T66 Report of third match game 1

In T66 WorldWideWolves has moved up again from Kasparov Section (Third Division) to Spassky Section (Second Division) and is consequently finding the opposition expectedly harder. We have lost the first and third round matches and skillfully avoided a match loss in the second round, where we had a bye! We are still very much in contention for the final but need four victories from the last four matches to have a chance of making it.

In this situation the first game for the team was played last night by the captain slek playing on board #3.

White: Slek
Black: tseltzer
1. e4 c6 2. d4 d5 3. e5 c5 4. c3 Nc6 5. f4 Qb6 6. Nf3 Bg4  
 It was a great start to the game. Early in the opening following the advance variation of the Caro Kann Defence, slek with white initiated a nice tactical operation on move 7... 

Position after 6...Bg4

7. dxc5 Qxc5 8. b4 Qb6 9. Qxd5 netting him a pawn three moves later. 

Position after grabbing 9.Qxd5!

9... Rd8 10. Qe4 e6 11. Be3 Qc7 12. Bb5 Bf5 13. Qc4 a6 14. Bxc6+ bxc6 15. Nd4 Be4 16. Nxe6  
 

Position after 17.Nxe6 winning his second pawn

16...fxe6


Slek was in his element playing in his spectacular style and with aggressive opening moves he managed to win two pawns and reach a position where the counterplay for his opponent was minimal. He managed further simplifications and won a second pawn on move 17, with a nice intermezzo.

17. Qxe4 Ne7  

At this stage, slek revealed via his ingame live commentary a plan to exchange dark squared bishops in order to avoid difficulties on a key dark-squared diagonal he had weakened earlier, as collateral damage of his plans earlier in the game. 
18. Bc5  It appeared there was a more prudent option in 18.0-0 instead of the 18.Bc5 played in the game. However, this was still not decisive and white still retains an advantage.

18....Nd5 19. Bxf8 Rxf8 20. O-O After the exchange of DSBs at f8 on the 19th turn, it appeared that 20.g3 was a good alternative to 20.0-0. 

20...Qb6+  

Position after 20...Qb6+

21. Kh1 Ne3  At this point black is seeking to lash out desperately being two pawns down and with an awkwardly placed rook. The chief players in this counterstrike were the queen the knight and the queen's rook playing a supporting role. 22. Rg1??  

Decisive mistake 22.Rg1

Despite this energetic counter-attack by black, white could have retained a massive advantage by coolly sacrificing the exchange by playing 22.Na3 in response to  21...Ne3. 


 

This position could have arisen giving white a massive advantage!

If black grabs the rook on f1, white subsequently gets his knight to the dominant d6 square via a3-c4-d6 when black either has to tolerate this oppressive piece or return the exchange for it. If he does not return the exchange his rooks are clumsily placed and pawns are weak and after returning the exchange white would still retain at least one of his two extra pawns. Unfortunately slek failed to judge this correctly and made the weak move Rg1 walking into a checkmate which could only be averted by parting with the queen.

22...Nd1 0-1

It was a subtle error and a sudden and unfortunate loss for slek and the team after a rousing beginning to the game. Our opponent tseltzer did well to keep up the pressure in a position where he had dug himself into a hole.

It was a nice try by slek to give the team the lead, but hopefully the three of us still to play our games can win the match for the team.


FLASH NEWS: Alextheseaman won our second game of this round to level the scores. Now matan and me (blore) will play in quick succession to decide the match!

Team Mascot!

This is our team mascot! Woof is our war-cry.....and "ooooooooooooooooooooooo" is our subsidiary war-cry!

Player Profiles

This is the playing style of my teammates and I as perceived by me. Hope you enjoy reading this.



FICS ID: Slek (Real Name: Samuel)
Playing style: He is a highly tactical player who is very resourceful in finding ways to complicate the position and often plays positions where he exchanges a bishop for a knight or even both bishops for both knights. His attacks in irrational positions with pieces hanging everywhere is of a very high standard. Watching his games is nerve-wracking and he packs games with excitement. His weak area is dry endgame positions with limited material or peaceful formations with more material.



FICS ID nraravind (Real Name: Aravind)
Playing style: He plays a variety of openings within a range of his preparation. He frequently plays unexpected moves and is not bogged down by positional prejudices. His greatest forte is practical play and 
he can continue brazenly when he enters awkward positions, where more conventional players lose their nerve. He can attack well as well as play positionally but the striking feature of his play is the practical unprejudiced thinking and he doesn't burden himself with theory or specific techniques. In positions where nothing game changing is happening to either side, he has limitless patience and can just keep the position together playing moves that do not jeopardise the harmony of the formation. His main weakness is in positions that have gone downhill and require dour defence, he tends to prefer a counter-strike which is not the best option in all such situations.

