[Event "Petah Tiqwa"]
[Site "Petah Tiqwa"]
[Date "1997.11.24"]
[Round "2"]
[White "Eyal, Ido"]
[Black "Tsesarsky, Ilya"]
[Result "0-1"]
[ECO "B48"]
[WhiteElo "2095"]
[BlackElo "2445"]
[PlyCount "62"]
[EventDate "1997.11.??"]
[EventType "swiss"]
[EventRounds "9"]
[EventCountry "ISR"]
[Source "ChessBase"]
[SourceDate "1998.01.31"]

1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Nxd4 Qc7 5. Nc3 e6 6. Be3 a6 7. Bd3 Nf6 8. O-O Bd6 9. h3 Bh2+ 10. Kh1 Bf4 11. Qd2 Bxe3 12. Qxe3 Qb6 13. Nf5 Qxe3 14. Nxe3 b5 15. a4 b4 16. Ne2 Ke7 17. a5 d6 18. Nc4 Nd7 19. f4 Bb7 20. Ng1 Nc5 21. Nb6 Rab8 22. Nf3 b3 23. e5 dxe5 24. Nxe5 Nb4 25. Na4 Nxa4 26. Rxa4 Nxc2 27. Bxc2 bxc2 28. Rc4 Rhc8 29. Rc1 Rxc4 30. Nxc4 Be4 31. Kg1 Rb4 0-1

Oops. I'd say you understand the thread of this game better than I did (or still do, in fact);

<If you had one more development tempo you'd be killing him.

For example, after 18.Rxe5 Bd6 19.Re6 skewers his bishops. Unfortunately, white has 19...Rfe8 when the threat to your back rank forces you to exchange rooks. Even then, though, white looks good after 20.Rxe8+ Rxe8 21.Be3 Bb8 >

All correct until 20...Rxe8; Blood Sucker QC preferred whipping it off with the knight. I'd seen this position when I played 14.dxc6, and so whacked out 21.Be3 pretty quickly. The smog has cleared e'er so slightly and the board now looks like this:

click for larger view

We needed a 2.5-1.5 victory to take the league. It was at this moment, however, that I looked to my left and saw that our board 4 - who earlier in the evening had slid to an easily winning position - had just lost about ninety pawns in three moves and was forced to resign. Panic! I probably can't just sit back and draw the bastard; I'll have to find a win somehow. Such direct action didn't sit comfortably with my new-found Taoist mindset. Then, five minutes later, our board 1 conceded a very fine draw to that Grand Old Man of British chess with merely half a face left but with still reassuringly leftist leanings, Bob Wade. Unfortunately board 2 was looking incredibly insipid too, and was I starting to get a tad fed up. All other games had finished by this point, so I was surrounded by a medium-sized crowd consisting mostly of bankers sweating foully.

21...Bc7 22.Bxa7 Rd8 23.b4 (directionless ad-lib, moi?) Nd6 24.Bd5+ Kh8 25.Bc5 Nxb7 26.Bxb7 Bxb7 (back rank mate threats ahoy!) 27.Bd4 Kg8 28.Re1 Kf7

To my horror I suddenly realised I had thirty seconds to make the time control at move 30. My hand hovered, then hovered some more, high above the board; the quintessential gibbering wreck. I'm eyeing the special malt whiskey that the league treasurer has brought in to mark the end of the season. My hand is still hovering a long way over the a-pawn. At which point Herr Scumbag bats it out of thin air, complaining that he 'can't see the whole board'. Despite the whole league watching, I can't help myself:

'Will you piss off? (then, leaning in closer, whispering) If you touch my hand again, I'll smash your @#$%ing face in.'

TBC...

'You'll go where you want to go
You'll say what you mean'
-Guided By Voices, 'It Is Divine'

I was never going to smash his @#$%ing face in, of course. I am but a 5'10" dweeb with a glass jaw and no muscles in sight and as such I couldn't hurt a fly, even if I really wanted to. But there's backstory here.

