After 22...Nxe2

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I've planned to organise a friendly consultation team chess game b/n some of the experienced kibitzers on the site.

The date of commencement will be decided after consulting with the members in the roster.

Rules( liable to change ) :

1. Three members on a team.
2. 2 days/move.

Once a total of six members fill the roster, "draw of lots" shall be used to decide the team.

I'm yet to decide on the forums to be used for the game.

I invite you to join the game. I'm sure everyone invovled in the game will enjoy and friendship will blossom among the members.

Roster thus far:

1.Richard Taylor
2.Benzol
3.technicaldraw

Believe it or not, as soon as you played 12...h5 I actually started to consider the possibility that my position was hopeless. I kept playing out little variations where you would just ruthlessly push h4 and hxg3, and they all appeared too strong to meet.

Maybe what was called for was 11.Nbd2, Nb3, and Bb2 to attack the d-pawn, applying the old principle of a 'strike in the center' to counter your flank attack.

We should stick a good computer on it now to see if they give us a clue.

I agree that maybe the plan of Nbd2 and Nb3 followed by Bb2 might have worked, in hindsight it looks so. That black d-pawn certainly looks difficult to hold onto, but of course maybe it could be advanced or sacrificed.

I must thank you tremendously for the incredible amount of sportsmanship you displayed in giving me the link to the games in the position after 8.a3, I don't think I would have played 8...f6 without it. Which brings me onto another point:

8...f6. This move seems to breath life into black's position. Firstly it attacks the annoying pawn at e5, stops a sacrifice for tempo with e6 followd by Ne5 of g5, and also enables the black knight on g8 to join the game in a useful spot, also eyeing the outpost on e4. It does open the h2-b8 diagonal for white's dark squared bishop, but from f4 it seems quite a target, and not as threatening as it looks. Which in turn brings me to another point:

It seems that white's Queenside attack looks good but is very hard to drive home. After a3, b4, Qa4, b5, Qxa7 etc it looks threatening but the knight on b8 is a superb defensive piece, and the square on c5 is now an outpost. If white can advance with c5, then it looks dangerous, but preventing that looks fairly possible. If the bishop is still on g2, then the attack looks strong, but if black can trade it off, which certainly seems likely, then that weapon is gone. Maybe, however, an idea would be to keep the bishop on for such an attack, aiming at b7, with a move responding to ...Bh3 with the crazy looking Bh1 ?

I applaud your play and thanks again. Whenever you feel up for a rematch, let me know. If you don't, then that's fine. Good luck for arguing for this opening on the Chessgames Challenge: Y Shulman vs The World, 2007 , maybe this game could even be used to point out the virtues of the Albin Counter Gambit. I'll post my thoughts on the game, move by move so to speak, in my next kibitz.

Thanks a bunch once more, and all the best! :)

For example, I was tempted to play 19.b6 until I looked at it a little more carefully

19.b6 and now:

19...cxb6? 20.Nf7! well that would be nice, but more realistically

19...hxg3!

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20.bxc7 (Threatening mate seems good, no? Moreover, I don't see any other way to continue White's attack to justify playing 19.b6)

And now Black has an absolutely forced win: 20...Qh3+ 21.Kf3 (only move) Nxg5+ 22.Bxg5 (only move) Rhf8+ 23.Bf4 (23.Ke4?? Qf5#) g2+ 24.Ke4 (only move) Qf5+ 25.Kf3 (only move) Qxf4+ with mate to follow

When I played b5 and forced him to play ...Nb8, I was snickering at first--after all, a knight forced to go back to the 1st rank can't be good, can it? But like Silver points out, that Petrosianesque knight seemed to keep everything in order.