Thursday 1 November 2018

Catastrophe In The Opening

IAKOV Neishtadt compiled Catastrophe In The Opening, which appeared originally in Russian before being published in English by Pergamon Press in 1980.
It highlighted "mistakes … committed in the initial stages of a game … which determine its outcome."
That neatly summarises my game on board two tonight for Battersea 3 in the second division of the Central London League against King's College.
Spanton (167) - Garik Mirzoyan (165)
Owen's Defence
1.e4 b6 2.d4 Bb7 3.Nc3 e6 4.Bd3 d5!?
An unusual continuation, and one that has not attracted the attention of strong players.
Most popular, at least in ChessBase's 2018 Mega database, is 4...Bb4, while John Owen, after whom the defence is named, chose 4...Nf6 in a loss to Blackburne in 1890 (28 years earlier Blackburne had played 4...g6 in a match-game loss to Steinitz).
5.exd5
The other 'obvious' move is 5.e5, but setting up a centre for Black to attack, initially with 5...c5, scores very poorly for White.
The idea of the text is to block Black's light-squared bishop (or gain the bishop-pair in the event of 5...Bxd5).
5...exd5 6.Nf3 Nf6 7.0-0 Be7 8.Re1
All 14 games in Mega18 saw 8...0-0, but my opponent chose a "catastrophe"
8...Nbd7??
Perhaps the plan was to unbalance the position by castling queenside, but after …
9.Qe2
… Black is already positionally lost.
9...c5
I thought afterwards that Black should have tried 9...Nf8, but my main analysis engines, Stockfish9 and Komodo9, give the simple 10.Bf5, when Black still cannot castle anytime soon.
10.Bf4 Kf8
This is the engines' top choice, but that only shows how bad Black's position is (1-0, 29 moves).
MY Battersea unbeaten streak has now reached 14 games.
Updated statistics
Battersea 2018-19
Event...Colour...Grade...Opponent's Grade...Result
CLL.........B.........167................196...............…D

LL...…….B...…...167...………..159...………….D
CLL...…..B...…...167...………..161...………….W
CLL...…..B...…...167...………..190...………….D
LL...…….W...…..167...………..161...………….Adj
CLL...…..W...…..167...………..148...………….D

CLL...…..W...…..167...………..165...………….W
Overall this season for Battersea I have scored +2=4-0 (plus one adjourned) for a grading performance of 187.
In season 2017-18 I scored +10=8-9 for a grading performance of 175.

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