Pawn Breakthrough in the Sveshnikov Sicilian

Bluff in chess - refuting opponent’s opening play

When your opponent is playing the opening of a chess game almost without thinking, it is hard to imagine that he is making severe blunders and that his play should be refuted. Most likely everything had been checked on a computer and has been played before either by him, or by other players in the database. But here is an example where my opponent “was just playing too fast”. I think after playing 2 games a day for 4 days in a row, he simply did not want to spend too long on this last round game.

Jiganchine – McLaren, BC Championship, 2008

White to move. Find the most promising continuation.s

Black has been playing very fast so far in this tournament game, and even though I was pleased with having a centralized knight on e4, I did not look too far for a tactical refutation as well. Yet after 17. Nd6! Qc7 (I was incorrectly concerned about 17… e4, but that is just wasting time since the knight wants to come to g5 anyway) 18. Nfg5 Nd8 Qe1!? – Black’s position has too many weaknesses, and White is going to win at least a pawn – Black can’t guard the e5 pawn, while also trying to cover up f7. Black’s pieces are also too passive to provide any real compensation for it.

Black to move. White is practically winning

Instead I wanted to keep a positional advantage and blockade on e4, and lost all of my advantage after 17 Nfg5? Nxe4 18. Nxe4 f3! with unclear position. The game ended well for me, but this was definitely a mistake on my part early out of the opening. Had my opponent been making his moves a bit slower, I would actually try to play more aggressively. Instead, I wanted to play solid moves and just blockade e4,which gave me nothing special. So in that sense, his “bluff” actually worked quite well for him! I go over the entire game in this video.

Piece sacrifice against French defence

Black delays castling, and that backfires as his pieces are not ready to deal with White's attack. Against pawn advances on the flanks - White responds with attack in the center. Diagrams with the key moments of this game in my blog entry.

Attack in Taimanov Sicilian - video

The video captures the analysis of one of my better games from BC Closed 2008.

Opposite Coloured Bishops – part 12

(14) Moore Harry - Herder D
1994 BC Closed (6), 1994

How are the opposite coloured bishop endgames affected when also one pair of rooks is on the board? A very important idea is that the stronger side can sacrifice the exchange in order to break through the blockade. This is very logical, as by giving up a rook for a bishop, we eliminate the drawish factor of the position - opposite colour bishops. 33...Bd5 White is suffering from weakness of light squares around his king, with potential back rank problems. This, in addition to Black's extra pawn is more than decisive. 34.exf6 Kxf6 35.a3 a4 36.h3 [36.Rc1 ! ? 36...Bc4 37.f3 -1.22 37...b5 38.Ba5 Rc6 39.Rd1 Be2] 36...Rc2 37.Bb4 h5 38.Ba5 Kf5 39.Bb4 Rb2 Diagram

40.Re3? Of course, it was necessary to prevent Rxb4. Then Black would have to transfer his king to b3 or a2, with the idea of still sacrificing the exchange on a3. The complex of weak light squares on the kingside would make it very hard for the White king or rook to prevent this invasion. [40.Bd6 ! ? 40...g4 -1.22 (40...Be4 ? 41.g4+; 40...Kf6 ? 41.Be5+) ] 40...g4 41.h4 Rb1+ Diagram

! probably White missed this intermediate check. 42.Re1 Rxb4 ! 43.axb4 a3 Diagram

now the pawn gets to a2 44.Kf1 Bc4+ 45.Kg2 a2 46.Rc1 b6 47.Ra1 Bd5+ 48.Kf1 Ke4 49.Ke2 Bc4+ 50.Kd2 Kf3 51.Ke1 [51.Kc3 Bd5 52.Rf1 Ke2] 51...b5 52.Rd1 Diagram

White does not let the black king to 'b2'. Dave Herder opens the 'second front'. 52...e5 53.Ra1 e4! 54.Rc1 Bd3 Threatening Bb1 55.Ra1 Bb1 56.Kf1 e3 Diagram

Very elegant play by the BC master! 0-1

Pawn sacrifice in Closed Sicilian

This position could have occurred in one of my recent online games

  White to move

White sacrificed a pawn (on b2), but has a surprisingly (to me) strong initiative.
14. e5!! dxe5 15. Nc6!! Out of nowhere, White generates dangerous threats! Black king is stuck in the center and his queenside pieces are not developed, so White opens up files and diagonals just on time.

now probably  best is 15... Qc7 and something like this could happen: 16. Bb6 Qd7 17. Nxe5 Qxd1 18. Rfxd1 O-O 19. Bc5 Re8 20. Bd6 Rd8 21.Bxb7 Bxb7 22. Rxb7 Ne4 23. Nxf7 Rdc8 24. Rc1 and and White maintains winning chances.

