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Saturday 28 September 2019

'O Brave New World'- Thursday's SDCL game against Stockport B

Marple A 3.5: Stockport B 2.5

The first game of the new season and a hard fought match against Stockport B saw us winning narrowly despite being out graded overall by almost 100 rating points.

Every single game was hard fought, close and went to the wire. Especial thanks go our two recent recruits, Jonathan Bennett and Paul Horrocks, who between them scored a decisive 1.5 (and indeed Paul was likely to have gone on to win in the last game to finish, but short of time wisely accepted an offer of a draw that secured us the win).

Let's keep it up for the rest of the season!


Monday 9 September 2019

Lessons to be learned

This game took place last week and following a brief discussion after the match Chris kindly offered to run through it for me.  In fact he did more than that and produced the following annotated game.

This game contains no brilliancies or particularly clever moves and of itself it isn’t particularly interesting – winding down to a draw after an exchange of queens on the 15th move.  But what it might offer is an example of how poor piece placement during the opening moves and a failure to appreciate the pawn structure can hamstring you later on.  As we will see I ended up with a particularly sorry pair of bishops that could offer no support to my other pieces.

My own observation is that I should have played c5 on the14th move to release my white squared bishop with a discovered attack on White’s centre.


Forrest,Brian - Dee,Neil [B06] 
Manchester Summer league vs Bury Marple (1), 29.08.2019
[Chris]

1.e4 d6 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.Nc3 g6 4.h3 Bg7 5.Bc4 0–0 6.a3 [This move by white just seems to waste a tempo!]

6...e5 [If you play c5 here you transpose into a Sicilian Dragon position that looks good for black because the white knight on f3 blocks the usual K-side pawn advance and the pawn on a3 looks like a wasted move. Your e5 blocks your bishop on G7 and in some future situation you might want your e-pawn on e6 to block out his bishop on c4. Of course sometimes "the book" does involve putting a pawn in the way of a fianchettoed bishop, but there needs to be a very good reason for doing so.]

7.d3 c6 [During the opening phase, the biggest priority is to get your minor pieces established on decent squares, secure your king and connect your rooks and deal with pawn structure as all this is underway. Your white square bishop already starts to look like a problem piece. You might consider Re8 then Be3 to exchange it off with his WSB. If meanwhile he puts his knight on d5, you can then play c6 to drive it away without loss of tempo.]

8.0–0 [Another pawn move whilst your Q side pieces remain at home and his WSB will be perfectly happy on a2 Meanwhile b5 has not helped your pawn structure.]

8...b5 9.Ba2 Bb7 [Your WSB has very little future on this square. It would be better on e6 after appropriate preparation. Another placement to have considered earlier on was on a6, supported by your knight. Generally speaking, in opening/middle game positions where there are no tactics going on, the best thing to do is to seek moves that improve piece placement or create outposts for minor pieces to settle on.]

10.Ne2 Nbd7 11.Ng3 d5 12.Nh2 dxe4 [The series of exchanges starting here leave your BSB still imprisoned and your K-side knight with hardly any squares to go to. Meanwhile his pieces have better activity. I quite like the look of d4 followed by a Q-side pawn advance that would give you a big Q-side space advantage and might be hard for him to cope with.]

13.Nxe4 Nxe4 14.dxe4 Nf6 15.Qxd8 Raxd8 16.f3 Rd7 [Doubling rooks at this point looks sensible on the surface but looking more generally, the placement and hence activity of your minor pieces is awful! For example you might think about how to improve your knight - is there a square where it could be more effective? e6 looks pretty good to me and it could go via e8 & c7. If white plays Bg5, you can block with f6 strengthening your e-pawn. Your BSB will probably escape via f8 and perhaps go to c5 supported by then by your knight.]

17.c3 Rfd8 18.Bg5 h6 19.Bh4 g5 20.Bf2 a6 21.h4 Rd2 [Getting a rook on the 7th is always tempting but the real priority is still to activate your minor pieces. White's piece activity means that your rooks won't do any damage on their own and they really are on their own! Your rooks are well placed as they are so Ne8 to get the knight towards a better square looks a lot more constructive to me.]

