Saturday 11 May 2019

Better Be Lucky Than Good

I BLUNDERED a pawn on move 17 of my first-round game today at the Bad Wiessee Senioren-Cup, and as you can see from the photos below, I can hardly blame the quality of the playing conditions.
The tournament hall at the Hotel Gasthof zur Post 
The one thing I would say is that it was much too warm - but we will probably appreciate that tomorrow as cold and snow are forecast.

Plenty of space in the analysis room too
Fortunately, although I gave away a pawn for nothing, I already had the bishop-pair, which now afforded me some compensation for my material deficit.
Some 14 moves later we reached the following position, after which the game only lasted one more move for each side.
Black to make his 31st move in Spanton (1880) - Carlo Traversi (1554)
*****
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*****
31...Kd7
32.fxg7 Resigns
Just for fun, annotate the finish of the game, and then compare your annotations with mine below.
*****
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31...Kd7?
Better is 31...gxf6, after which 32.exf6 Kd7 is clearly much better for Black.
32.fxg7!?
This seems to be strong, but not for the reason we both thought at the time.
More straightforward is 32.Bc5 Ke8 (not 32...Bxc5?? 33.fxg7) 33.fxg7 Bxg7 34.Bb6 Kd7 35.Bxd8 Kxd8 36.Bxc6 with what is surely a drawn opposite-coloured bishops ending.
32...Resigns??
Black is winning easily after 32...Bxg7 33.e6+?? Nxe6 (the move we both missed). However White has the possibility of 33.f5 or 33.Bb6, both of which give White a slight edge, according to the analysis engines Komodo9 and Stockfish10. The position is unclear - Black has an extra pawn, and his queenside majority could become very threatening, but Black, despite the small amount of material left on the board, is cramped. Meanwhile White still has the bishop-pair and now has play against Black's kingside weaknesses.
In any event, on this occasion at least, luck-in-chess played its part. It was only when I came to put the game into ChessBase that the engines showed me just how premature Black was in resigning.

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