But what if Black wants to be ‘shown’?

15…dxc6?! 16. Bxc6+ Bd7 17. Bxa8 Qxa8 18. Qd6!

Black to move. Rb8 is a decisive threat. White is winning. 18… Ne4 19. Rb8+ Bc8 20. Qc7 +-

British Columbia Chess Championship 2009

Round robin tournaments are in my opinion more appropriate for improving one’s chess strength, compared to Swiss events or knockouts. In this post I will try to explain why. Round robins tend to have players of more balanced strength, and allow to prepare for your opponents well in advance, resulting in higher quality of games, and fewer accidental opening choices. Here are some lessons learned from a typical round robin tournament among players of average 2200 FIDE strength.

I competed in the 2009 BC Closed Championship last weekend. Thank you, Stephen, for running the tournament again, and providing the crosstable:

Last year I already wrote a summary of my games and tournament overview of 2008 championship. Back then I had 3 wins and 3 losses, only a single draw. This time I took a different path to the same result – 1 win, 1 loss and 5 draws, with a tie for the 3rd place yet again. In itself, regular participation in a tournament like this is definitely essential if I want to maintain and improve my chess level, so I am very glad I took part. Jack Yoos won convincingly, although he was clearly losing at one point in his game against Lucas in round 6, that game could have change the situation quite a bit. Dragoljub Milicevic was included at the last moment, but posted an awesome result. He now agrees to draws a lot more willingly than 10 years ago, but also is being practical about picking up points when opponents give him a chance. Tanraj Sohal showed a lot of potential for his age, I did not realize that he is only 12 years old.

A few personal observations again:

- I had a bit more time to prepare the openings before the tournament, and was more careful about getting enough sleep throughout the tournament. My games were also shorter, so I was not as exhausted as last year. Last year’s preparation was also helpful since 4 of last year’s opponents played again this time, and obviously their opening repertoires have not changed all that much since then. Opening preparation for a tournament like this (opponents are known well in advance) is time consuming and sets the tone for each game. Although I thought I was reasonably well prepared in the opening - my opponents still managed to surprise me by their choice in the opening in nearly every game. Still, except for the games against Jack Yoos and Brian McLaren, I felt sufficiently familiar with the position that arose …

- I am not happy with my time management again. In a couple of games I had a good position in the end, but went for a draw by repetition because I had significantly less time than my opponents. What was worse, in two games I knew all the opening moves quite well, but still spent half an hour or more on those known moves. Roman, if you know the moves – just frigging play them!

- UBC is a pretty nice place! It was a longer daily commute for me than last year, but I still enjoyed the playing site quite a bit.

I also posted the video of my only win – game against Alfred Pechisker, and a nice combination I found analysing my endgame against Howard Wu. Another tactical idea I posted about – was found while preparing for a game against him.

Chess Endgame Tablebases - online

As I was analysing my endgame against Jack Yoos, from the BC Closed Championship 2000, I came across this position below (Black to move).

 
Is it a draw? Or a win for Black? A regular engine thinks it’s –2.00, so that does not help. But I am down to 5 pieces, so this position has been already “fully” pre-analyzed, and as the online chess tablebase server shows – this is a draw! You just paste the FEN for the position into a form on the webpage, and it tells you exactly what’s happening here. A draw in this position means I have to keep looking for other ways for Black to win this endgame. Poking around earlier in the analysis, I see that I can reach an improved version of this position. Obviously – here Black is winning:

Paul Keres Memorial 2009 - overview

Jack Yoos had a great tournament this year, only a month after moving to Vancouver from Montreal. Welcome back, Jack!

Just like I gave an overview of my BC Closed games last October, here are some little notes with quick impressions of my play.

Round 1: LeBlanc – Jiganchine (0-1)

Black to move.

White is a bit better: 16… Rxd6 is not good due to 17. c5 and the knight on d6 is strong.. Since my bishop is also attacked, I decided to move it with a gain of tempo, playing 16… Bg4. White responded with a big blunder – 17.f3??. After Qxd4+, black picks up up two pawns, so the game ended pretty quickly: 17… Qxd4+ 18. Kh1 Bxf3 19. Rad1 Qxd1 20. Qxd1 Bxd1 21. Rxd1 Ne8 0-1

This surely reminded me of my game against Paul from last year’s Keres where after my blunder he had a winning position, but blundered back and lost.