FICS ID: alexmontes (Real Name: Alejandro)
Playing style: He currently plays a small set of openings and is looking to expand his repertoire greatly. He is really thorough with the standard formations that arise from his openings and plays strongly in the middle game. Most often Alejandro's victories come straight out of thin air. It looks like nothing is happening and pieces are being slowly moved into the right places, and then he strikes and it is all over. The end is a quick flurry and powerful, delightful to watch. He is also a good fighter defending and actively seeking counter-chances when faced with difficult positions. He is tactically very strong (complex combinations as against wild dynamic play).



FICS ID: blore (Real Name: Rahul)
Playing style: He relies a lot on learning a mass of opening theory from a wide variety of openings regularly. He plays some openings more frequently than others and these change with time, but he plays most openings, with the exception of some really sharp ones like the king's Gambit. He often uses ideas from one opening in another and improvises. He is good at handling quiet positions with a positional advantage and frequently prefers reducing material with early exchanges. He plays attacks but usually only those which grow slowly and takeoff in the late middle game to early endgame stages. His strongest suit is winning equal and plus endgames and defending minus endgames mostly honed by extensive study of endgame technique from text books. He can spot simple or marginally difficult tactics well. His weakest link is in handling wild positions with an explosion of options and he frequently loses the thread rarely managing to find the right continuation.

Wolf Attack!

We begin with a brilliant attacking game played by Slek in the FICS team-league. The pgn viewer from chessbase doesn't seem to work (see end of article), so I am showing various positions throughout the game.

White: behzadxxx (rating: 2060), Black: Slek (rating: 1904) The game began with some kind of Benoni. Afer 1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 c5 3. d5 e6 4. Nc3 exd5 5. cxd5 d6 6. Nf3 g6, we had the following position.

The next moves were 7. h3 Bg7 8. e3 O-O 9. Be2 Na6 10. O-O Rb8 11. Re1 Bf5 12. Nd2 Re8 13. Bb5 Bd7 14. Bf1 b5 15. a4?! b4!?
The first interesting moment came on the 15th move. White pushed a4 exploiting the pin against Black's knight. Black responded with b4 counterattacking W's knight.

White now played 16. Nb1?, a big mistake following up on the earlier error of not playing a pre-emptive a4. As blore may have said, if an opponent has blundered once, he is likely to do it again.
Black then exchanged off his LSB with an interesting maneuver (17...Bc8!?) and put pressure on White's pawns on d5 and e4. After 16. Ncb1 Nc7 17. e4 Bc8 18. Bd3 Ba6 19. Bxa6 Nxa6, White decided it was time for his second double-blunder, and played 20. Nb3? Nxe4 21. Qd3? setting the stage for Black to show some real fireworks.

Here, Slek played 21...Qh4! and the White King's final countdown begins. After W responded with 22. g3 (22. Be3 was better), B played 22...Nxg3. Since W's rook is en prise, he played 23. Rxe8+ Rxe8 24. fxg3.

Play continued with 24...Qxh3 25. N1d2 c4! 26. Nxc4 Nc5! What is the idea behind Black's last two moves?

After 27. Nxc5, the idea becomes clear with Black's next, brilliant move: 27...Bd4+! If W takes the bishop, then he gets mated with 28... Re1+ and 29... Qf1#.

White tried 28. Be3, but after 28...Qxg3+ 29. Kf1 Qf3+ 30. Kg1 dxc5 31. Re1, once again Black found a killer move.

The move was 31...Re4. Instead of resigning immediately, W played on for 4 more moves, but the result was inevitable. The rest was 32. Qxe4 Qxe4 33. d6 Qg4+ 34. Kf2 Qf4+ 35. Kg2 Bxe3 White resigns.
A great win for Slek and the team. Starting with 21...Qh4, Black unleashed a series of powerful and forcing moves without giving a single chance to White.

The pgn viewer which doesn't work at present.

[Event "FICS rated standard game"] [Site "FICS freechess.org"] [FICSGamesDBGameNo "398842440"] [White "behzadxxx"] [Black "Slek"] [WhiteElo "2060"] [BlackElo "1904"] [WhiteRD "70.3"] [BlackRD "31.5"] [TimeControl "2700+45"] [Date "2016.09.04"] [ECO "A61"] [Result "0-1"] 1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 c5 3. d5 e6 4. Nc3 exd5 5. cxd5 d6 6. Nf3 g6 7. h3 Bg7 8. e3 O-O 9. Be2 Na6 10. O-O Rb8 11. Re1 Bf5 12. Nd2 Re8 13. Bb5 Bd7 14. Bf1 b5 15. a4 b4 16. Ncb1 Nc7 17. e4 Bc8 18. Bd3 Ba6 19. Bxa6 Nxa6 20. Nb3 Nxe4 21. Qd3 Qh4 22. g3 Nxg3 23. Rxe8+ Rxe8 24. fxg3 Qxh3 25. N1d2 c4 26. Nxc4 Nc5 27. Nxc5 Bd4+ 28. Be3 Qxg3+ 29. Kf1 Qf3+ 30. Kg1 dxc5 31. Re1 Re4 32. Qxe4 Qxe4 33. d6 Qg4+ 34. Kf2 Qf4+ 35. Kg2 Bxe3 {White resigns} 0-1