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Chessville
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June 2004 Lessons Learned Today's Lesson is from GM Alexander Baburin
This column is sponsored by Chess eXpress Ratings; learn more about CXR in this Review by someone who actually uses their service.
A Rude Awakening Chess players don't like to show their losses. That surely has something to do with ego - and chess pros have pretty big 'chess' egos. Still, sometimes chessplayers do annotate their losses. I've done it on numerous occasions and for me the main reason for doing so was to help myself to get over the loss and move on. And if other people can learn a few things from my lost game, good for them! The following game was played in the last round of the
Four
Nations Chess League (4NCL). Before the weekend it was clear that my team
Wood Green would have to beat our main rival - Guildford in the last round
to keep the title of 4NCL champion. However, Guildford unexpectedly
drew in round 10, so in round 11 we only needed a draw. That looked
plausible as we had higher rated players on almost every board and beat the
same team 7-1 a couple of years ago. Still, anything can happen in a
team match - and that's why they are played out and not decided on rating
count! Baburin,A (2548) - King,D (2497) [D31] [Click
Here to follow the game on a JavaScript board] In 4NCL you learn about your opponent one hour before the game. Our opponents could put pretty much any of their 7 men on any of the first 7 boards (I was playing board 6). But I had played all of them before and had a good idea about their styles, etc. It turned out that in this game I was to play GM Danny King, whom I had played several times. Just like me, Danny doesn't play much nowadays, working mainly as a journalist and commentator. He is a very solid player and my initial feeling was that despite my good score again King, he was not the easiest opponent I could get that morning. The reason was that I was playing White and in team matches players with White are expected to 'bring home' some extra points. This is all very fine when you work on your openings 5-6 hours a day, but as I don't, it's often psychologically easier for me to play Black in team matches. 1.d4 e6 2.c4 d5 3.Nc3 Be7
First surprise. As far as I knew, King usually did not mind playing 3...Nf6 4.cxd5 exd5 5.Bg5 which I normally play with White. 4.cxd5 What else to do? If you have a limited repertoire that makes it easy for your opponent to prepare, but a critical team match is no place to learn some new lines! 4...exd5 5.Bf4 c6 6.Qc2 The main line goes 6.e3 Bf5 and in retrospect this is what I should have preferred, since King probably prepared only for 6.Qc2, which I played exclusively before. Presenting your opponent with a new opening problem at 11 in the morning can't be a bad thing to do! 6...Bd6 The main line here used to be 6...g6 7.e3 Bf5 8.Qd2 but 6...Bd6 is very popular too. 7.Bg3
Exchanging on d6 would make life easy for Black. White wants to exchange on his own terms - with opening of the h-file. But this move also gives Black time to develop quickly. 7...Ne7 8.e3 Bf5 9.Qd2 White used to play here 9.Qb3 and after 9...Bxg3 10.hxg3 Qb6. White usually got a small edge thanks to the semi-open h-file. In the game Bareev-Lputian, Lucern 1993, Black tried the risky 9...b5, but in 1997 in Los Angeles Vaganian played against me 9...Nc8! After 10.Nf3 Qb6 11.Be2 Na6 12.0-0 Qxb3 13.axb3 Nc7 Black got a good game. Since then White found some new ideas in that line, but I wanted to try another move (9.Qd2) recommended to me by my team-mate in the German Bundesliga, GM Agrest. 9...0-0 10.Nf3?! The lack of home work begins to show... Better is 10.Be2, when 10...Ng6 can be met with 11.Bxd6 Qxd6 12.g4 Be6 13.h4 with unclear play, while after 10...Be6 11.Nf3 Nf5 12.Bd3 Nxg3 13.hxg3 h6 14.Qc2 White got better chances in Agrest-Akesson, Linkoping 2001. 10...Ng6 11.Be2 Re8
12.0-0 Later I learnt that in the game Moskalenko-Kharitonov, Alushta 1994 White tried 12.Bxd6 Qxd6 13.h4 Nd7 14.h5 Ne7 15.Nh4 Be6 16.g4 - that was certainly more interesting than what I chose. 12...Bxg3! 13.hxg3 Nd7
Black has easy game now - all his pieces are developed and he will soon start play on the kingside with ...h7-h5-h4, which will employ his idle g6-knight. 14.b4? Typical mistake - White wants to carry out the minority attack. But here it would be hard to put any pressure on the c6-pawn since White's pieces are not coordinated for that job. Meanwhile this move weakens the c4-square, which could become a good outpost for the Black knight. Did I understand the problems with that move during the game? Yes. But often players see that their idea is flawed and still play it, hoping that things will somehow work out. The main reason why I played 14.b4? was that I still felt that I had to try for advantage (I was playing White, remember?!) though I knew that objectively White already had no advantage... This move is also based on a blunder, of which more later. For White it was time to reckon that he had no advantage whatsoever and play something like. 14.Bd3. 14...h5! 15.b5 Nb6! 16.bxc6 In retrospect White should not have rushed with this move which opens up the b-file for Black, but we are all very clever in retrospect! 16...bxc6 17.Rfe1 h4 18.gxh4 Here I seriously considered 18.Bf1 hxg3 19.fxg3 Qd6 20.Qf2 - White's pawns don't look pretty, but at least his king remain safe. Perhaps I should have done that, but my 'sense of danger' really let me down that morning. 18...Nxh4
19.g3 I had seen this position when playing 14.b4? and had planned here 19.Ne5?? followed by g2-g3. Only when I got closer I realized that Black would strike first: 19...Nxg2! 20.Kxg2 Qg5+ winning due to the deadly rook lift Re6-h6. 19...Nc4! This is the problem with b2-b4. Of course, when I played 14.b4? the e2-bishop was covering the c4-square, but even then it wasn't too hard to see that the bishop would be much needed to cover light squares on the kingside after ...h7-h5-h4! 20.Qc1 Nxf3+ 21.Bxf3 Rb8!
