Friday 9 November 2007

I'm such a putz!

Originally this post was going to be about good and bad positions, and a good combination might not be enough to get you out of a bad position. I even had a game as an example from earlier this week when I set up what I thought was a clever combination, but still ended up with an average position (which I then lost).
When I looked over the game concerned I realised it wasn't my position that was at fault it was the fact that I simply miscalculated my combination and simply missed a good win. In my defence I was short of time, but this is a lesson in itself, as the position reached in the game was still good for me, but I had spent so much time calculating my moves I wasn't able to defend it with less than 60 seconds on the clock.

Guo,E - Press,S [D00]
ANU Spring Rapid, 07.11.2007

1.d4 d5 2.e3 Nf6 3.Bd3 Nc6 4.c3 e5 5.f4 exf4 6.exf4 Bg4 7.Nf3 Qe7+ 8.Kf2 0-0-0 9.Re1 Ne4+ 10.Kg1 f5 11.Nbd2 Qd6 12.Qa4 Kb8 13.Ne5 Nxe5 14.fxe5 Qg6 15.c4 Here was where I went for the big think. I spent a great deal of time working out whether capturing on c4 was good, especially after the queen recaptures. I planned to sac the rook on d4 and then either win the queen or force smothered mate. 15...dxc4 16.Qxc4 (D)
16. ... Rxd4 17.Qc2
[ 17.Qxd4 Bc5 was what I'd planned but White can play 18.Rxe4 Bxd4+ 19.Rxd4 with RBNvQ] 17...Rxd3 18.Qxd3 Qb6+?? But here is my mistake [ 18...Bc5+ I simply failed to look at this move closely enough. 19.Kf1 Ng3+!! is the winning move, but I doubt I would have found it with the time I had remaining. 20.hxg3 Qh6 21.Re3 Bxe3 22.Ke1-+] 19.Re3 [ When calculating at move 15 I thought that White would play 19.Qe3 when 19...Bc5 just wins.;
19.Kh1 was the other move I saw, which allows me to end the game with 19...Nf2+ 20.Kg1 Nh3+ 21.Kh1 Qg1+ 22.Rxg1 Nf2#] 19...Bc5 20.Nc4 Bxe3+ 21.Bxe3 Qe6 and although I have a slight edge in the position I only had 50 seconds on the clock (with a 10 second increment per move), and my opponent kept pressuring me until I got mated and lost on time at the same moment! 1-0

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