I was very sorry to hear of the passing this week of Maurice Coveney. Sincere condolences to his family.
His playing career spanned six decades, and he also contributed heavily in several administrative roles.
He played in four Irish championships—1967, 1971, 1972, and 1977—and also acted as controller in the 1971 event, where he scored 4½/9 for joint 9th place.
“Maurice Coveney, Laskerville, Carrigaline East, has lived all his life in the locality except for ten years he trained at Baldonnell and worked in the aircraft industry overseas. Over a period of 25 years running his own business he employed between 20 and 100 mostly local people” ran a profile, from which the photograph above is taken, in the Southern Star in 2009, when he ran as an independent candidate for Cork County Council.
The first records of his chess career date to the 1962-63 season, when he was stationed at Baldonnel Aerodrome in Dublin (renamed Casement Aerodrome in the mid-1960s). He played for Kevin Barry in the Ennis Shield that season, and also competed in the Irish Correspondence Chess Championship, in a junior section. He moved to Middlesex at the end of 1964, but continued to compete in I.C.C.C. events, winning his section in 1963-64. He returned to Ireland by the end of 1966, and played with Bellevue C.C.
He took a variety of roles in the Cork Chess Association, including Chairman from 1969-71, and served as Cork representative on the ICU. He compiled the first C.C.A. rating list in 1968, in the days when there was no unified ICU rating list, and provincial unions maintained their own lists.
He was Irish Veterans joint champion in 2001, and played in last year’s Sligo Challengers.
Maurice James COVENEY, b. Cork?, 25 July 1939, d. Cork, 4 September 2024.
I knew Maurice for years, indeed I still have the first ever trophy that I won in chess from a tournament that Maurice organised…the Carrigaline school childrens open in 1980 (3rd place) and Maurice was a friend of my dad in the 60’s or early 70’s and was also either a co-worker or he employed my dad? I was just reading about Maurice here today having earlier learned of his sad passing on the ICU web site…I knew Maurice lived in Carrigaline most of his life so I was just curious about where he lived and I typed into google “Laskerville, Carrigaline East” and was amazed to see a headline about an 81 year old born in 1939….my first thoughts…that has to be Maurice….Well I never……..the old devil had a bit more life in him than I thought 🙂
(he replied, “If it happened again I would do it again.” )
….RIP Maurice.
http://www.echolive.ie/corknews/arid-40246208.html
It’s with reaI sorrow that I write these few words after Maurice’s passing.
I first got to know him in the Refinery club in the mid 70s.
It was the post Fischer, Spassky era and a lot of good young players came through the club.
Maurice, a number of years older and with a rating of 1900+ was a mentor, coach and chauffer to many of us at that time.
He organized and ran junior tournaments in Carrigaline for many years.
One of his pupils eventually decided to stick with soccer and Denis lrwin was lost to chess.
I played on Refinery, Carrigaline and indeed Munster teams with him before the Douglas team of the 90s.
A couple of weeks before a Munster League match v Limerick in the mid 90s Maurice underwent a quadruple bypass. I naturally assumed he’d be laid up for a while but was shocked and indeed a bit concerned when he insisted he would be fine to play!
Maurice had a fairly predictable opening repertoire.
With white he’d Play 1 .d4 and followed up with 2.e3 and 3.f4 if allowed. This often led to long games which suited him fine.
On this occasion he played 1e4 and 2d4 and followed up with fast piece development.
By move 25 his opponent had been blown away by a K-side attack leading Philip Short to remark ‘Whatever that procedure Maurice had, the whole team should be booked in for it’!!
ln recent years, despite health issues, he played regularly for the sheer love of the game and is a great example to many of us for that alone..
One of my early memories of Maurice was in the Refinery chess club also… I think I was 13 and had only just joined the club, The Plunkett (Cork ch. that year) was nearing it’s final rounds …rounds were played 1 game a week and in those days they had adjournments…yourself and Maurice had just adjourned your game to be resumed the following week. I was in and out to the adjacent room playing snooker…you had been analising your position for some time maybe 1 hour and Kevin James came in, had a quick look at your position for 2 minutes and says…”Maurice just plays… so and so and game over”…after some further study of the position by yourself you realised the gravity of your situation and said quote…”I’ll ring him (Maurice) up and resign”. KJ said don’t do any such thing…he might not have made that sealed move….a week later when the game resumed…it turned out that Maurice had missed the winning move (like yourself) and proceeded to lose the game…but he was a tough nut to crack…I remember he held Philip Short to a draw a couple of years later in the Mulcahy.
Hi Martin……Just trying to recall that…Was it 1981? I was extremely fortunate to beat Maurice in that years Plunkett.
Thank you Martin and Kevin for your memories