Black has undisputable advantage here - he controls the b-file and has good prospects of attack on the kingside. White would love to manage e3-e4 here, but this is hard to achieve. Thus he is on an important cross-road now: White can try to prevent ...Rb2 or he can move the knight towards the kingside, hoping to fortify it. I chose the former: 22.Na4 Qf6!
Clever move - Black just improves his position. Now the f3-bishop is somewhat shaky, while the f2-pawn is also coming under fire. Black played this after 12-minute thinking and then had 22 minutes left to make 18 moves. I had 38 minutes. But the trouble is that it's a lot easier for Black to find good moves now than for White. At this point I felt that things were getting fishy, but even after nine minutes thinking (20% of my remaining time) I still made a mistake: 23.Nc5? This move has its logic - I wanted to take better control over e4 (in case of ...Be4) and e6 - in case of rook lift ...Re8-e6-h6). Meanwhile I kept the bishop on f3, so I could meet ...Rb2 with Re1-e2. Still, this move is a mistake which made Black's attack decisive. Better was 23.Bg2 Rb4 24.Qd1! Sure, Black is better, but life goes on and he has to work hard to crack White's position. In the game it was too easy for him. (Not 24.Nc5 Rb2 25.Rf1 Rc2 26.Qd1 Rxe3! 27.fxe3 Nxe3-+) 23...Rb2! Of course! Now Black threatens 24...Rc2 25.Qd1 Nb2. 24.Bd1?!
I saw Black's next move but decided that there was no way to stop it. To my horror I finally saw that the planned 24.Re2 would be met with 24...Bh3!. But perhaps in this line after 25.Bh5 White still has some chances after 25...g6 26.Rxb2 gxh5 27.Kh2 or 25...Qf5 26.Rxb2 Qxh5 27.Nd3 Bf5 28.Ne1. Anyway, 24.Re2 might be a better practical decision. 24...Qxd4! 25.Re2 Of course, not 25.exd4 Rxe1+ 26.Kg2 Ne3+ 27.Kf3 Bg4+ 28.Kf4 Rxf2+ with quick checkmate. 25...Qf6! The most practical approach - Black is now a pawn up in a much superior position. In the brief post-mortem Danny said that he wanted to play 25...Qxc5 26.Rxb2 Qd6 (26...Qa5 27.Bc2 Nxb2 28.Bxf5 Nc4 still leaves Black a pawn up.) 27.Rb3 Be4 Sure, Black is doing fine, but I believe that from a practical point of view that decision would be wrong. 26.Rxb2 Nxb2
Black is a healthy pawn up, while White still plays without his rook. The rest of the game went in mutual time trouble. 27.Bc2?! Bg4 28.Nd3 Nxd3 29.Bxd3 Bf3 30.Bf1 c5 31.Bg2 d4 32.exd4 cxd4
Here Danny had a couple of minutes left, while I had about four. But I used them very badly, spending a lot of time and falling behind on the clock. I should have not looked for best moves - White's position is lost anyway - just play what the intuition tell you and do it quickly! 33.Rb1? I did not like 33.Qf4 Qxf4 34.gxf4 Be2!; But I should have played 33.Bxf3 Qxf3 34.Qf4 without much thinking - let Black to decide what to do next, while his clock is ticking. 33...d3 34.Bxf3 Qxf3 35.Qc4 d2
It's all over... 36.Qf1 g6! 37.Rd1 Qxd1 38.Qxd1 Re1+ 0-1 Now I must say that I don't really believe in the notion that we look at your game(s), find out what went wrong and then emerge a better player for sure. I suspect that while I may not commit the same mistake, I will certainly find a different one to make! Still, analyzing your games at least gives you some chance of getting better, while not looking at your losses will lead you nowhere. I usually spend much more time looking at the games which I lost than at my victories. And thanks to my current form, this makes me much more hard-working than somebody like Capablanca! :-) Now to the lessons one might learn form this particular game:
Finally, I noticed that I lost a lot of games lately playing
in the morning. I used to be an early bird and did not mind playing early. Something must have changed and this should be taken into consideration. Usually before the game I feel whether I am really ready for it or not. But
sometimes even when I have my doubts, I do not adjust my play. Lasker and
Petrosian were certainly better at picking signals from their brain and
body! But maybe that was one of the things which put them into a
different league...
This column was sponsored by... "CXR ratings provide you with more information than any traditional rating. As you use our service, you'll find that you have numerous statistics (not only a rating) that can give you advantages never before available. These statistics can help you decide what you need to study and practice for further improvement." Check out this Review of CXR, by someone who actually uses their service, Pete Blanchette. |
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