| Aug-03-12 | | fisayo123: Nice Chinese dragon from Jones!! Brilliancy indeed. Inspired play. |
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Aug-03-12
 | | profK: 13.h5 doesn't look the best. I'd also want to keep the White KB. The c4 exchange by white opens up the Q-side for instant attack. |
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| Aug-03-12 | | Everett: I just had a strange experience: I've played many openings over the years, and when I started out I would often get into Dragon-type positions, and it simply made sense to play Bd7, Rb8, a Knight move and ..b5. To my novice mind, if one couldn't play ..d5, then try to get in ..b5. It's good to see that some of my ideas are not completely crap... |
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Aug-04-12
 | | YouRang: Subtle errors (which I see with computer help):
After <20...Rc8>
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White plays <21.Nd5>, which after <21...Nxd5 22.exd5> leaves the backward Pc2 under attack by the rook AND opens the diagonal allowing ...Bf5 to put even more pressure on Pc2. Better was the simple 21.Kb2. After <23.e5>
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White plays <24.Ne2>, again opening the attack on Pc2. In fact, it allows black to win with the immediate 24...Rxc2+! 25.Kxc2 Qa2+ 26.Kc3 Bf5! (threats: ...Qc2+ and ...Rc7+) 27.Qd8+ Rf8 28.Rd2 Qa3 29.Qc7 Rc8 (pins Q)  . Better was 24.Nc6! blocking the c-file. After <25.Rb7>
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White plays <26.Ra1>, just pushing the Q where it wants to go: 26...Qc5 putting pressure on Pc2, and black has unstoppable tactics. Only hope was to defend with 27.Qe3. Of course, tactics are much easier to see with the computer. |
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Aug-04-12
 | | Eyal: <YouRang: Better was <24.Nc6!> blocking the c-file.> As well as leading to the weakening of e6, interestingly: 
click for larger viewNow after 24...Bxc6 (otherwise White is better after 24...Qc7/c5 25.Rh4! with the idea Rc4) White can force a draw by 25.Rxh7! Kxh7 26.Rh1+ Kg7 27.Qh6+ Kf6 28.Qh4+ Kg7 29.Qh6+ etc. or 25...Rxh7 26.Qxg6+ Kh8 (26...Rg7? <27.Qe6+> [made possible by the bishop being diverted from d7]) 27.Qf6+ Kg8 28.Qg6+ etc. Note that an immediate 24.Rxh7:
click for larger viewloses to 24...Qc3+! (24...Rxh7 25.Nc6! and it’s a draw again) 25.Kb1/Ka2 Rxh7 26.Qxg6+ Rg7. But yeah, this is all rather computerish tactics... |
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Aug-05-12
 | | HeMateMe: Holy smokes, what a squeeze! Great game. |
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Sep-04-12
 | | Phony Benoni: When it comes to puns, there's no accounting for taste. |
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| Sep-04-12 | | backyard pawn: Does it look like Black has to be careful at the end -- White can draw by repetition with Qe7+. |
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Sep-04-12
 | | Once: I used to play alongside David's brother, Andrew Ledger. A very strong player who could fashion a vicious attack out of seemingly harmless openings like the caro kann and closed sicilian. Well, when I say "play alongside" he was on top board for my work team and I was way way down the food chain around board six or seven. Good game for GOTD. We have the traditional sicilian imbalance of castling on opposite wings with white attacking on the kingside and black attacking on the queenside. Where did white go wrong? Playing through the game in human mode it's hard to see a glaring mistake. I wasn't sure that white had the time to play 20. Qg5. I would have preferred to build the pressure with a move like g4 instead. These sicilians are often a race to see whose attack can get in fastest. Fritzie doesn't agree with me. He sees nothing wrong with 20. Qg5. He points the finger (if computers have fingers?) at <Yourang's> 21. Nd5 but more substantially at the natural looking 26. Ra1 
click for larger viewWhich of us wouldn't play a move like that OTB? But the eval drops from a little under equality (-0.45) to worse than -4. Instead, Fritzie says that 26. Qe3 was essential to shore up the defences. A sparkling finish to the game. I particularly enjoyed 29....Bxc2. It looks as if the c2 square is adequately defended, but the follow-up rook sac 30...Rxb3+ wins through tactics by threatening mate. Very good GOTD between two strong players. Unlike some GOTDs recently, it doesn't rely on a massive mistake by one of the players. The biggest game-changing move - according to Fritz - was 26. Ra1, but it was far from obvious that this was a mistake. |
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Sep-04-12
 | | Abdel Irada: A bonny counterattack by Gawain. Mordred would be most gratified. |
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Sep-04-12
