I thought you might be interested to see one of the endgames that I won recently in Italy, including my thought process during the game. I really had to win this game with black to have the best odds of meeting a titled player in the last round which was necessary to acheive WIM norm. The opening was a double-edged variation of Timanov Sicilian where white castles queenside and black often doesn't castle for a long time. So when the queens came off I wasn't overly happy as I thought I might have better chances of winning in the middlegame. However, I assessed the following endgame as slightly better for black even if my advantage is very minimal. I had no choice but to make the best out of what I had.
Claus Seyfried (2087) - Maria Yurenok (1984)
Round 8, 11 June 2010
1st Open Di Roseto
18.Bg2?! - It maybe tempting to put the bishop on the big diagonal but it's not straightforward to push f4 to free it up. I was convinced that 18.Be2 was a better move as I can't really stop Rhf1 and f4, so I was happy to see that white chose the alternative.
18...Be7 19. Bd4?! - again, it's tempting to put the bishop on the big diagonal, but it's not necessarily better placed there. It would have been more consistent to continue with the f4 plan by playing something like: 19. Rd2 0-0 20. Rg1 Rfd8 21. f4 Bxg2 22. Rgxg2 and the position is pretty equal.
19...0-0 - the other alternative was 19...f6 which was probably a slightly better move as the king will go to f7 staying a bit closer to the centre for the endgame, followed by active play with h5. Even e5 or g5 may become a possibility at some point controlling f4 square and stopping white's f4 plan.
20. Be5 - the move looks good in the first instance as it's with a tempo and e5 seems like a nice place for the bishop, but on the second thought it can be pushed back with a tempo via f6 later and this move isn't helping white's main plan of f4 push.
20...Rbd8! - I was very pleased when I found this move. I think it's a good move because it's not obvious as it's more natural to want to put the f-rook on d8 square, so for that reason I considered 20...Rb7 first. My move is also good because it's prophylactic, stopping 21.Rd2 due to Bxa2+ 22. Kc1 winning a pawn.
21. b3 - white decides to stop my Bxa2+ trick but it's weakening the pawn structure around the king and it's a little concession that I can hook on to.
21...a5 22. Rd3 - I didn't quite understand this move as it appears that white has given up on the idea of pushing f4. I think it was still worth continuing with the original plan: 22. Rd2 a4 23. f4 axb3 24. axb3 Bxg2 25. Rxg2 Rd5 giving better chances for black but probably defendable
22...f6 23. Bd4 a4 24. Rg1 - it appears that white wants to push f4 again but that allows my black-squared bishop to become active giving me another little concession to accumulate on.
24...axb3 25. axb3 Bd6 26. h4 Rf7?! - probably not the best move from me while 26...g5 would have been better. I made my move because I wanted to give myself an option of moving d6 bishop to f4 without having a threat of white's Bc5. Besides, rook on f7 has a chance to double up with the rook on d8. However, clever Rybka suggests that white can untangle himself by sacrificing a pawn for initiative and compensation with: 27. g5 hxg5 28. hxg5 fxg5 29. Bh3 Bf4 30. Re1 =
27. Bh3?! - my opponent was close to time trouble. This move is a bit pointless after my response.
27...g5 28. h5 Bf4 - now my position is quite a bit better as white's white-squared bishop is rather bad, white has no counter-play on the king side while his king is a bit weak and my pieces are generally better placed. Apart from all that I had more time than my opponent who was in time-trouble. As I didn't have a great amount of time myself I decided to try improving position of my pieces without committing myself to changing the position significantly (e.g. not changing pawn structure), so that I don't lose my advantage by the time we've passed the 40th move time control. Since it's a closed position it's possible to make some non-committal manoeuvring moves waiting to see if the opponent takes any action. I thought that since my pieces are positioned quite well, I should have a good response to any attempt of activity by white.
29. Rgd1 Ra8 30. Bf1 Kg7 31. Be2 - finally, the bishop has arrived to where it was supposed to be initially!
31...Rb7 32. Bb2?! - this gives my rook a7 square - another concession from white as he seemed to be a bit stuck trying to find a useful move with little time left on the clock. 32. Kb2 is better with the idea of 33. Ra1.
32...Rba7 33. Rd4? - decisive mistake, white is trying to activate the pieces but missing tactics. It was necessary to stand still, for example, by moving the rook backwards and forwards along the 1st rank until the end of time trouble as I'm not exactly threatening anything immediate. Although even then he has to be careful with his rook placement since he would lose to my Be5 if he places his rook on h1 or g1.
33...Be5 34. Rxb4?? - this just misses checkmate in two
34...Ra1+ 0:1
This game was an interesting lesson for me as it seems that sometimes waiting is the best strategy. Over the years I've observed just how many games strong players win by making a few waiting moves, as weaker players crack and start making significant changes in their position (e.g. pawn structure, exchanges) without realising that they are making things worse for themselves and it was better to stand as still as possible. I've made that mistake many times myself! You may have noticed that this tends to happen even more in time trouble when, for example, selecting a variation of exchanging several pieces allows to make several moves without spending much time. And you realise too late that those exchanges were best avoided.
Posts
2 comments:
Thanks for describing your thought process.
This is an ending usually I loose, because you are supposed to find a good plan, stopping the threats of the opponent. Too times are in "doing" mode when I need a "being" mode.
Thanks Alberto. I hope it helps!
Post a Comment