Speelman's Agony #64

by Jonathan Speelman
11/12/2017 – Jon looks at a pair of exciting if blunderful games from an enthusiastic Chilean amateur. Want Jon to take a look at your games? Send them in, and if selected, not only will you get free detailed commentary of your games by one of chess’s great authors and instructors, and former world no. 4 player, but you also win a free three-month ChessBase Premium Account!
Corr Database 2018 is an extensive collection of correspondence games, featuring classical correspondence games played by mail as well as email games.

An admirable lack of materialism

This week's games are by a Chilean who wrote to me as JJ or Juan Jose de la C.V.

He writes:

Juan Jose de la C.V.I am 40 years old, I'm from Chile, and I'm a translator by profession, but I also fill my days doing other very rewarding activities. I don't have a band, but I love playing electric guitar and singing, and transcribing complicated guitar solos that I like. Also, I recently started playing piano, because it sounds so beautifully. I love many kinds of music.

I started playing chess at a rather old age, but I always felt attracted to it. Maybe it has to do with the fact that chess always offers you the possibility of creating great things, of taking you beyond your boundaries, but in a constructive, challenging way — it might take place inside the confines of a 64-squared board, but it usually takes all of you to make it work.

Though at the beginning I used to gather with a good friend of mine to play blitz for hours and hours, I leaned towards correspondence chess once I discovered that you get, not merely hours to think of your moves, but weeks or even months! So I started playing correspondence chess, and after 10 years of hard-fought battles, I decided to try on-the-board chess again, but this time in actual OTB chess tournaments. Since then, I've played many OTB tournament games, with varying degrees of success, and I have learned to enjoy blitz and bullet online.

The two games I selected show the two sides of the coin that every player gets to know sooner or later in his chess life: the agony of losing badly, and the ecstasy of a great victory.

The games JJ sent are very far from totally accurate but interesting in that they show considerable flair and an admirable lack of materialism. He annotated both in detail and as usual I've added my own comments as JS.

We start with the Agony:

 
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This was the second game of my first ever OTB chess tournament. A 45m+5s, 8 rounds Swiss tournament. I am a correspondence chess player, so I wasn't used to such 'fast' time controls... 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.Bc4 Nc6 4.d4 cxd4 5.c3 dxc3 6.Nxc3
I knew this was a Smith-Morra, of course, but had faced it just once before in my life (at a correspondence game, many years ago). So, after 6 moves, I was already thinking what to do... 6...Bg4?? Attrocious. I didn't want to use much time from my clock at the opening stage, since I paid dearly for such extravagance in my first round game. 7.Bxf7+ When my opponent picked up the f7-pawn with his bishop, 5 seconds after I put mine at g4, I realized what an elementary trick I had just fell prey to. I tried not to panic, nor to get mad, and reconciled myself to the fact that, not only was I losing a pawn, but that there was no more castling in store for me; that my king was stuck in the center for the rest of the game... Kxf7 8.Ng5+ What a pitiful sight for Black. Ke8 9.Qxg4 Here, for the first time, I realized one of the main differences between correspondence chess and OTB chess: you better learn some theory, or you might find yourself pretty quickly in some really uncomfortable situations (in corr. chess, you don't need to memorize anything, for you either look at openings in some database, or simply come up with something the computer will help you craft through: you've got plenty of time for it!). Nf6 10.Qe6 Unbelievable. We are at move 10, and my position is so depressing that I could've resigned already and no one would've blamed me for it. However, I thought to myself, what if Black simply forgot about his woes, and played on, forward, as if nothing unusual was going on? I guess I had nothing else to lose already... Nd4 11.Qf7+ Kd7 My king, at d7, has set a blockade on his own queen! Yet, the threat of Nd4-c2+, picking up the a1-rook later, bought me some piece of mind. 12.0-0 Oops. No more 'picking up the a1-rook later', now. h6 13.Nh3 13.Be3 JS was even better and after Nc2 14.Rfc1 Nxe3? 14...hxg5 15.Rxc2+- 15.Qe6+ Ke8 16.Nb5 was admittedly generated in this case by an engine but is admirably clear. 13...Qe8 ameliorating some of the pressure on Black's king seemed like the appropriate thing to do for me. 14.Qc4 e5! That knight stays there, my friend. 15.Be3 Rc8 16.Qa4+ Nc6 17.Rad1 It doesn't look very bright for Black, does it? a6
The computer says Black is toasted here, especially if White chooses 18. Nd5 now, as Black's king would be forced to stay in the center a little longer. 18.f4? But by playing 18. f4, probably with the intention of opening up Black's center pawns, White allows Black's king the possibility of retreating to the queenside, where he will find safe heaven... Kc7 19.Qb3 White is trying to generate some attacking chances for himself, given that most of his piecs are already developed. But my king will be well guarded at b8 for the time being. Is Black out of the woods yet? Kb8 20.Nf2 White seems to be regrouping his pieces. Nd4!? I didn't like Black's kind of passive stance, so I wanted to do something in order to open things up a little. I wasn't planning on just sitting there to watch White's pieces coming over to the queenside to assault my king... 21.Bxd4 White gets rid of the annoying d4-knight, and wins a pawn, but loses his valuable dark-squared bishop. exd4 22.Rxd4
After 22. Nxd5, I thought 22... Nxe4 to be good enough for Black. But after the game, the computer showed me how wrong I was: 23. Rfe1, and my planned 23... Nc5, hitting his queen back at b3, doesn't work because after he captures mine, at e8, he captures my c8-rook with check, forcing me to capture back before withdrawing my knight from b3, therefore losing a piece. Fortunately for me, though, my opponent preferred to capture at d4, which is not bad either, but it allows the move I was pinning my hopes on... JS Yes Nd5 was much cleaner. 22...d5! I remember being so proud of this move during the game (I'm still are): Black gives up a second pawn in order to free his pieces, hoping to compensate for his material deficit with active play. If I was going to lose, I'd much rather lose fighting than waiting in a corner for my opponent to strike the final blow... 23.exd5!? After some 10 minutes of thought, my opponent, who up to that moment never really used more than a minute for any of his moves, slowly captured at d5 with his e-pawn, as if he wasn't completely sure of the best course of action for White here. 23.e5 Bc5 23.Nxd5 Bc5 24.Nxf6 gxf6 and Black has counterplay based on the open lines for his rooks, active queen and better minor piece. JS Presumably White should at the very least be much better with good play buut I agree, he's certainly fighting. 23...Bc5