Round 2: Jiganchine – Orlov (1-0)

If you live in BC, Canada then - basically Georgi Orlov is the strongest player you get to regularly see. And after playing in Keres Memorial 6 times – I never actually got to play him – until the 7th tournament. Jack Yoos and Sergei Sokourinski used to have an argument about whether Orlov and Spraggett were of similar strength, and while Jack was convinced (based on his own score against each) that Spraggett is stronger, the very fact of comparison being made speaks volumes.

Black risked a bit more than he should have in the opening, and the ‘star’ move definitely came here, after Black played … c5.

White to move

19. Bc6!

No, this is not me drawing the arrow on the diagram incorrectly - the bishop actually did stop one square short from taking the rook. The rook is not running away (taking it would give Black compensation), instead White totally dominates central squares and increases pressure against c5 pawn with Qd5 coming. After the game Georgi admitted having missed this move. He then had to give a rook for a dark squared bishop, and my light squared bishop live to tell the tale, the game ended after some complications in this position:

White to move

38. Rbf7! and Black resigned since Bf3 mate can’t be prevented without giving up the queen.

After this game – the tournament kind of ended for me – I took a bye, and then still could not play normally since the feeling of having done something special overwhelmed me. This was the first time I played an International Master in my entire life, so to score a win from the first attempt felt quite extraordinary. I realized that Georgi was rusty, and that he comes to Keres Memorial to play risky chess against local amateurs like myself which does mean he loses a game like this once every couple of years, but I still could to get back to my senses (I did try quite hard).

Round 3:  bye (1/2) I was quite exhausted after the previous game, and having been tired before the tournament (this programmer’s been very busy at work recently) – I had planned to take a bye anyway, so this seemed like a good moment for that.

Round 4: Jiganchine – Gentes (1/2-1/2)

24… Qb6

After some manoeuvring by both sides, in this position Kevin offered me a draw, which I accepted. During previous few moves I was mostly focused on keeping positional balance.

Round 5: Pechisker – Jiganchine (1/2 – 1/2)

This was the game that really threw me off balance and probably had to do with my dismal play the next day. Alfred has a style that I find hard to adjust to, so every game against him is usually hard for me. Just like in our last game in the BC Closed, I got a great position out of the opening (Slav defence), but failed to convert.

Black to move

23… Bd5! White has to give up a pawn with 24. e4 just to rescue his tied up pieces.

However a few moves later, the game was somewhere between winning for Black, and a draw and I made a humongous error:

35… a6? allowed 36. Nc5, and suddenly my pawns are weak, pieces are passive, and I am low on time.

That kind of move is hard to explain, but I think, I had planned c6-c5, and was concerned about a5-a6, and Nb3-a5-b7 with counter play. Fortunately this time my desperate measures worked, and in the complications Alfred offered a draw, which I accepted. I was terrified however that I allowed such massive counter play in a technical position.

Round 6: Jiganchine - ChangeHe Li (1/2 – 1/2)

White to move

Another Sicilian Scheveningen, just like in round 4, and again my understanding of position was lacking.
In my quick preparation the morning before the game I had anticipated something similar (an early e4-e5 break), but did not look deep enough.
Here apparently 12.Bxb7 Qxb7 13.Qh5! scores around 90%. I instead played 12. Bf4 and after 12…Nc6 took the knight and offered a draw. I was uncomfortable playing a young improving player, but also getting increasingly worried that I misplayed something (which was kind of true). I also wanted to get some rest before the final round (but had I known that after a draw I would get to play Jack, I would have re-considered).

Round 7: Yoos – Jiganchine (1–0)

I had not lost to Jack Yoos since 1999, but I still remembered the feeling of getting blown off the board before the opening was over. I really wanted to avoid that, so instead of my main opening as Black – I played the line in the Caro-Kann, which I believed to be passive but solid.
Jack played very energetically and still had a very dangerous initiative:

Black to move

Being tired from defending for the last couple of hours - I missed the most obvious threat created by 19.Nc2 – which is Bxc4, and knight has to keep guarding d7, so White gets his pawn back with great position. Trying to get Nh6 into the game - I played 19…f7-f6? (instead Rd8 was better) and after 20.exf6 gxf6 21.Bxc4! and Rhe1 – I made a few more blunders and lost fairly soon (but things were really going downhill at that point). I was very impressed by the way Jack treated this opening variation (and wished I had put up a better resistance).

