.Be3 Nxc5 20.Nh4 Ne4+ 21.Kd1± (this position is detailed in Diagram Two). Here the pawn on g6 looks very week and the strong Knight on e4 can easily be moved with f3.

On board two Martin Simons beat Khaled Esmat in fine style, whilst Dominic Tunks outplayed David Cutmore from a level position on board three. These games are worth playing through and I have supplied some annotation to them (just click on the white player's name from the results table to play through the game).

Going into the last round there were four players on four points from five games, Tony Corkett, Michael Yeo, Martin Simons and Dominic Tunks. Tony Corkett had the advantage of knowing that his Sum of Progressive score was the best, so with a further tie after the sixth round he would be Hampshire Champion. 

Going back to my game, both players managed to Queen a pawn (see Diagram One), but David was always going to win my last pawn by force (see Diagram Two), which gave him a fairly advanced pawn in the Queen ending. These endings are difficult for both sides, with Black having to make sure he does not allow White to exchange queens, which is normally by means of Check. White has to stop the constant checks by the Black Queen and ensure that his last pawn is not captured.

Therefore for Black it is best to keep his King away from the White pawn, as these are the situations that normally allow the swapping of the Queens. This goes against most endings where the King needs to get close to the pawn.

As mentioned, I was very pleased to draw this game and I don't think I made any major errors in the quick-play finish. The game is captured up to move 73, but the game was probably about 100 moves in the end. It is certainly the longest game I have played!