What move would you make here ?

st40

Only Chess

06 Oct 15

st40

Joined: 05 Nov 08
Moves: 13417

06 Oct 15

2 edits

I recently moved from NYC to NZ and joined the chess club in the city I'm now living in. The set up in NZ in terms of how club champs and games are played is a bit different to what I'm used to (games are played with a time allowance and then a per move increment rather than a set time for a set number of moves followed by a set amount of time to finish the game). This is my first reasonably serious OTB chess in over 5 years. Anyway, I played in a 5 round club tournament (25 minutes plus 10 seconds per move) to qualify for the club champs. I played the first round of the champs (60 minutes plus 30 seconds per move) yesterday. I'm black against a guy FIDE rated 2235. Here is a position I reached as black with me to move. In my opinion its the crucial position of the game. There are a number of candidate moves for me as black. What would you have played ?

Data Fly

Joined: 18 Feb 10
Moves: 0

06 Oct 15

Originally posted by st40
I recently moved from NYC to NZ and joined the chess club in the city I'm now living in. The set up in NZ in terms of how club champs and games are played is a bit different to what I'm used to (games are played with a time allowance and then a per move increment rather than a set time for a set number of moves followed by a set amount of time to finish the ga ...[text shortened]... ck. What would you have played ?

[fen] 4r1kb/p3p3/2pppnp1/q7/3BP1P1/2N2P2/PrPQ4/R3K2R [/fen]

White is threatening Rxh8+ so I think I'd play Kf7 followed by Rg8 if really necessary, though I'd be looking to play more aggressive moves such as c5 by preference.

Marinkatomb

wotagr8game

tbc

Joined: 18 Feb 04
Moves: 61941

06 Oct 15

..c5, getting the bishop off the long diagonal and unpinning the knight of f6. There must be tactics on c3..

greenpawn34

Joined: 06 May 08
Moves: 43363

06 Oct 15

Interesting.

If Black plays c5 then Rxh8+ looks OK for White. So Black probably has to play e5.

I assume White can still castle, there may be a 0-0-0 in there hitting the b2 Rook
and brining the a1 Rook right into the game.

Any chance we can see the whole game.

st40

Joined: 05 Nov 08
Moves: 13417

06 Oct 15

1 edit

I will post the whole game later, the candidate moves I looked at were :

a) e5
b) c5
c) Bg7
d) Reb8
e) Kf7

yes, white can still castle

st40

Joined: 05 Nov 08
Moves: 13417

06 Oct 15

Here is the full game

1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Nxd4 Nf6 5. Bc4 {leaving his e-pawn hanging, I don't recall seeing this before but assumed it must be a trap so just ignored it} g6 6. Nc3 Bg7 7. Be3 0-0 8. f3 Nc6 9. Nxc6 {unexpected and changes the dynamic of the position} bxc6 10. Qd2 Re8 {He frowned when I played this} 11. Bh6 Bh8 {the point of my previous move and a variation picked up a long time ago from the very good book "Winning with the Dragon", often with the Yugoslav, white's bishop on h6 gets in the way of his attack and keeping the dragon bishop can usually be a very valuable defender as well as attacker} 12. g4 Be6 {I might need f7 for my king once (if?) white breaks through on the kingside, I need to get white's bishop off this diagonal} 13. Bxe6 {in the post mortem, white said he thought this was a mistake and that he should have retreated to b3, if he had I would have chopped it} fxe6 14. h4 Qa5 15. h5 Rb8 {with white not castling I'd like to break through in the center but that looks too slow so with the "hidden" potential of the dragon bishop, my Queen on a5 and his king and queen on the a5-e1 diagonal I try another standard dragon theme, undermine c3} 16. hxg6 hxg6 17. Be3 {white reroutes his bishop and clears lines for perhaps Qh2} Rxb2 {In for a penny, in for a pound} 18. Bd4 {the earlier diagrammed position.  I now thought for a long time, and although I had the 30 second per move increment, I was now in time trouble} c5 {in light of what followed not sure whether or not to give this a ? or a ?!} 19. Rxh8 {I had (fairly briefly) looked at this and thought all white had was a perpetual so given his rating I did not think he would go down this route} Kxh8 20. Qh6 Kg8 21. Qxg6 Kf8 22. Bxf6 exf6 23. Qxf6 Kg8 {when looking at 19. Rxh8 I had got this far and thought white had nothing better than a perpetual} 24. O-O-O {well spotted greenpawn, I now had to have another think, not that I had a lot of time left, in post game analysis I think I missed a shot here, seeing the first move in a variation but not the second and third moves - can anyone see what I think I missed?} Rb7 {after this I'm now pretty much down to the 30 second increment so from here I have to just bash moves out} 25. Rxd6 Rf7 26. Qg5 Rg7 27. Qe5 Qc7 {with this retreat I'm probably admitting defeat} 28. Nd5 {missed this, had seen Nb5 but in my rush to play "something" missed the knight going to d5} exd5 29. Qxe8 Kh7 {with queens still on the board if I can get my queen active, I'm (vainly) hoping for some kind of checking blitz when you never know what might happen} 30. Qh5 Kg8 31. Qd5 Kh7 32. g5 {and I resign}

Data Fly

Joined: 18 Feb 10
Moves: 0

06 Oct 15

Is this the chance that you missed? I've had a good look and I think White is winning anyway, but I might have overlooked something.

st40

Joined: 05 Nov 08
Moves: 13417

06 Oct 15

Hi DF,

was the line we looked at after the game but I guess we were a bit tired !, your line looks forced.

greenpawn34

Joined: 06 May 08
Moves: 43363

07 Oct 15

Good game, e5 instead of c5. The h8 Bishop will moan but at least
it's not allowing the sac and an easier game for White to play.

He's got the perpetual and his moves were not difficult, you on the other
hand are in blunder land and need to play some exact spot on stuff and
at 30 seconds a move it's a major accident waiting to happen.

Out came Qc7 and he played Nd5.

He could have wrapped it up neater. Had a blitz finish just like a few days ago.

st40

Joined: 05 Nov 08
Moves: 13417

07 Oct 15

If I can go back to the original position, rather than e5 I can't (now) see anything wrong with Bg7

(sorry can't get the FEN / PGN combo thing to work)

with a c5 to follow, I believe Qh2 (and/or the h file attack in general) for white is harmless as long as I have the dragon bishop

thoughts ?

Data Fly

Joined: 18 Feb 10
Moves: 0

07 Oct 15

I agree. After 18. ... Bg7, White has nothing. In which case 18. ... c5 deserves two question marks!

FEN	4r1k1/p7/3ppQ2/q1p5/4P1P1/2N2P2/PrP5/R3K3 w Q - 0 1
SETUP	1