In the second game of the league season our venerable captain and board 2 was playing on in a losing rook and pawn endgame. There was no life whatsoever in his position. And then, as if by chance, the shopkeeper appeared - a sneaky and unlikely little mating web presented itself which, although obvious, gave serious counterplay. It wasn't obvious to said opponent, however, and the Cap'n played the mate with all the speed and flourish that Curt Henig gave to his snap suplexes. He extended his hand, all the time mumbling apologetically. Matey was having none of it, however, shooing his hand away (a theme, eh) with a refrain of 'I don't want that!'. He's not been since. It was only about fifteen minutes later that a disinterested spectator walked past the board, glanced at the final position, and remarked, quite correctly: 'that's not actually mate, is it?'

By league match no. 5 Big Fat Unpleasant Lawyer QC (also prez of the league leaders) is threatening to 'sue' over this one incident. No joke. It goes without saying that he's playing our board 2, Chess Blind Willie McTell. Once more our spiritual (?!) leader finds himself in a veritable cul-de-sac of a rook and pawn endgame. But Gormless @#$% QC - a notoriously weak time manager - is making a pig's ear of things. With no more than three minutes to go he forgets to press his clock not once, but twice. Both times our chap had the decency to take a normal amount of time and then feign the pressing of the clock. The third time around, however, he wasn't so generous, and seeing that our favourite wanker had 90 seconds left, he proceeded to act angsty and indecisiveness-t until the very second when the flag fell. Another ill-deserved point gained! Huzzah!

According to some sources he said "yobbo" but my original research has established that the word was "khuligan".

'and was I starting to get a tad fed up'

Oh, you know what I meant.

'indecisiveness-t'

Oh, I give up.

I've just had longer to brood, and haven't played 5000 other games in the meantime. Plus, the odds are in my favour: I lost a lot of games like that in the 1980s, while somehow clinging onto a rating of 1999.

Upstick job asswise = I resign

'and was I starting to get a tad fed up' = Upfed start tadwise?

Incidentally, I'm ashamed to admit I may have been partly responsible for reintroducing 'tad' to the English language. I nicked it from Doonesbury: it had never gone away in fey East Coast Murrican. But I started using it over here, and ... it caught on.

No wonder this place is called Frogspawn with all those tads on my excuse for a conscience.

I did my 5.30am Wednesday start-up today, a patent method of cramming a week's 'work' into a calendar day. Hence slightly knackered by now. And 'loggorrhea-ing' out ...

"I don't want love, I don't want forgiveness, all I want is outta here ..."

I'm not one of these Korchnoi types who has to hate the other guy. Most of the time I feel reasonably benign towards 'em, which is probably why I can never say no to a draw if pitched in the right manner.

So my habit with an unpressed clock is as follows. First, have a 'free' ten-minute think, whether needed or not. Maybe extend to 15 or 20 mins, if I need to catch up on the clock. Then glance over, look startled, catch opponent's eye, and hit the clock myself, shrugging a vague apology for not having noticed before.

But - if I'd managed to pass a law exam without studying (it's a cinch in English or Philosophy, but I'm told Law is different) then *I* might be one of those 40-something lawyers who are the bane of your chessic existence.

Although the [hobbies: heroin, chess, planning political assassinations, limeraiku, poker, scrabble] section of my CV would have put off possible employers.

And I'd *never* have been one of the fat ones.

Still, perhaps we should try to hold kinder, gentler thoughts about the lawyers of the world. There but for the grace of quantum randomness...

No!

Right, let's wrap this up. This is rather turning into a Chekhov play: a contrived and disproportionately lengthy telling of a short unhappy episode in the life of a tosser. Don't worry, I don't kill myself at the end.

Where were we? Ah yes, odd piece sac, boards 1 & 4 dropping off, Bob Wade (happy birthday!), long explanatory flashback in order to make it more Hollywood-friendly... right, more moves:

29.a4 Bd6 30.f4 Bxb4?? (time control) 31.Rb1 Rc6

It goes without saying that I did not accept the draw offer that accompanied this move. Bloody cheek! If you like a nice clean finish, look away now. What follows is an abject lesson in not playing endgames. My only excuse is that I had very little time indeed and that we don't play with such things as increments.

