Marijn Otte, 18 years of Utrecht Netherlands, currently studying in Malta, won the Closed Invitation tournament held recently at the premises of the Malta Chess Federation in Sliema. Otte, who was the top seed, scored seven out of eight losing only to John Richards in the round 2.

This chess competition brought together a number of relatively strong players (average rating of 1890) and demonstrated clearly the usefulness of such competitions to the more serious player. The interest was high until the very last round and most of the games were well fought with players showing good preparation.

John Richards played solidly throughout the competition and managed second place with five wins and two draws. His best game was undoubtedly his second round win against Otte. This game vindicated his loss in round one to Stephen Farrugia in a game he should have won or at least drawn. Farrugia, on his part, had a quite tournament scoring three wins and four draws and finishing third. Unfortunately he could not play his last game against Otte and therefore missed the opportunity to try and go to the top of the table in the very last game.

Fourth placed Ayman Ibrahim improved his rating thanks to some well deserved wins and a game he deserved to lose but won instead against Ron Sammut. The latter missed a mate in one when he was two pieces up.

Sam Sacco, George Caruana and Ron Sammut could have done better had they not missed the good opportunities that came their way along the competition. The same can be said of Ivan Attard who lost two end-games that he should have at least drawn.

Anthony Muscat Baron, on his part, had a good tournament and although his current rating is well below that of the rest of the field, still managed to give everyone a good show and deserved better in the end.

Final Classification

1 Otte Marijn 2134 NED 7

2 Richards John 1944 MLT 6

3 Farrugia Stephen 2029 MLT 5

4 Ibrahim Ayman 1879 MLT 4½

5 Sacco Sam 1940 MLT 4

6 Attard Ivan 1837 MLT 3½

7 Sammut Ron 1827 MLT 3

8 Caruana George 1864 MLT 2

9 Muscat Baron Anthony 1564 MLT 1