22.Rab1 Re2 23.hxg5 hxg5 24.Rfe1 Rdd2 [This results in terrible placement of your rook after the exchanges. You needed to play RxR so as to keep your remaining rook active on the open d file.]

25.Rxe2 Rxe2 [The exchanges on the 7th have put you in a very awkward situation! You want to play Rd2 but then Be3 happens and you lose your g pawn.]

26.Ng4 [Looks like a blunder by white as it wrecks his K-side pawn structure.]

26...Nxg4 27.fxg4 Kf8 [Bc8 was much better. It starts to activate your bishop, attacks g4 and covers d7 which is a square you don't want white to occupy with his rook. I think after your move a draw is a fair outcome.]

28.Rd1 Ke7 29.Bc5+ Ke8 30.Rf1 f6 31.Be6 Rd2 32.b4 Rd8 33.Bf5 Kf7

½–½

Friday 6 September 2019

Tuesday night's game against Worsley

The Marple team was under extra pressure when Glen told us we needed to score one and a half points to avoid relegation in the South East Lancs Summer League, especially as we were having to default on bottom board. On board 1, Glen reached a drawn position fairly quickly against a strong player but we were heavily outgraded on all the other boards so the situation looked a bit gloomy.

I had black on Board 2 against Mike Connor (147) but managed to get the necessary win (we lost on all the other boards).

When I manage to win a game, it rarely involves a middle game checkmate so this game was pretty unusual for me. I think the mating pattern was rather nice (Mike actually resigned when it was mate in one). Here is the game...


1.d4 d5 2.c4 Nf6 3.g3 c6 [The Catalan. A bit similar to The English that I like to play with white. I have hardly ever faced this with black though.]

4.Bg2 Bf5 [I decided to get the QB outside the pawn chain afer some thought. It proved a good decision as things developed and is the most popular move in Chessbase.]

5.Nf3 e6 6.0–0 Be7 7.Nc3 Nbd7 8.Nd2 0–0 9.Re1 [After this I kept checking to see that white cannot advance his pawns so as to trap one of my minor pieces.]

9...Re8 10.cxd5 exd5 [Keep the pawn on c6 to oppose white's bishop.]

11.f3 Qb6 [The pawn on d4 is undefended and this move draws away one of the white knights covering what is looking like a very important e4 square.]

12.Nb3 Bb4 [This bishop can't cover e4 so I thought it would be good to exchange it for a knight that can.]

13.a3 Bxc3 14.bxc3 Nf8 [Re-routing to e6 as I don't want him to post a knight on c5 where it covers e4 etc.]

15.Nc5 Ne6 16.Be3 [I was surprised by this move. e4 is better.]

16...Qc7 [Fritz prefers 15. .. Nxc5 17. dxc5 Qb3, but I correctly anticipated the next few moves and liked the look of RQR tripled on the e-file.]

17.Nxe6 Rxe6 18.Bf2 Rae8 19.Ra2 Qe7 20.e3 Nd7 [I spent a long time on this move. I really liked my position but couldn't see how to improve - I sort of wanted white to move again to show his hand. I eventually decided that this knight would stand well on c4 if I can get it there.]

21.c4 Nb6 22.cxd5 Nxd5 [At first sight, e4 looks devastating but I had seen well in advance that Nc3 would fork Q & R.]

23.Qb3 [Played after a very long think and not the best. In fact e4 with loss of the exchange was the best move, though I would be doing pretty well then of course.]

23...Nxe3 24.Rb2 [Bxe3 is better but I should still have a winning endgame.]

24...Nxg2 25.Rxe6 Bxe6 [This is the killer move which I think my opponent must have missed. It gives me the tempo I need to protect the knight. The white king is trapped in a rather attractive mating net.]

26.Qa4 Bh3 27.Qxa7 Ne1 28.Qxb7 Nxf3+ 29.Kh1 Qe1+ [Mate on the next turn!]

0–1