32.Rxb4 Ra8 33.Rb6 Bxa4 34.Rb7+ Ke6 35.Rxg7 h5 36.Rg6+Kd5 37.Rg5 Ke4 38.Rxh5 Bb5 39.Rh7 Ra1+ 40.Kg2 Ra2+ 43.Bf2 Bc6 44.Rc7 Ba8 45.Rd7 (heh) Ra4 46.Kh3 Kf3 47.Bd4 Ra6 (an unusual number of mating nets in this ending, eh) 48.Rh7 Bd5 49.Kh4 Kg2 50.Kg5 Ra8 51.Rh4 Rg8+ 52.Kh5 Rg4 53.Rxg4 Bf3 54.Kg5 Bxg4 55.h4 Kxg3 56.h5 Bxh5

No self-respecting chess player should fail to win this as white. Good job I'm not a self-respecting chess player, I suppose. Terrified by the thirty seconds left on my clock and depressed by the fact that our board 3 had just drawn (thereby removing any chance we had of winning the league), I whipped off the pawn rather than the bishop, shuffled around for a few more moves, and spat out a draw offer. Damp squib, eh. Thankfully, there was plenty of that malt left.

Did Paxman [sic] do his Big Fat Speech yet? Isn't the actual 10-year LGF anniversary around now. LGF: Bob 'Oskins, innit.

I found a game last night - Kasparov in one of his Deep Blue matches - where Gazza as white had put six of his pawns on the 3rd rank by move 12 or so. A reversed hippo? An Oppih?

Oh Nellie- it takes me so long to digest any chess-related material and you guys move so fast--

Mainly, Thank you SO much for spending so much time and thought on the Game I posted. I did play through and consider all of your suggestions, as well as those of others who so generously lent a hand.

Ok good luck on your Club game, and congrats to <mack> for his triumph.

As a Canadian who is shamefully ignorant about <Suttles>, I thought of both of you guys when I recently played through the <suttles-fischer> game in the 1970 Interzonal.

It was an Unsuttling Experience too.

1.Nf3 Nf6
2.g3 Nc6!

Fiendish! If he'd played 1...Nc6 I'd have sprung the Munster Attack, 2.a3 -- but now 3.a3 would be a bit silly. So it's a choice, apparently, between a Chigorin QGD and an English... maybe.

3.d4 d6

Another surprise. I expected ...d5. Now I'd normally play c4 and go for a King's Indian, Fianchetto Var - but I'm not too fond of those Panno-type lines where Black plays ...Nc6 and White ends up playing d5 and closing the whole thing up. So...

4.Bg2 g6
5.Nc3 Bg7
6.e4 0-0
7.0-0

Reaching a familiar position in the Pirc -- which I've played before, but as Black. I'm starting to see the point of playing both sides of an opening (thanks, <Deffi>!) -- you get a better all-round understanding and you don't become too attached to your favourite variation.

The usual move now is 7...Bg4 or 7...e5. But Black played the somewhat dubious

7 ... Nd7

And I started thinking I was Tal. What can I sac?

I'll post the rest of this stuff tomorrow. I'm not saying I succeeded in emulating Tal - far from it - but there was an unusual degree of Talness in my thought processes nonetheless. If only I could calculate mates ...

PS. There's some guy over in your gaff claiming you're a *girl*.

click for larger view

Well, 25.Bc5 does look rather pointless in this position... (it would have been strong had Black played 24...Kf8 rather than Kh8). Instead, 25.Re1! aiming for e7 should be winning. For example:

25...Bxb7 26.Bxb7 Nxb7 27.Re7.

25...Nxb7 26.b5.

25...Bb8 26.Bxb8 Rxb8 27.Re6.

25...Ne4 26.c4 Bb8 27.Bxb8 Rxb8 28.c5! and Black is crushed, e.g. 28... Bxb7 29.Bxb7 Rxb7 30.c6 Rxb4 31.c7 Rc4 32.Rd1; or 28...Nf6 29.b5! Bxb5 30.Bg2 Ne4 31.Rxe4! fxe4 32.Bxe4 and next Black would have to give up the bishop on c6.