Air! 24.Rdd1? Played after some 30 seconds, he seemed unsure about where to put his rook. d1 doesn't seem to be such a bad square for it, though, as rooks usually use those squares (d1, e1) to control central files from afar. However... JS If 24.Rc4 Qe7 25.h3 b5!? is probably the best move but puts some strain on Black's position. 25...h5 keeps the pin since if 26.Kh2? Bxf2 27.Rxc8+ Kxc8 28.Rxf2 Ng4+ 29.hxg4 hxg4+ 30.Kg1 Qe1+ 31.Rf1 Qe3+ 32.Rf2 g3 is winning 24.Rd2 Ng4 25.Ncd1! Qh5 26.h3 Nxf2 27.Nxf2 Qh4 JS also gives Black plenty of play. 24...Ng4! and suddenly Black is in the driver's seat! Five moves ago, Black had nothing. Now, a couple of innacuracies from White after enterprising play from my part, and I'm in command of the game's destiny! I remember being so excited at such a dramatic turn of events. 25.h3 played after almost 20 minutes of thought, my opponent had realized things on the board had changed. He tried to be more cautious this time... Ne3!? 25... Nxf2 was the continuation I looked at when playing 24... Ng4 (25... Nxf2 26. Rxf2 Qe3 27. Rf1 Rf8, and White will have to shed some material in order to get rid of the pin at f2). But then my attention got caught by the interesting 25... Ne3. However, it took me a lot of time to come up with the double pawn sacrifice idea, not to mention surviving the mess I made of my position after move 6. So now, as a result, I was already under the 2 minutes mark, and had to decide on something, and quickly, and just couldn't resist the temptation of complicating things for me even more!? JS Nxf2 was much simpler, even if Ne3 is still good. 25...Nxf2 26.Rxf2 Qe3 27.Rdf1 Qxf4! JS and Black should win (unless there is an accident in time trouble). 27...Rhf8 is the line given by JJ 26.Nce4! Ouch! Since my own knight is blocking the pin on White's f2-knight, Exequiel can now activate this other knight of his and chase my bishop away! If I move it back to a7, on the other hand, he has 27. Nd6, and White is winning the exchange himself, so... Nxd1 27.Nxc5 Rxc5 28.Rxd1 Black is an exchange up, but White has two extra pawns, one of them passed at d5. Who has the better position? Qe2! with the idea of bringing my c8-rook to c2 and wreck havoc on White's second rank (I felt my attack was faster than his d-pawn). 29.Qg3
protecting g2, and eyeing g7. 29...Rf8?! I was under 20 seconds here, and the position was still pretty sharp, so I tried not to think much and play by instinct. It took me years to adjust to these 'much faster' OTB time controls... 29...Rc2 JS is the most obvious move, keeping pretty good control. 30.d6 Qxb2 31.Kh2
JS White now has a lot of play, even if engines can still find a path to advantage. 31...Qf6? I was blazing my moves by now trying to win some seconds back on the clock, but my opponent, though with much more time on his clock (he had like 5 or 7 minutes left), was nervous and missed the winning 32. Ne4 here. It seems that he wanted to avoid complications at any cost. JS: 31...Rc3 32.Qh4 32.Qxg7?? Rxh3+ 32...Rcc8 stops the pawn with at least some advantage. 32.Qe3? 32.Ne4! of course. 32...Rc6? 33.Ng4 Qb2? playing at the bring of losing on time, my hands already moved independently of my thoughts: I just took my queen, put it far away, and moved on... 34.d7 Rd8 35.Qe8
35...Rxe8 moving on... JS: JJ quite rightly gave this a question mark. Instead 35...Qb6 36.Ne5 Rf6 37.Nf7 Rxf7 38.Qxf7 seems to be winning by a tempo but would be a nightmare to calculate correctly in a game. Qf6 39.Qxf6 gxf6 40.Kg3 Kc7 41.Kg4 Rxd7 42.Rxd7+ Kxd7 43.Kh5 b5 44.Kxh6 a5 45.g4 b4 46.g5 fxg5 or 46...a4 47.gxf6 Ke6 48.Kg7 b3 49.axb3 a3 50.f5+ 47.fxg5 a4 48.g6 b3 49.axb3 axb3 50.g7 b2 51.g8Q b1Q 52.Qh7+! 36.dxe8Q+ Ka7 37.Qe3+ Kb8 38.Qe5+! I didn't see this one coming, check to my king, plus fork on my queen. Qxe5 39.fxe5 ... and I lost on time, but things were already hopeless. Aghhhh! It would've been such a great comeback! But my highly ineffectual use of the clock took its toll on me... (and I couldn't manage to get full rest that night either). JS Of course, there are some horrible mistakes in this game but JJ's attitude was excellent and his fight back was splendid until it foundered on the rock of time trouble. 1–0
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WhiteEloWBlackEloBResYearECOEventRnd
Fuentes Bravo,E1822J.J.-1–02011B21Torneo Abierto Otoño 2011 (45m+5s)4
J.J.1626Quiroz Sanhueza,B17551–02012B84IRT - Club Providencia 90m + 30s2

Click or tap the second game in the list above for the "ecstasy"!

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Jonathan Speelman, born in 1956, studied mathematics but became a professional chess player in 1977. He was a member of the English Olympic team from 1980–2006 and three times British Champion. He played twice in Candidates Tournaments, reaching the semi-final in 1989. He twice seconded a World Championship challenger: Nigel Short and then Viswanathan Anand against Garry Kasparov in London 1993 and New York 1995.

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