Thoughts On Daventry II

AFTER taking a halfpoint bye in round two, I was positionally outplayed in round three by a girl aged nine or 10 (probably the former - she is listed by the English Chess Federation's as England's second-best under-10-year-old).
Tara Tamilselvan (1879 ECF/1820 Fide) went on to finish tied for second in the U2000, scoring +4=3-0 with a rating performance over 2050.

That may not make her a prodigy, but she has plenty of juvenile years ahead of her in which to get even better, and of course there are many adult players who can only dream of being so 'weak'.

She beat me positionally, but in the following round won against a Ukrainian in the tactical style associated with juniors.

Tara Tamilselvan (1879 ECF/1820 Fide) - Dmytro Chernov (1920 ECF/no Fide)

Pribyl Defence

1.Nf3 d6 2.e4 Nf6 3.Nc3 c6 4.d4 Bg4

This is easily the most popular move in ChessBase's 2026 Mega database, although Stockfish17.1 and Dragon1 prefer transposing into a Pirc with 4...g6.

5.h3 Bh5 6.Bd3 Qc7?!

The engines strongly dislike this, claiming White is now winning.

How should White proceed?

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7.Bf4

This seems to be a novelty. The engines' main line runs 7.g4!? Bg6 8.e5 Bxd3 9.Qxd3 Nd5 10.e6!? f6 11.0-0, assessing White as having a positionally won game.

7...Nbd7 8.g4 Bg6 9.e5

The engines prefer 9.Be3!? or 9.g5.

9...dxe5 10.Nxe5 Qa5 11.Qe2

White has the upper hand after 11.Nc4, according to the engines.

11...Nd5?!

11...Nxe5 equalises (Stockfish17.1) or cuts White's advantage to a slight edge (Dragon1).

12.Nc4! Nxf4

More-or-less forced as 12...Qd8?? allows 13.Nd6#.

13.Nd6+ Kd8 14.Nxb7+ Kc7 15.Nxa5 Nxe2 16.Kxe2 Rb8 17.Nb3 e5

White has emerged from the tactics a pawn up, so Black tries to open lines in the centre to get at the white king

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18.d5 Bb4 19.dxc6 Bxd3+ 20.cxd3 Kxc6

The engines prefer closing the c file with 20...Bxc3!? before capturing on c6.

21.Rac1 h5?

The black king is too vulnerable to allow time for this.

22.Ne4+ Kb6 23.Rc4 Be7 24.Rhc1 Rbd8?!

Almost certainly better is 24...Rh6, preventing White's next.

25.Rc6+ Kb7 26.Na5+ Kb8 27.Rc7 Rc8!?

White was threatening to deliver mate, starting with 28.Rb7+ Ka8 29.Rcc7.

28.Rb7+ Ka8 29.Rxc8+ Rxc8 30.Rxd7 Bb4 31.Nc4 1-0