Another possibility after 26.c4 in this line is 26...Nf6 27.b5 Bxb5 28.cxb5 Nxd5 29.Rd1 or 29.Rc1 with the idea of a4, Rxc7 and b8Q.

click for larger view

Nice sturdy old-fashioned pawn centre, eh? I'm not really sure how to handle such things, but at least I have a fianchetto on g2 for psychological comfort. <mack> may instinctively prefer the Black side, but note the general lack of Hippo-style pawn advances. My plan here is to ensure that the Black queenside remains undeveloped, while trying to open up the centre and kingside.

8.Be3 e5
9.Qd2

I do *not* want to play anything involving d4-d5. I'd rather just give the d-pawn away, in fact ...

9 ... f5
10.exf5 Rxf5

Hmm. I'd have thought ...gxf5 more consistent: Black's already inconvencienced by the fact that his Bc8 can't get out.

11.Nh4

The engines don't like this much, and squirm at what follows, but I've already decided to sac the d-pawn.

11 ... Rf8
12.Bh6!? Nxd4
13.Bxg7 Kxg7
14.f4 Nf5

An alternative idea, possibly better, is 14...c6 -- keeping white pieces out of d5, maintaining the N on d4 to cover d6, and aiming for ...d5 at some point.

15.Nxf5+ Rxf5

Fritz evaluates this as equal. For my pawn, I've got some initiative, a black kingside full of weaknesses, and an undeveloped black queenside. The trick now is to keep that initiative at all costs.

16.Rae1 exf4
17.Nd5!

I'm giving myself a '!' because I still think it's a nice move -- even after Fritz points out the line 17.Bh3!? Re5 18.Bxd7 Qxd7 19.Qxf4 Qf5 20.Rxe5 Qxf4 21.Re7+ Kf8 22.Rxh7 Qxf1+ 23.Kxf1 with advantage.

17 ... Re5?

This is a mistake. I should actually win the game right now, but I contrive to make it a long drawn-out process. There are now two excellent continuations for white:

(a) 18.Qc3 fxg3 19.Nxc7 gxh2+ 20.Kh1 Rb8? (or 20...Kg8 21.Nxa8) 21.Ne6+ winning

(b) 18.gxf4 Rxe1 19.Rxe1 Nf6 20.Qc3 Kf7 21.Nxf6 Qxf6 22.Bd5+ Be6 (King moves get mated) 23.Qxc7+ winning

But I picked a 3rd move:

18.Qxf4?

Now 18...Rf5 would leave White with just a slight advantage. Luckily, he blundered right back at me.

18 ... Qg8?
19.Nxc7 Rb8
20.Qd4

With a huge advantage. Still, there was something even better: 20.Rxe5 dxe5 21.Qg5! forces mate - Bd5 with Rf7+ or Ne6+ being the main line. And if 20.Rxe5 Nxe5 then 21.Qf6+ Kh6 22.Bd5 is murderous.

20 ... Qxa2

Well, why not grab something? Here I became entranced by the sheer number of options. 21.Bd5 sends the black queen offside, 21.b3 locks it out, 21.Ra1 sends it back to g8 ... not to mention the ever-available 21.Rxe5 and even 21.Ne8+

So I had a long time-wasting think, in this position. White to play.

click for larger view

What did I do?

Here's the line I missed. I got worried about the sheer number of pieces en prise after ...Qa5, not seeing that it didn't matter because I had a forced mate, to wit:

21.Bd5 Qa5

Losing by force: Black has to give up his queen to postpone mate.

Here's how it should have gone:

22.Rf7+ Kh8
23.Rxe5 dxe5

[or 23...Qa1+ 24.Re1+ when white doesn't even have to take the queen, but just carries on mating with 24...Ne5 25.Rf8+ Kg7 26.Rg8+ Kf6 27.Qh4+ Kf5 28.Qf4#]

24.Rf8+! Kg7

[24 ... Nxf8 25.Qxe5#]

25.Ne6+ Kh6
26.Qh4#

Of course, there's another line to be found after 22.Rf7+ Kh6, but 23.Qf4+ leads to mate.

