march 27 2012

Daniel's report

Hello,
the session has once again turned into a private lesson and will end, it is to be feared, in a private lesson of listeners.
Not following the soap opera currently broadcast on France 3, I can't give you any news about the pillars of the earth, but I can tell you that the pillars of the oldest chess course in France are wavering.
Fortunately, each time a small miracle occurs, narrowly avoiding that the audience is reduced to a single listener.
Thus, in the absence of the regular Registrar and pillar of the course since always, I prayed to Caissa that Gregory would appear as he had done during the previous course and that between us we could progress in the elucidation of the wonders prepared by the Master.
Alas, I had to attack the first study without help, with the sole ambition of clearing up the essentials before the lunchtime deadline.
 
Be reassured for this time, the miracle took place, and the course was able to proceed in full thanks to the unexpected return of the great Guy.

 Being less well equipped than the post holder, there is no diagram in the text. I am sorry about that.

Once again, I have the curious impression that I agree with a judge. Is it age? But this time it is the great Abdurahmanović himself. The first two prizes he gives (the first of which goes to a Frenchman) have already been included in the report, as well as a mention (an helpmate 10# from our Guy). No others have been. We give these three problems again.
 
Two other helpmates, a 2# from Monsieur le Comte, a spiritual 3#, and 4 selfmate problems, two of which are serial, explained for the lazy. 
 
A deep study where a nice conclusion is prepared with Queen and Knight against Queen.
Stalemates echoes in the Queen endgame, but you have to be precise from the first move. The English commentator manages to forget the main variation, which motivates the key.
 
A very tense confrontation of a candidate for the title (you can guess which one) against a holder of the same title, which precisely reminds of another one with the same characteristics, already shown in the club.
 
Rendezvous, God willing, in a month's time, on 24 April.
Have a good time. 

A win study of Tkachento, to begin with.
W(5) Ka4, Qa6, Re2, Nb7, Pc2
B(5) Kg5, Qc1, Re3, Pa2,d4.
A very interesting position to look for, provided you are accompanied by the Master, because you can quickly get lost.
First of all, you have to find the first 4 moves that you quickly determine as forced, and don't believe (as I did!) that White makes mate in 2 or 3 moves because Black has the right to defend themselves!
Then, it is certainly findable, but not obvious because the Q+N/Q endgame does not look so much like the ones already seen.
We can say that this study is very interesting because unlike some studies of composers suffering from agueusia, here the foreground has its own interest and is not just a heavy and inelegant extension.
 
This is followed by a study of Becker & Akobia who, if they sometimes produce works that are difficult to understand, can also treat us to true masterpieces.
W(5) Ke1, Qg1, Re7, Rg6, Pc6.
B(6) Kh8, Qf3, Pd3,e2,f4, g3.
To help the reader who would like to search, we need to start by finding a sustainable way to counter the various threats of mast. This will be quite expensive.
The reader should not worry about the question "why couldn't the 1st and 3rd moves be switched", he should find the best black 3rd move, see why the 4th moves B and N are forced, and reach the 6th move B. The rest of the game presents two echoing stalemates but the details of the draw remain a tablebased story.
 
After these rather complex introductions, the game of the day from the Candidates' quarter final match in 1994.
The B player, although 19 years old, was already in the top 5 ranked players in the world
As the truth of the position is given in the Master's electronic record, I choose to provide weaker comments that reflect the questions that the audience may have had during the course (Ah, live!).
 
1:c4 c5; 2:Nf3 Nc6 3:Nc3 Nf6 4:e3 e6 5:d4 d5 6:a3 a6 7:b3 cxd
(at the time they did what they wanted, but now in these troubled times I rather recommend this move at b6 because if you play 7:...b6 and the game is drawn quickly enough you expose yourself to the risk of the double bubble...)
8:exd Be7 9:c5 b6! 10:cxb (W is not yet in a position to play the tempting 10:b4 bxc 11:bxc Ne4!)
10:..Nd7 11:Bd3 a5 B seems to have settled the opening phase: they are ready to play Fa6 and answer Na4 with Nxb6. W decides to enter complications to take advantage of the temporary bottleneck of B-pieces on the Q-side.
12:Cb5! Db6 13:Ff4 o-o 14:o-o! (and not the tempting but premature 14:Rc1 Ba6 15:Nc7 Bxa3! taking advantage of the fact that K is still in e1 16:Na8 Ra8 17:Rb1 Bb4+16:Kf1 Nd4!)
14:..Na7 asking N if he really wants to venture out 15:Nc7 Rb8 From now on, W's must constantly calculate moves like Rb7 or especially e5.
16:b4. A variation which will probably lead to the loss of a pawn but which requires a more precise treatment of the B's as the activity of the W's is further increased.
I have considered here 16:Ne5 with the idea 16:...Qxc7 17:Bxh7 Kxh7 18:Ng6! (and not 18:Qh5? Kg8 19:Ng6 hxg attacking the Q) but 16:...Qxf4 prevents checkmate and the B's get 3 pieces for the Q. So the rest of the game looks more serious. I think that if the Master Greffier had been present, we would certainly have dug this attack with the preparatory move Rc1 for example but his tactical genius was lacking.
16:.. Bb7. Sur 16:..axb 17:axb Bxb4? 18:Qc2! with the threats h7, Rb1 and Na6.
17:bxa to keep away the Q from e6. Qxa5 18:Qe2 e5 19:Bxe5 ?! it's curious that W misses 19:Nxe5! Qxc7 20:Rc1! Qd6 21:Nxd7 Qxd7 22:Rc7 +- but it is understandable because in limited time, one tends to analyse Nxe5 Qxc7 Bxh7 and one can miss the extreme strength of the Rc1 move and its almost prosaic continuation.
19:..Nxe5 20:Qxe5 Nc6 21:Qf4 Rbc8 22:Nb5 Ba6 23:a4 Nb4 24:Bf5 Rcd8 25:Rfe1 Bf6 26:Ne5 Be5 27:dxe Bb5 The Ws explain that in a time crisis, they choose to return the pawn to have a more active position and therefore easier to play in zeitnot.
28:axb Qb5 29:Ra3 Qc4 30:Bh7 Kh7 31:Qf5 Kg8 (on g6 won immediately Rh3 then Qf6) 32:Rh3 Rfe8 33:Qh7 Kf8 34:Qh8 Ke7 35:Qg7 d4?! It appears that B could save himself by 35:... Qf4! among others thanks to the variation 36:Rf3? Qf3!! or 36:e6 Kd6! but in a time crisis, such choices are not human.
36:e6 Kd6 37:e7 Rd7! (attention: on 37:...Rxe7 W has a single winning move) 38:Qe5 Kc6 39:Rh6 Kb7 40:Qa5 Rdxe7  and here again there is only one win (!) which curiously seems to me not so obvious. I leave it to the reader to find out the two moves which conclude the game.
 

greffier's moustache

In the Becker & Akobia study, the bP is in e3, not e2. And the right question is "why couldn't the 1st and 2nd moves be switched". 
In the game of the day, 37...Rd7 deserves neither the "!" of the acting Master Greffier, nor the "?" granted by Gelfand, but probably a ?!, because 37...Rc8 poses more problems. 
No other mistakes, it seems. Thanks to Daniel for his many pertinent remarks.