 | | scormus: <Once> Nice discussion. Like you I was struggling to put my finger on where W went wrong and also thought it was earlier. In fact I felt the sequence starting 15 hxg6 was all a bit slow and also hand-showing - W cant possibly force through a quick attack with the BR on f8 and able to go to f7. I thought 16 Bh6 would then be better since ... Bh8 is not an option. Be interesting to run that by my Si friend. In any case a great game by Gawain. I like the way he gets his dragon spitting fire so quickly. The move pair ... Rb8 and ... b5 looks like a good strategy. And a devastating finish, all the guns firing in sync. |
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| Sep-04-12 | | kelu: Does the sacrifice really sounds ? What would you play (without silicon)after 30. Rd3? |
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| Sep-04-12 | | newzild: <kelu> 30. Rd3 Qb5
By the way, in the final position 35. Red2 loses to 35...Rxc2! |
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| Sep-04-12 | | LoveThatJoker: <Once> I'm sending you this note to say that Chess is a magnificent endeavour. When a decisive game is played between two humans, a mistake is bound to be found. I'm not replying to your post because you are <Once>, I'm replying to your post because it is just natural to find mistakes in decisive games. And great games are no exception. Just because the victor's opposition played an inferior move in Botvinnik vs Capablanca, 1938, or Karpov vs Kasparov, 1985, or Kasparov vs Topalov, 1999, or Kramnik vs Anand, 2008, doesn't mean that these games are not great. These games are brilliant actually! And kudos to the victor for playing as well as he did; as well as the bested legends for attempting as much resistance as they possibly could. Your friend in Chess,
LTJ |
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| Sep-04-12 | | MATTYMONKEES: It's good to see that even really accomplished players fall into the trap sometimes of leaving their Queen too isolated to be effective. Here, Black cleverly baits White into moving his Queen far from the center of the board, then proceeds to use his own Queen to decimate with impunity. |
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Sep-04-12
| | Once: <scormus> In many ways the position reminded me of the so-called "150 attack" against the pirc/modern complex. White castles queenside and then lines up Qd2-Be3 with the intention of playing Bh6. Meanwhile he pushes his h pawn (being prepared to sacrifice it if necessary) to open the h file for the benefit of the Rh1. Sure, moves like Rf8-Rf7 can be annoying in this kind of position, but you just keep chucking prawns and pieces at the black king. And if you lose a few prawns you just tell yourself that they are line opening sacrifices for the benefit of the black rooks. The problem is that it is a relatively crude attacking plan. Gawain does exactly the right thing - defends and then gets his attack in first. But I would have loved to have been a fly on the wall at the post-match analysis! |
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Sep-04-12
 | | kevin86: The rooks and queen buffalo white's king. |
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| Sep-04-12 | | zinomaniac: newzild: By the way, in the final position 35. Red2 loses to 35...Rxc2! 35...Rxc2 Qe7+ perpetual |
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| Sep-04-12 | | ptr: A better pun would have been: Sir Gawain and the Pinned Knight. |
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Sep-04-12
 | | gawain: A wonderful attacking game by my Avatar's accidental namesake. (I had to say something about this one, didn't I?) |
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Sep-04-12
 | | Tiggler: <YouRang>: <After <25.Rb7> White plays <26.Ra1>, just pushing the Q where it wants to go > <Once>'s Frizie also <points the finger> here. I don't know that that is where the Q wanted to go, but when white pushed it, he might have seen where it would go and that his reply would be Rc1. Since the Q was not actually threatening anything on the a-file, the white R might have gone to c1 a move earlier. Then also 28. g4 , after a zwichenzug pushed the B somewhere. Where? Into the rightly acclaimed sacrifice on c2. Oh - and that zwischenzug (I spelled it differently this time so that one of them is right, the second probably) drove the white Q out of play. No one here yet commented about the ending position. I had to look at it quite a while to see why white resigned. |
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| Sep-05-12 | | newzild: <zinomaniac: newzild: By the way, in the final position 35. Red2 loses to 35...Rxc2! 35...Rxc2 Qe7+ perpetual>
Ooops. You're quite right. Correct is 35...Qf1+ 36. Qe1 Rxc1+ 37. Rxc1 Rxc1+ 38. Kxc1 Qxe1+ |
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sac: 29...Bxc2