More CDCL News

A late news flash! Last night (Thursday) the Schenectady Chess Club was the site of a match between the Albany and Saratoga A teams to settle second place in this year’s Capital district Chess League. Albany secured second place with a solid match win scoring 3-1.

The Albany team used the Schenectady club room for their home games this year. Now that the Albany club has found a new home at the Hamilton Presbyterian Church in Guilderland on Route 20, next season they will likely use the new site for home games.

The breakdown of the results in the Albany - Saratoga Match is:

(The first named player had the White pieces)

Board 1: Matt Katrein, Albany: 0 Steve Taylor, Saratoga: 1

The opening was a Sicilian, Alapin variation, 28 moves.

Board 2: Lee Battes, Saratoga: 0 Dean Howard, Albany: 1

The opening was a French Defense. The game went about 50 moves with a the last 15 moves played in terrific time trouble.

Board 3:Jon Leisner, Albany: 1 Gordon Magat, Saratoga: 0

The opening was the Bird’s, and again, the number of moves is not clear - something about 45 to 50 - with the last several played when Magat was in great time pressure.

Board 4: Alan Le Cours, Saratoga: 0 Tim Wright, Albany: 1

The opening was a Slav Defense, the 4..., a6 variation, 50 moves.

A solid win for Albany in a match that did not begin in too promising a fashion. Early in the session Matt Katrein, Albany’s first board, after not being able to prevent Taylor from equalizing in the opening, lost material in the middle game and had to resign on his 29th turn. The rest of the Albany team battled on. Howard had the advantage on the second board, but matters were far from clear in the remaining games. As the playing session was winding down and time pressure built, one by one the Albany players notched wins. It was an impressive effort by the team to lock in second place in the League. A full report of the match with the game scores will be posted here soon.

Returning to the Schenectady - Albany match from last week:

On board two a couple of Experts battled to wring an advantage from the positional Catalan System. In the end the point was split.

CDCL Match Schenectady A v Albany

White: Peter Michelman, Albany

Black: Philip Sells

Date: 17 June, 2010

1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.g3 d5 4.Bg2 c6 5.Nf3 Be7 6.0–0 0–0 7.Nbd2 Nbd7

The Grandmasters play this way for both sides. The game will be a positional struggle about pawn formations and which side obtains a better disposition of his pieces.

8.Qc2 c5!?

This seems slightly questionable. The GMs prefer to prepare the advance to c5 with .., b6; first. That move also presents White with some worries about just what the intentions are for the Bc8. Is it coming out via a6, or is it going to be assigned support duties on b7? Nevertheless, the computer sees the position with only a small plus for White.

9.cxd5 exd5 10.dxc5 Nxc5

Now we can see the form of the rest of the game; White will pressure the isolated d-pawn. Black will defend it, and while doing so, coordinate his pieces on the best squares possible.

The position has shown up in a couple of master games in the not too distant past; Ionesco - Slovineanu, Bucharest Spring, 2001 1-0 in 42 moves and Slavina - Yagupov. Petrov Mem., 2002 ½ -½ I 23 moves.

11.Rd1 Qb6 12.b3 Re8 13.Bb2 Bg4 14.Bd4..

White has settled on his plan; try to make something out of the bold Nc5.

14..., Rac8 15.h3 Be6 16.Rac1 Qa6 17.Qb2 Ncd7

Not the foolish 17..., Qxe7?; it loses right away to 18 Bf1 since 18..., Nd3; just is not quite good enough to get the Black Queen out of her troubles.

18.Nb1..

The game now begins to head towards a draw. If White wanted to try for a victory 18 b4 seems to be a move worth giving a go.

18..., Bf8 19.e3 Ne4 20.Bf1 Qa5 21.a3 a6 22.b4 Qd8 23.Rxc8 Qxc8 24.Rc1 Qb8 25.Ne5 f6 26.Nxd7 Bxd7 27.Nc3 Nxc3 28.Rxc3 Rc8 29.Qb3 Be6 30.Bg2 Rxc3 31.Qxc3 Qd6 32.Bc5 Drawn by agreement.

Both players had used up most of the time on their clocks, all the other games had finished (two wins and a draw for Schenectady) and White has only a very small edge in the final position. The contestants could see no point in spoiling the score of a pretty well played game with a time scramble for a meaningless point. A reasonable and gentlemanly decision.