Clive Cubitt 1951-2025

[David Rowson]

I am very sorry to report that Clive Cubitt passed away on 29 January this year. Clive was British Under-18 Champion in 1969 (with 9/11, a point ahead of Miles and Nunn), Hampshire Champion in 1970-71 and came 4th equal in the British Championship of 1977. I worked with Clive at Bellerbys College in SE London for several years. As a chess player, it was a pleasure to have a colleague who was not only very strong but also passionate about the game and always ready to discuss and share his insights. At the time he was not playing competitively, but he continued to study the game and I remember that he was especially excited when a young Russian who had enrolled on one of our summer schools turned out to be a very talented player. That Russian was Daniel Yuffa, now domiciled in Spain and currently, as I write this, among the leaders at the European Individual Championships.

Clive had recently returned to competitive chess, coming second equal at the Great Yarmouth (his hometown) Open in 2022 and showing that he was still a force to be reckoned with. Clive was appreciated by all his work colleagues, chess players and non-players alike, for his tremendous enthusiasm, kindness and integrity. I feel that if he hadn’t had so many other passions (bridge, to name just one) he would have had even greater success at chess.

[Paul Habershon]

I am very sorry to report that Clive Cubitt passed away on 29 January this year. Clive was British Under-18 Champion in 1969 (with 9/11, a point ahead of Miles and Nunn)

I was at Rhyl and think Clive started with 9/9 but I may be wrong. The nearest detail I can find is
https://www.saund.co.uk/britbase/pgn/19 ... iewer.html

Still called the British Boys' Championship in those days.

[John Saunders]

I was at Rhyl and think Clive started with 9/9 but I may be wrong.

Possibly correct but the bulletin only records the fact that he won his first eight games and I've yet to find evidence of a ninth straight win.

I've updated the page to record this fact (and link back to this thread):

https://www.saund.org.uk/britbase/pgn/1 ... r.html#u18

I was present myself in Rhyl in 1969, playing in the Under-16 Championship, and Clive Cubitt's performance made an impression on me at the time. He left players of the calibre of John Nunn and Tony Miles in his wake. Thereafter he only played sporadically and I could only muster 27 game scores when I had a look for his games.

[Roger de Coverly]

Possibly correct but the bulletin only records the fact that he won his first eight games and I've yet to find evidence of a ninth straight win.

According to my filled in cross table, he drew in round 9, lost in round 10 and drew in round 11.

[Kevin Thurlow]

Some familiar names there. In fairness to John Nunn, he was only 14 then. Awesome performance by CC nonetheless.

[John Clarke]

I think it's worth noting Clive's important role in the rapid early development of his schoolfellow and future IM Robert Bellin. Together they headed a formidable Great Yarmouth Grammar team which one year reached the last four in the Sunday Times knockout competition (and a couple of years before that were certainly too good for our own side, the only time we ever won our zone). Just as Ray Keene had John Sugden spurring him on at Dulwich College, so Robert had Clive as a necessary talented rival.

Clive's opening repertoire was eclectic, if not outright eccentric in those early days. I remember seeing a couple of his games (possibly from that Rhyl event) published in Chess. Both featured the Polish or some closely related system, and B H Wood peppered the b4 moves with ?! each time.

[John Saunders]

Here's a link to a PGN file of Clive Cubitt's games. Just 27 of them but that's all I have on file - a tiny number for such a strong player but as I mentioned earlier in the thread, he only played sporadically and rarely in high-profile events.

https://www.saund.org.uk/britbase/pgn/cubitt.pgn

Perhaps forum members can find a few more.

[GrahamStuart]

Here's a link to a PGN file of Clive Cubitt's games. Just 27 of them but that's all I have on file - a tiny number for such a strong player but as I mentioned earlier in the thread, he only played sporadically and rarely in high-profile events.

https://www.saund.org.uk/britbase/pgn/cubitt.pgn

Perhaps forum members can find a few more.

