Round 6: Primates beat Kingfischers57 & make the Playoffs

You could almost say Primates “backed” into the playoffs. This division has been incredibly tough every round, and the top three teams have had the same score (or within a half point of each other) since the first round. Even the fourth ranked team, XXXXX, won as many games as the second placed team. Little wonder then that the Primates would have to win the round to assure qualifying for the playoffs. If the Primates drew our final match, then we would require some assistance in the form of the other match drawing 2 – 2 in order to qualify based on better tiebreaks. I started off first, playing the black side of the Ruy Lopez Worrall attack against Eurander. Unfortunately for Eurander (and fortunately for me), I had anticipated the line we would play and I had also played a game that went down an analogous position. As a draw was my initial goal, I was never in real trouble and even took a draw being a pawn up. In retrospect I should have pushed for the win, however, the last thing I wanted to do was blow the position, lose the game and put my team in a hole – especially given the fact that Eurander, rated at 2250, was a solid 200 points higher rated than me.
But then things got ugly as Tom had game #2 and lost against another 2200 rated player, putting us in a 0.5 – 1.5 hole and requiring Darren and The Other Bob to win both their games. Darren was the first to play, winning in convincing style and leaving it up to the Other Bob in the finale, which he did in a tense battle.