Since first joining this site in 2012 I had not often played OTB
and when I did it was against friends who mostly didn't know the "en passant" rule.
I have had the pleasure of meeting friends from the Yorkshire Laikers clan,
we played a few games but these were relaxed and without a clock... I had not lost a single game OTB all these years.
I finally took the plunge and joined a local chess club, who play in the Doncaster League of I think 7 teams.
This past Wednesday was my first game, but was literally the last game of the season,
so perhaps it was unfortunate timing as there'll be no more games for a while.
I played Black against an experienced player, who's around 140 ECF (so I was told).
[Event "?"] [Site "?"] [Date "2017.05.03"] [Round "?"] [White "Him"] [Black "Me"] [Result "1-0"] [WhiteElo ""] [BlackElo ""] [ECO ""] [CurrentPosition "r2q1rk1/1p2bpp1/p2p2b1/4p1Pp/2B1P2P/P1NPpP2/1PP5/R2QK2R b KQ - 1 20"] 1.e4 {Excellent start, I wrote "d4" on the score sheet... didn't notice until around move 11, then changed it} 1... c5 2.Nc3 d6 3.Nf3 Nc6 4.Bb5 a6 5.Bc4 Bg4 {Oh dear, while my opponent was thinking I realised this fell into Bxf7+ stuff, I would have definitely avoided this on RHP} 6.h3 {My opponent knew this was my first game, so perhaps he overlooked this tactic on purpose... I was thankful either way} 6... Bh5 7.g4 Bg6 8.d3 e6 9.a3 Be7 10.h4 h6 11.Bf4 Nd4 {I saw the idea of taking his Knight then winning h4} 12.Bg3 {He defended neatly} 12... Nf6 13.Nxd4 cxd4 {This pawn would later fall, but I felt at the time like I wasn't necessarily worse, my engine agreed with an equal evaluation} 14.Nb1 {Perhaps Ne2 was slightly better, this move made me feel comfortable} 14... h5 {which is perhaps why I was complacent with my Kingside... d5 instead was a good shout} 15.g5 Ng4 {I guess I thought this Knight would be a nuisance} 16.Bf4 e5 17.Bd2 O-O 18.f3 Ne3 19.Bxe3 dxe3 20.Nc3 {sadly for me the Knight comes back to the game, quickly with threats} 20... Bxg5 {for lack of better move I saw this sac led to a mate in two threat, not exactly forced, but I thought "why not? Let's have some fun"} 21.hxg5 Qxg5 22.Ke2 {I think realisation set in here... I could only play for a draw now} 22... Kh8 23.Qg1 Qh6 24.Nd5 f5 25.Nxe3 fxe4 26.dxe4 Bf7 27.Bxf7 Rxf7 28.Qg3 g6 29.Rag1 Kh7 30.Qg5 Qxg5 31.Rxg5 Kh6 32.Rhg1 Rf6 33.Nd5 {Only now I saw the fork} Re6 {I let him play it then resigned, GG} 34.Nc7 *
What do you guys think?
I feel like I can learn from this game.
If I keep playing with clocks and maybe enter a tournament or two, I can soon see real genuine improvement,
far more significant than playing this correspondence rubbish 🙂
Time controls were 60 minutes each, with an extra 15 minutes after move 30 (no increment).
I mostly kept ahead of him on the clock, but perhaps this was not necessarily a good thing considering I lost!
Time pressure is an intrinsic element of OTB play: if you're loosing, complicate and maybe your opponent won't find a refutation in time. This does not work nearly so well in correspondence chess.
