Thursday saw the kick-off of the next stage of the Schenectady chess season with the beginning of the round-robin Finals and the Consolation Swiss. Participating in the Swiss are: Dave Finnerman at 1658 the highest rated contestant, and with the following, in rating order; Richard Chu, David Connors, Cory Northrup, Matt Clough, Jeff Capitummino, Mike Stanley and Michael Kline. It is not quite as strong as last year’s lineup, but the event is much more closely matched and promises a serious struggle for first place. I was way too busy against the younger Mr. Aaron, Dilip, to obtain an accurate report of the results in the Swiss, other than that Richard Chu managed somehow to win the following game from Matt Clough:
Clough, Matthew - Chu, Richard [B30]
Consolation Swiss 2011 Schenectady, NY, 03.02.2011
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 g6
The early fianchetto is given a closed treatment by White in this game. John Donaldson and Jeremy Silman wrote a book, Accelerated Dragons, Gloucester Publishers, plc, London 1998, and in it they named this line the Hyper-Accelerated Dragon. It is a favorite of Donaldson. The line is tricky and quite playable.
3.Bc4 Bg7 4.0–0 Nc6 5.Nc3,..
Donaldson and Silman only consider 5 c3, here. From what Rybka tells me the move played is OK also with the added virtue of getting the game out of the well know theory.
5..., e6 6.Re1 Ne5
It is better to develop with 6..., Nge7.
7.Bf1,..
The straight forward 7 Nxe5, is correct. White has some advantage because Black has used extra time to trade off a developed piece. Black shortly maneuvers to win a pawn or to do some damage to the White pawn structure.
7..., Ne7 8.Nb5 Qb6 9.d4 Nxf3+ 10.Qxf3 cxd4 11.e5!?,..
White has the laudable intention of stamping the dark squares as weaknesses around the Black King. He has given up a center pawn and is very focused on pressing ahead towards the Black King. However, more promising is 11 Bg5 f6 12 Bf4 e5 13 Bd2, and White has compensation for the pawn. One example is when Black takes aim at the Nb5; 13..., a6?! 14 Qa3! 0-0?! 15 Bb4 Nc6 16 Bc4+!, and Black will lose material and the game soon. After the text the game is about equal.
11..., 0–0 12.Bg5 Nc6 13.Bf6 a6 14.Na3?!,..
I wandered by as Matt was considering his move. A few minutes of thought and it seemed to me that 14 Nd6, was the likely try. All of the details were by no means clear, but the line 14 Nd6 Nxe5 15 Bxe5 Bxe5 16 Nc4, appeared promising. After 16..., Bxh2+ 17 Kxh2 Qc5 18 Qa3 b6 19 Qxc5 bxc5; White has the extra piece and Black three pawns of compensation. The problem for White is he has an extra Knight. In the long run it is not as good as the Bishop against three pawns according to statistics. Further complicating the evaluation is the existence of Rook pairs and same color Bishops on the board along with the danger of the pawns concentrated in the center. All things considered, there were the makings of quite an interesting battle to come.
After the move played, the balance shifts to Black. An observation worth noting; against Barnes in the Preliminaries, Matt worked his way successfully through similar complications. This time he does not do so. A useful exercise for Matt would be to do go over both games thinking about what his thoughts were during both games. Why, for example did he go forward versus Barnes and here decide to go backward?
14..., Qc5?
Richard is too routine hereabouts. Better is 14..., Bxf6 15 exf6 d5; and while Black must keep his eye on the White Queen ending up on h6, he is for choice. The move played gives White a chance to equalize.
15.Qf4?!,..
Mr. Clough does not realize he is passing on a chance to make things difficult for Black. Here 15 Bxg7 Kxg7 16 Qf6+ Kg8 17 Nc4, is not entirely sound, but it does make things difficult to calculate to the end. Play could go 17..., b5 18 Nd6 Qxc2 19 Qh4 d3 20 Ne4 f5; and Black is for choice, but White does has active play and there is a chance of error. The White plan seems to be an attack with his Queen and Rooks. As GM Har-Zvi is fond of saying: “Rooks are not good attackers. There are too many ways to frustrate them”. The White minor pieces are singularly absent from the contemplated assault.
15..., b5 16.Rad1 Ra7 17.Rd3 d6 18.Bxg7 Kxg7 19.Qf6+ Kg8 20.Re4 dxe5 21.Rg4 Qe7
This move puts paid to any realistic idea of an attack on the Black King. The remainder of the game is mopping up. The Black pawn dominance of the center in itself is as important as the extra pawns. White can’t find safe ground upon which to make a last stand.
22.Qh4 Qxh4 23.Rxh4 f5 24.c4 b4 25.Nc2 a5 26.Ne1 Raf7 27.Rd1 e4 28.f3 e5 29.fxe4 fxe4 30.Nc2 e3 31.Bd3 Bf5 0–1
As John Phillips pointed out after the evenings festivities were over, all the games in the Finals could be considered upsets. Firstly, all the higher rated players lost, and secondly, Black won all the games. The outcomes in the Finals were unusual no doubt.