So much for the one that got away.

The 2nd-best move for White is probably our old pal 21.Rxe5, with the same sort of ideas - Bd5 and Ne6+ - to follow. I didn't play that either.

Once I'd frightened myself away from the winning 21.Bd5! I got rather taken by the idea of sending the Black Queen back to whence it came, and preserving my rook (why, for gawd's sake?) into the bargain. So I played (back to the actual game now):

21.Ra1 Qg8

Fritz still evaluates this as something like +11.6 in White's favour, so it's safe to assume I'm still winning. Once again, 22.Bd5 is the winning idea here. Instead I thought I had time to grab a pawn - that idiotic old get-material-back reflex - and I made a cretinous move that let Black right back into it.

22.Qxd6+?

That blasted knight on d7 is preventing black from developing his queenside, but it's also holding the whole thing together -- guarding both rooks, covering key squares like f8 and f6 and e5 and c5. I should've paid more attention to c5.

22 ... Qc4!

Ouch. With a great big threat of exchanging queens with a check on c5, and squirming into an ending where I might not have enough to win. I'd overlooked this idea when I played Qxd6, and I now had another long think -- having already used up too much time not finding the mate with Bd5. Eventually I produced

23.b4!

Which is actually quite strong, and puts an end to the queen exchange nonsense. I felt reasonably sure I could handle the other aspect of black's counterplay, viz, putting his Queen and Rook on my 2nd rank and trying to mate me.

23 ... Re2
24.Bd5!?

Better late than never, I suppose. The problem is Black can check on d4 and then play ...Qe5, and the queen exchange theme returns.

24 ... Qd4+
25.Kh1 Qd2?

Phew. He's trying to mate me after all. But I can hit him first.

26.Rf7+ Kh6
27.g4! Rg2?!

I now used up most of my remaining time deciding on the next move and trying to calculate all the way to mate ...

28.Rxh7+ Kxh7
29.Qe7+ Kh6
30.Qh4+ Kg7
31.Ne6+ Kg8

I'd foreseen all this - but neither on move 28 or now could I find the rest of it, which is a forced mate in six. This is the position:

click for larger view

I'll continue with the (anti-)climax in a while. If you want some weekend exercise, find a mate in 6 without consulting machinery. I was on the right track, but I just didn't have the time so I chickened out.

I chickened out with the obvious 32.Bxg2, of course. It was useful to have the rook sitting there throughout the previous 'combination', knowing I could change direction and grab it at any point. But if he'd played a different move instead of 27...Rg2, I might have been forced to find the mate. And it's actually a bit tricky.

Once again, here's what I didn't find:

32.Qd8+ Kf7
33.Rf1+! Rf2
34.Rxf2+ Qxf2
35.Nf4+ Kg7
36.Qe7+ Kh6
37.g5#

The key is the (apparently pointless, not to mention risky-looking) 33.Rf1+, which decoys the queen from the e-file. I'd looked at other discovered checks like Nd4+ and Nf4+ (to protect the Bd5) but neither of these is good enough without the Rf1+ motif.

Back to reality-land. The game actually finished with these moves at high speed. Not one of <mack>'s 20-second specials, but I was down to 2 or 3 minutes for the rest of the game, and I didn't want to have to play any sort of ending. Apart from those with an extra queen, maybe.

The finale (from the last diagram, once more...:

32.Bxg2 Nb6
33.Ng5 Qd7
34.Rf1 Qg7

[there are some nice alternatives after 34.Re1 with the idea of the sac 35.Re8+ followed by Queen and minor piece penetration ... but I needed simple stuff by this stage ...]

35.Qg3 Ra8
36.Qb3+ Kh8
37.Rf7 Qa1+
38.Bf1

1-0

This time it really *is* mate in a couple of moves, and even I could see that ...

Incidentally, my opponent here was rated about 400 Elo points below me, so I don't get any kudos for winning. And apart from that ...Qg8 and a couple of missed chances, he didn't play badly.

The spirit to be Tal-like is there all right ... but the flesh, oy, the flesh ...