I wrote about Clive's 1971 Hampshire Individual Championship win on the Hampshire Chess History website. This had several strong juniors who were at Southampton University at this time, as well as local players. Although Clive won the tournament, the only game of his from the event was his loss to Gerald Bennett which I could not see in John's file. I doubt the final position was the end of the game, as although better, Black was not winning.

https://hampshirechesshistory.co.uk/ham ... ship-1971/

[Event "Hampshire Championship 1970 71"] [Site "Southampton"] [Date "1970.11.??"] [Round "?"] [White "Cubitt, Clive"] [Black "Bennett, Gerald H"] [Result "0-1"] [ECO "D02"] [WhiteElo "196"] [BlackElo "197"] [PlyCount "100"] [GameId "2160027266720882"] [EventDate "1946.11.10"] [EventCountry "ENG"] [SourceTitle "Hampshire Bulletin no 17"] [SourceDate "1971.01.01"] [SourceVersion "1"] [SourceVersionDate "1971.01.31"] [SourceQuality "1"] 1. Nf3 g6 2. g3 Bg7 3. d4 d5 4. Bg2 Nf6 5. O-O O-O 6. Nc3 c6 7. Bg5 Nbd7 8. Qc1 Ne4 9. Nxe4 dxe4 10. Nd2 h6 11. Be3 f5 12. Nb3 Kh7 13. f3 exf3 14. exf3 Nf6 15. c4 a5 16. a4 Be6 17. Nc5 Qc8 18. Re1 Bg8 19. Qc2 Nd7 20. Nd3 Re8 21. f4 Qc7 22. Rad1 Rad8 23. b3 Nf6 24. h3 b5 25. cxb5 Nd5 26. Ne5 Bxe5 27. fxe5 cxb5 28. Qxc7 Nxc7 29. axb5 Bxb3 30. Ra1 a4 31. Bc6 Rg8 32. b6 Nd5 33. Bxa4 Bxa4 34. Rxa4 Nxb6 35. Ra7 Nd5 36. Bc1 Kg7 37. Ba3 Ra8 38. Bc5 Rxa7 39. Bxa7 Ra8 40. Bc5 Ra2 41. Rf1 Kf7 42. Rf2 Ra1+ 43. Kg2 Rd1 44. Ra2 Ne3+ 45. Kf2 Nd5 46. Ra3 Rd2+ 47. Kg1 Ke6 48. Ra6+ Kf7 49. Ra3 Rb2 50. Kh1 Rc2 0-1
Sunil Weeramantry was kind enough to supply some background on the players at Southampton University and did state that Clive was their top player.

We had a very active chess club at the University and we competed regularly in the Southampton, Bournemouth and Hampshire Leagues. Our top player was Clive Cubitt, followed by myself and Tony (AJ) Stebbings. I also travelled up to London on a regular basis to play for Waltham Forest in the London League.

Sunil Weeramantry – February 2022

[Nick Ivell]

My only memory of Clive is of him playing in the top event at a British I attended; Brighton 1977 maybe.

The way he outshone Miles and Nunn shows he could have been a titled player, had he put the time and effort in.

I had always thought of Great Yarmouth as a chess backwater; this thread has already shown how wrong I was. For some reason I assumed Bellin (who briefly coached me, remotely) was from the home counties.

[Christopher Kreuzer]

Thank you for the recollections, Nick.

Could I ask roughly when Bellin coached you "remotely"?

I am assuming this would have been before computers, or was it in the early days of computers?

How did that work? Were stacks of envelopes and "homework" exchanged, or did it involve telephone calls as well?

Apologies if I have the era completely wrong, and this was via computers!!

[Nick Ivell]

Long before computers. It was very brief, in 1976 I think. I sent him games and he posted a cassette back with his thoughts - it was the early days of cassette players.

It soon withered on the vine. Not sure how it came about; Leonard Barden may know more.

[Nick Ivell]

I do recall Bellin saying on one of his tapes that he wasn't in it for the money, so I assume he did not get paid much!

[Christopher Kreuzer]

Thank you. It would be interesting to try and capture still-existing memories of that period before computers.

[Nick Ivell]

My guess is that little of note happened that was not face to face. Recording a tape must have been an incredible faff; certainly, Bellin soon gave up.

[Kevin Thurlow]

"Long before computers. It was very brief, in 1976 I think. I sent him games and he posted a cassette back with his thoughts - it was the early days of cassette players.

It soon withered on the vine. Not sure how it came about; Leonard Barden may know more."

Mike Basman did organize coaching like that. I started with Tony Miles as cassette-recording coach, but then he got too busy, so I moved on to John Nunn. Being able to move the pieces whilst a voice explained what was going on (instead of just reading words) was helpful. John's voice stating, "Well, Kevin, you may be interested to know that your move here is a theoretical novelty. Unfortunately, it is not a good one!" got my attention.