It is with great regret and sadness that the club has learnt of the death of Brian O'Mullane. He passed away peacefully on June 15 in the Blackrock Clinic where he had been receiving medical treatment.
​Brian was an esteemed member of Dublin Chess Club for over 50 years having joined in 1967. He was a keen league player, a stalwart supporter of the club and will be sadly missed by us all.
Our deepest sympathies go out to his wife Kaye and family including his son Ross our fellow club member.

Club member Patrick Spillane has been organising monthly "Themed Club Nights" which aim to provide a talk on an opening or other chess theme followed by a discussion and over the board try-outs of the ideas presented. Patrick ran the first one on Feb. 7 which examined the English Attack version of the Sicilian Najdorf opening.
Daniel Marhofer presented the second one on March 7 on the Sicilian Dragon. 
Stanley Yin covered his own opening (yet to named but the Dublin Opening has been suggested) on March 28.
Daniel Otero explored end game strategy on April 25 including hand-outs of end-game problems to be solved.
These special evenings have proven popular with members and the next one will take place in the club on May 30 starting at 7.00 PM - the theme will be about the Benko Gambit. This is an aggressive response by black to White's D4 opening, involving a positional pawn sacrifice which gives Black a very strong and swift initiative on the queen side; It was a favourite of Mikhail Tal, infamous for his deadly attacking style.

Following a great campaign in the O'Hanlon Leinster League in which they secured second place, Dublin was promoted to the Ennis Division for next season. A team panel of some 12 players was involved with strong motivation and management provided by Ollie Sinnot the team captain.

A club blitz event was held on Feb. 21. The entry was lower than usual, possibly due to a BEA match falling on the previous evening and the Bunratty event coming on the following weekend. As a result the competitors were not split into sections and instead competed on an "all play all" round robin basis under the watchful eye of Club President Eddie O'Connor who presented a prize to Daniel M Otero the overall winner.

The annual Christmas Dinner was held on November 24th. in the beautiful dining room of the United Arts Club. The club members and guests filled the room to capacity and enjoyed traditional Christmas fare prepared by the Arts Club's expert chef Anthony O'Grady. The highlight of the evening was the presentation of the William Brennan Cup and miniatures to Dublin's winning team, captained by Ollie Sinnott and pictured below.

In other photos taken on the night, Ollie can be seen triumphantly hoisting the very impressive Wm. Brennan trophy and Milton M Luaces displaying his Summer Tournament winner's trophy at his admiring table.

The AGM was held on November 21st. in the club. The main item of business was the election of the committee for the 2017-18 season.
All members of the out-going committee, with the exception of Cormac Reid, had indicated their willingness to go forward again. As no positions were contested, the following officers and committee were proposed, seconded & declared elected:
President: Eddie O’Connor, Hon. Secretary: Rory Broderick, Hon. Treasurer: Ronan Nolan,
Committee members: Martin Schmidt, Joe Durkan, Nezar Ammari and Ross O’Mullane. As this left one vacancy, Daniel Schlachter was proposed by Rory, seconded by Eddie and duly elected to join the committee.

This club blitz attracted a very large entry of 19 players including a visitor from both the USA and Argentina. Mark Collins won the Senior Section with a terrific performance in finishing with a score of 8/9.
​The Junior Section was won by Daniel Schlachter also with a fine score of 6.5/8

The club tournament was run again over the May to Sept. period and attracted 14 entrants. In the Senior Section Daniel M Otero and Milton M Luaces both finished the round robin on 4.5/6 and had to play a tie-break which Milton won.
​Davide Cesaro was a clear winner in the Junior Section with a fine score of 6/6. Ollie Sinnott was the runner-up on 4.5/6.
The winners were presented with their trophies at the Christmas Dinner and are pictured receiving their prizes from Club President Eddie O'Connor - Davide in the first photo and Milton in the second one one.

The RAC in London, better known as a motorists' organisation, also have a chess club. They sent a six person team to Dublin to compete against DCC on June 18. Their captain was Stephen Meyler who is a former member of DCC and who organised the event in conjunction with Eddie O'Connor who captained the Dublin team. Although beaten 4-2 in the match, RAC have invited Dublin to visit London for a return match in 2018. The photo shows Brian O'Mullane and Colm Egan in deep thought during the battle.

The Dublin Chess Club '1867' Rapid-play on May 20 featured 20 players, will Killian Delaney emerging in first place with a fine score of 5/6.

A key encounter in the early rounds included a time scramble between Colm Daly and Tom O'Gorman which many spectators considered to be a drawn knight v. bishop endgame, but Colm found a winning resource. 

Three players ended up tied for 2nd place after the final round as shown in the table below. The sudden death play-offs lasted for a further six games. Tom O'Gorman defeated Jonathan O'Connor first, but he then lost to David Murray who was in turn defeated by Jonathan to restart the play-off cycle. Jonathan then defeated Tom and drew with David to secure 2nd place as David lost to Tom with a checkmate in the early middle-game.