Online chess – clearing diagonal for a bishop

Here is a quick snapshot from one of the games I played today:

DDT3000 - deadly-viper, ICC, 3 0, 2009

1. e4 b5 2. d4 a6 3. Bd3 Bb7 4. Nf3 d6 5. O-O Nd7 6. a4 c6 7. Re1 b4 8. c4 a5
9. Nbd2 g6 10. b3 e6 11. Bb2 Bg7 12. Qc2 Ne7 13. Nf1 O-O 14. Ng3 h6 15. Rad1
Rc8 16. h4 h5 17. Ng5 Nf6 18. Qe2 Qc7 19. Bb1 e5 20. dxe5 dxe5

 White to move

21. c5! It may seem that the pawn could become weak on c5, but it is much more important to hit the weak spot on f7. Rfd8 22.Bd3 Rd7 23. Bc4 Rcd8 24. Bxf7+

Kh8 25. Be6 Rxd1 26. Rxd1 Bc8 27. Nf7+ Kh7 28.Nxd8 Bxe6 29. Nxe6 Qb8 30. Nxg7 Kxg7 31. Qc4 Neg8 32. Qe6 Qb7 33. Bxe5 Qa6 34.Rd7+ Kh6 35. Bxf6 Black resigns 1-0

About a year ago in a slow game I missed a similar, but less obvious opportunity:

Jiganchine – Trotchanovich, 2008:

White to move

32. a5! was the best way to continue the attack, since when the black king would try to escape from the kingside – Ba4 would come with decisive effect. I had found this example fairly interesting and even made a youtube video about it.

This also reminded me of an episode from one of my other games that was played even a longer time ago:
Seid – Jiganchine, 2001, BC Closed 2001

Black to move

32… c4! Now Black's pieces can be activated through the c5 square. 33. Bg2 Qc7 34. Ne4
Nd7 35. Bd4 Nc5 36. Bxc5 Bxc5 37. Nxc5 Qxc5 38. Bf1 Bd3 39. Bxd3 Rxd3
This position is an easy technical win for Black. A passed pawn, active pieces and an exposed White king make it almost impossible not to win this endgame.40. Ke2 Rd4 41. Qc3 Qd5 42. Rf3 Rd1 43. Qc2 Rh1 44. Rf2 Qd4 45. Kf3 Rd1 46. Re2
Rd3+ 47. Kg2 c3 48. Kf1 Rd1+ 49. Kg2 Rd2 After the exchanges on d2 the king is too far to stop the pawn 0-1

BC Chess Championship 2008 - quick overview

Stephen Wright has kindly posted the full games over here, so below is a quick overview of my games, in their critical moments. As you can see, I started with two good wins, but was then struggling to score a win until the last round, which did help me to 'save face'.

Round 1. Jiganchine - MacKay (1:0)

After 16... Kxe7 (variation)

White got a great attacking position in the Sicilian (which happens to me quite rarely), and Black had to give up a piece just to not get mated. Here is one of the "sacrificial" attacks:

17. Rxe5+!! dxe5 18. Bc5+ Kf6 (18... Ke8 19. Qd6) 19.Qf3+ Kg5 20. Be3+ Kh4 21. Qg4#

Given the strength of my opponent in this game (an FM who was once a member of the Scotch national team) - this was probably one of my best games ever.

Round 2. Davies - Jiganchine (0-1)

After 23. Bc4

I stopped liking the 'dynamics' of the game - White was about to play Ne3, and neither d5 nor f5 would be possible for me. So it seemed like I must try to break up White's bind on light squares and open up some files to expose his king.

So I came up with the pawn break that in the end worked out to my advantage

23... d5! 24. exd5 f5! The pressure on the f and b files was soon to much for white to bear, and after Nf5-d6xc4, the b3 pawn fell, and then the White king got under a mating attack. Perhaps this was my most satisfying game with the Sveshnikov so far.

 

Round 3. Jiganchine - Patterson (0-1)

After 35... f4

In in an unclear position I made a couple of aggressive moves, but my opponent discovered a hole in my plot. While I though my queen was putting pressure on Black king and pawns, it turns out that Bd8 is about to win my queen, and h3 is about to threaten checkmate. 36. Nd4 was an interesting suggestion from the computer (with the idea of after exd4 playing Re1, Re6 and going for the perpetual), I played 36.f3 (so that I can play Qg4 after Bd8) and after 36... h3 my king soon got burned (although there were a couple of chances to make things complicated along the way).

Round 4. Berry - Jiganchine (1/2:1/2)

After 10. e4 Bh7

Jonathan's move order in the opening allowed me to get the bishop to f5, so not being to happy about his position, he played 11. cxd5 and offered a draw. I accepted since getting a bit more rest before the evening game seemed like a good thing.