For the record here are the games from the first round:
Le Cours, Alan - Phillips, John [D44]
SCC Ch Finals 2011 Schenectady, NY, 03.02.2011
This is a party in the theory of the Slav, Botvinnik variation.
1.Nf3 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 d5 4.d4 c6 5.Bg5 dxc4 6.e4 b5 7.e5 h6 8.Bh4 g5 9.Nxg5 hxg5 10.Bxg5 Nbd7 11.g3 Rg8 12.h4 Rxg5 13.hxg5 Nd5 14.g6 fxg6 15.Qg4 Qe7 16.Qxg6+ Qf7 17.Qg4 Bb7 18.Nxd5 cxd5 19.Bh3 Bb4+ 20.Ke2 Nf8 21.a3 Be7 22.Rhf1 Qh7 23.Rad1 b4 24.f4 c3 25.Rf3 Ba6+ 26 Resigns 0-1
The encounter between Chi and Sells carried the potential of deciding the tournament winner. Patrick, at 2048, out rated Philip by 84 points. Both players have had good to excellent results the last couple of years. The game unfolded in some sense about as expected; a hard fight leading to an ending with serious time trouble for Mr. Sells. Once more in a dangerous ending Sells kept his alertness at a high level and Chi was able to quite match that. Sells played about fifteen moves with only one second(!) on his clock, and Mr. Chi overlooked a killing pin that cost him the game.
Chi, Patrick - Sells, Philip [E24]
SCC Ch Finals 2011 Schenectady, NY, 03.02.2011
1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Bb4 4.f3 d5 5.a3 Bxc3+ 6.bxc3 0–0 7.e3 c5 8.Bd3 Nc6 9.Ne2 b6 10.cxd5 exd5 11.0–0 Bb7 12.Rb1 Qe7 13.Ng3 Rac8 14.Qe1 Qc7 15.Bd2 Rfe8 16.Qf2 Na5 17.Nf5 Nc4 18.Bc1 Nd6 19.e4 Nxf5 20.e5 Ne4 21.fxe4 dxe4 22.Bb5 g6 23.Bxe8 Rxe8 24.Be3 cxd4 25.cxd4 Qc3 26.Rfe1 Bd5 27.g4 Nxe3 28.Qxe3 Rc8 29.Qxc3 Rxc3 30.Ra1 Rd3 31.Red1 Bb3 32.Rdb1 Be6 33.Rb4 Bxg4 34.d5 Rxd5 35.Rxe4 Bf5 36.Re3 Kf8 37.Rc1 Ke7 38.Kf2 Bd7 39.Rc7 a5 40.Kg3 Ke6 41.Rb7 b5 42.Rb6+ Ke7 43.Ra6 b4 44.axb4 axb4 45.Rb6 Rd4 46.Rb3 Re4 47.Rd3 Be6 48.Kf3 Rxe5 49.Rxb4 h5 50.Rc3 g5 51.Rb8 Bd5+ 52.Kf2 Be6 53.Rg8 Kf6 54.Rd8 g4 55.Kg3 Kg5 56.Rg8+ Kf6 57.Rd8 Kg5 58.Rh8 Rf5 59.Re3 Ra5 60.Re1 Rb5 61.Re3 Ra5 62.Rg8+ Kf6 63.Re4 Ra3+ 64.Kg2 Bd5 65.Rge8 Ra4 0–1
The game went on a few more moves but there was no doubt of the outcome.
The game Little - Dilip Aaron was real upset, there were 350 rating points difference between the players. After getting a nice, though small, advantage my concentration “went south” and young Dilip was alert to his chances. After dropping the Exchange my situation was bad but not quite hopeless. After a few more moves only worthy of a five minute game, I turned the bad into utterly lost, and Dilip won convincingly.
Little, Bill - Aaron, Dilip [B01]
SCC Ch Finals 2011 Schenectady, NY, 06.02.2011
1.e4 d5 2.exd5 Qxd5 3.Nc3 Qa5 4.Bc4 Nf6 5.d3 c6 6.Bd2 Bf5 7.Nf3 Nbd7 8.Qe2 e6 9.Nd4 Qe5 10.Qxe5 Nxe5 11.Nxf5 Nxc4 12.Nxg7+ Bxg7 13.dxc4 0–0–0 14.0–0–0 Ng4 15.Rdf1 Rd4 16.h3 Ne5 17.b3 Ng6 18.Be3 Rd7 19.Ne4 b6 20.Rd1 Rhd8 21.Bg5 Bb2+ 22.Kxb2 Rxd1 23.Rxd1 Rxd1 24.Nf6 Rf1 25.f4 Nxf4 26.Nxh7 Nxg2 0–1
The weather forecasters promise us more snow for the coming week. If true I will have plenty of time to work on these games. My intention is to analyze these for the blog.
More soon.
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