Peter Bishop game from Heidenfeld

Bishop, Peter vs. Brehhov, Martin, Heidenfeld, October 2009

Annotated by Peter Bishop

Position after White’s 17. d5 (add 17 to subsequent moves to get the right number…)

The position is a little unusual in that I had castled on the Queen’s side. My opponent having more space is not usual. I was a little concerned about my weak A pawn. I had been building an attack on F4 for some time with a view to advancing a pawn to F5.

1. f4 hxg3 2. hxg3 Rxh1 3. Rxh1 exf4 4. gxf4 dxe4 5. f5 exd3 6. fxe6 Qxe6
I had not expected Black’s move 23. I now focused in shoring up my position and trying to capture the pawn on D3 safely. The game continued as follows:

7. Ned4 Qd5 8. Rh2 c5 9. Nb5 c4 10. N3d4 a6 11. Na3 Re8 12. b3 Ne5 13. Nxc4 Nxc4 14. bxc4 Qxc4

The D 3 pawn is now isolated and I have four major pieces (K, Q, R N) against three (K, Q, R). The knight on D4 is very strong. The A pawn is still a problem as are Black’s pass pawns on F7 and G7 (but not majorly so).

15. Kb2 Re5 16. Rh3 Ra5 17. Nb3 Rd5 18. Nd4 f5 19. Rxd3
My plan now was to attack Black’s king directly before his King’s side pawns became a real problem.

19…g6 20. Rh3 Rd6
This I considered to be a mistake at the time but spent no time analysing it. As you can see it builds a “wall” of C5, D5, E5 which the king can’t cross. Also it is unsupported by the king and the queen.

21. Rh8+ Kc7 22. Qf4 g5 23. Rh7+ 1-0

My opponent quickly resigned after the obvious lose of the rook. A nice win considering I would have accepted a draw some five moves earlier.

A Grandmaster’s lesson

Baburin vs. Scannell, Galway, 2009.

Replay the game here.
Queen’s Gambit Declined, Exchange Variation.

1. d4 d5 2. c4 e6 3. Nc3 Nf6 4. cxd5 exd5 5. Bg5 Be7 6. e3 Nbd7 7. Bd3 h6?

A big positional mistake in the Exchange variation of QGD.

8. Bh4 O-O 9. Nge2 c6 10. f3 Re8 11. Qc2 b6 12. O-O-O Bb7 13. g4

White has a target to aim for on h6 and with queen-side castling, he has an ideal pawn storm too. Black is already in a difficult position. I was trying desperately to drum up some counter-play on the queen side myself.

13…c5 14. Bf2 Nf8 15. Bb5 N6d7 16. h4 a6 17.Bxd7 Qxd7

Weirdly, Fritz estimates a small advantage to black in this position. All this proves is how little computers know about chess!
18. g5 h5 19. Kb1 Rac8 20. e4 c4? A major mistake however. Black has to take on either d4 or e4. Now, his counterplay is stymied completely and white gets his knight into the action with tempo. Instead,20…fxe4 21. fxe4 cxd4 22. Bxd4 Bd6 and black is sitting pretty. Probably has equal chances.

21. Nf4 dxe4 22.fxe4
Fritz still thinks it is pretty equal here! I felt under tremendous pressure in the game and was sure I was lost. But b5! was the right move, to get those pawns rolling. If 23. Nxh5, then b4! would create problems for white.

22…g6??

Trying to protect the h-pawn, which I naturally enough thought was vital to my defence. But now g6 becomes a chronic weakness, especially after white arranges the removal of the e6 pawn.

23. d5 b5? Even now, Bd6 makes a better fight of things, trying to stem the advance of the pawns.

24.e5 b4 25. e6! Natural enough and easy. 25…Qd6 26. exf7+ Kxf7

And now for the coup de grace.

 

27. Rhf1!  A fine move that works to crush black. It is easy to see it after the move has been taken, but harder when you’ve got two pieces hanging. 27…Kg8 28. Bd4! All part of the follow-up. 28…bxc3 A piece up against a grandmaster!! Let me dwell on this for one moment… 29. Ne6 Ah. My dream is over. Resigning is the only option…    1-0
The final position is 100% hopeless for black. If 29…Qd7 30. Rxf8 Bxf8 31. Qxg6+ Bg7 32. Nxg7 Qf7 33. Qxh5 Qxh5 34. Nxh5 black faces too many far-advanced pawns. White has a won game despite being the exchange down.

Chess links added to blogroll

Dur to a recent request, I’ve added some useful chess-related links to the blogroll.
Look to the right, under the heading “Blogroll”, and you’ll find them permanently.
They’re to

1. Chessbase at http://www.chessbase.com
2. TWIC at http://www.chess.co.uk/twic/twic.html
3. ICC at http://www.chessclub.com/chessfm/

All of them come highly recommended. Chessbase is brilliant for news and off-hand items from the chess world. TWIC cannot be beaten for live coverage of big events and for the massive databases of games that can be downloaded. The ICC excels at instructional videos (but you need to pay a registration fee…although a free trial is available). Enjoy!

Heidenfeld B draw Curragh

Date 17/10/2009

Opponents Curragh

Board Player Rating Result Player Rating
1 John Aherne 1760 1 / 0 Dunne, Pearse  1809
2 David O’Connell 1452 0 / 1 Lynch, Noel  1637
3 Peter J. Lynch 1540 ½ / ½ McLoughlin, Mark  1548
4 Peter Bishop 1436 1 / 0 Brehhov, Martin  1496
5 Nicholas Pierce 1411 0 / 1 Valters, Harijs  1460
6 Patrick Freer 1384 ½ / ½ Klompers, Peter  1404
7 John Maher 1353 1 / 0 Hammouma, Hugues  1391
8 0 / 1 Duffy, Brendan  1369
Score 4 / 4

Heidenfeld win against Phibsboro

Here´s the scorecard from Phibsboro vs Rathmines A, 15-Oct-09:
 

bd.	Phibsboro	ICU no.	Rating	Result	Rathmines A	ICU no.	Rating
1	John O´Brien	2159	1745	0.5 – 0.5	David Goggins	497	1817
2	Conor Gilmer	490	1702	0 – 1	Leon Fagan	406	1790
3	Michael Delaney	317	1639	0 – 1	Michael Kennedy	3955	1838
4	Tom Fitzpatrick	4587	1632	0 – 1	John Burns	137	1744
5	Mohammed Parouare	12124	1614	1 – 0	John Crowley	277	1613
6	Anthony Duffy	375	1601	0 – 1	Atanas Kouhtev	5571	1367
7	Noel Duffy	6021	1557	0 – 1	John Gaffney	10737	1409
8	Algimantas Ogintas	9606	1514	1 – 0	Paul Mogerley	900	1320
				2.5 – 5.5

Artwork by Peter Bishop

En Passant pawn capture

Heidenfeld Result of A vs. B

Here’s the scorecard from Heidenfeld match Rathmines A v B:
 
B Rathmines A ICU# Rating Result Rathmines B ICU# Rating
1 David Goggins 1817 0 – 1 John Aherne 1760
2 Leon Fagan 1790 1 – 0 Ken Moore 1657
3 Lukasz Goralski 1787 1 – 0 Niall Whelan 1419
4 John Burns 1744 1 – 0 Pat Freer 1384
5 James Burke 1718 1 – 0 James Osborne 1357
6 Michael Kennedy 1838 1 – 0 David O’Connell 1452
7 Pat McEvoy 1586 1 – 0 Nicky Pierce 1411
8 John O’Connell 1452 0 – 1 Ciaran Byrne 1328
    6 – 2