Round 5. Jiganchine - Wu (0:1)

The most important event in this game happened outside the board - the clock was setup "with delay" instead of "with increment", so in a complex endgame I made several crucial decisions in a bit of a panic, as my time appeared to be running away quite fast. That was of course my own fault - I should have paid more attention to how time was getting incremented before it got too late.

After 33... Nb6

34. Kf3 was still enough to keep the game balanced. Instead I overlooked the fact that Black can play ... f3 himself. Several moves later I was hopelessly tied up:

34. R5a3?! f3+! 35. Kd3 Rxa3 36. bxa3?! Re8 Now even if there is a draw, I played a few more "natural" moves and lost.

Round 6. Pechisker - Jiganchine (1:0)

After 14.Be2?

Apparently 14... Nxe5 15. Bxe5 Bf5+ 16. e4 Rxe5 was winning quite easily. White cannot take on e5 or on f5 because then a piece on either d2 or e2 falls with grave consequences. I was already very short on time, so I simplified into what turned out to be a difficult endgame with

14...Bxd2? 15. Nxd2 Rxd2+?  16.Kxd2 Nb3+ 17. Kc3 Nxa1 18. Rxa1 and soon lost. Perhaps that was my most frustrating loss in this tournament.

 

Round 7. Jiganchine - McLaren (1:0)

After 24. Nd6

It may seem that the position is unclear because of Black's advanced pawns and two bishops, but actually Whites' pressure on the queenside is more important. White won the b7 pawn, and soon - the game.

British Columbia Chess Championship 2008

Last weekend Stephen Wright directed the main round robin tournament of the year in our province - "the BC Closed". Jonathan Berry had a great run and won the first place with 5.5/7. This year I was both invited, and actually able to accept. I already posted an extensive collection of fragments from the 2001 championship - the last one in which I had competed. I also played in 2000. My play in each championship was probably characteristic of my chess strength and weaknesses at the time:

2000: 2.5/9 (-4=5)

2001: 6.5/9 (+5=3-1)

2008: 3.5/7 (+3-3=1)

In 2000 it was the first time I played in a stronger round robin, so I was unable to see a way to find advantage in any game at all. Opponents were not making the blunders I had been used to from playing U2000 rated guys, so I was not sure what to do about it (having fairly passive openings did not help either). In 2001 I was in a good shape, there were a couple of less strong players (who helped by playing a risky opening as black against me), so I collected all the points I could at the time, and then maybe a bit more when Jonathan Berry tried to win a drawn position so that he could catch up with Milicevic.

This year I was not in a terribly good shape. I want give a more detailed self-analysis of each game, but here are some general notes on what went well, and what did not

-my opening preparation was sufficient for this tournament - in two games my opponents knew more theory about the opening; in one game - I did, but overall each position I got out of the opening was playable, and in 2 cases it was plain better, borderline winning. In a way though, the opening preparation came at a high price - the night and morning before each game I was trying to prepare major opening systems that I had never played before. By the time I was playing the second game of the day, I was regularly having strong headache, and that was not helping. A more important conclusion is that I am more happy now about where my repertoir is going, since the 3 wins I did score - mostly came out of complex middlegames in the lines that are pretty important to my current repertoir.

- My tactical vision was reasonable, although I did miss a simple tactical shot against Alfred, and ended up losing the game.

- There was several complex endgames, and that's pretty much where I lost all 3 of my games. The fundamental problem however was not the endgame understanding, but awful time management. Going into endgames and feeling pretty optimistic, I was spending lots of time trying to find better continuations, failing, and going for simple options which were turning out to be inferior.

The conclusion is not very surprising - I need to be able to play faster, and to do that - I need to make progress in all parts of my game so that the same moves take less effort.

Fullbrook - Milicevic, BC Closed 2001

Replay Game

Nigel Fullbrook - Dragoljub Milicevic

BC Closed/Vancouver (9.4) 2001

40. Kd2 Black's advantage (space + 2 bishops) is obvious and yet it is not quite clear how to exploit it. 40... Ng4! A beautiful strategic piece sacrifice! 41. fxg4 forced 41... hxg4 42. Rh1 g3

43. Nd3 Bg4 It is interesting that even Fritz immediately evaluates this position in Black's favour 44. Ne1 f4-f3 was a threat 44... Rh5 g5 is threatened and it is not clear how White can untie his pieces 45. Nb2? Be3# By winning this game Dragoljub Milicevic also won the title, his 3rd in the last 5 years. However, in 1997 and in 2000 he had to share it with M. Fuentebella and J. Berry. This is his first clear victory. Congratulations! 0-1 [Roman Jiganchine]