Muddling Through Sacrifices

While working through "Perfect Your Chess", I decided to take a break and play a couple of online games on FICS.

I arrived at the following position. It's Black to play.

Black is under a bit of pressure. I find that going through the tactics book is starting to have some effect on my game.

I break down my line of thought as follows:

White has an extremely dangerous b-passed pawn and the only open file is the a-file and guarded by White's rook. If Black does not do something now, the White Knight on f1 becomes active and together with the b-passed pawn, Black will forced to be on the back foot for a long time.

Now have a look at White's pawn chain, the pawn chain while residing on dark squares, the Bishop lacks scope and dreadfully out of place and attacking the base of the pawn chain with the bishop takes too many moves.

However, there is a way to regain the initiative. Looking at this position, I played

1..... Bxb5! Sacrificing the bishop.

Why is it necessary to sacrifice the bishop here?

a. The bishop is not doing anything useful
b. White's pawn chain is very hard to break down.
c. Awkward placement of White's knight on f1 and possible back rank mate tricks.
d. 2 pawns for the sacrifice
e. The black c-pawn now become a dangerous passed pawn
f. The Black king is relatively safe
g. The Black Rook now has activity with an open b-file to work on

So after 2. cxb5 Rxb5 ... play becomes considerably sharper and the initiative has been passed to the Black side and it is White who must now tread carefully.

I won't bore you with the rest of the game but suffice it to say that White was forced to give back the piece and Black won eventually after a somewhat prolonged struggle. I was quite satisfied with this game.

Of course not every sacrifice works. When going for a sacrifice, especially an exchange sacrifice, both the short term and the long term strategy and aspects of the position must be taken into account and it is here where I spent a lot of time calculating lines and other variations. I have to say that it took me a long time before I decided to sac the bishop and I wasn't 100% certain it would work but it "looked" workable.

I am still trying to understand how exchange sacrifices work and how to fathom when such a strategy works and when it does not, especially in dynamic positions. It's definitely not easy.

Squashed Like A Fly

Wow, I felt I was being swatted like a fly on FICS (freechess.org). I played the first 3 games and lost them all, I was hit left, right and centre. Cruising for a bruising... as they say. These players are easily at least 1700++ rated players and I was mightily impressed with the systematic way my position was torn apart. Wished I could have saved my log (using the Java interface). It would provided me with valuable insight on what is wrong with my position.

I guess I just need to be more careful of the nuances in my position and to pay more attention to my weak squares.

I made a very nice plan in another game today. I'm sure Fritz would suggest something better once I've let it analyse the game but at that point in time, this is what I could have come up with during the game.

This games started with the Bb5 Sicilian. My opponent played 9.... g6 (see diagram). I am White.

I sank into a long thought over this. I had a few alternatives. I had a slight headstart in my development but I need to be careful of the queenside pawns storming up the board. I also knew that I need to quickly develop my pieces. My question was:

What do I play? There are no immediate threats to my pieces yet and Black is still trying to develop his pieces.

So developing a minor piece is the most natural move. But which piece do I move? Do I:

a. do a pawn push e4-e5 or d4-d5? I looked at it and wasn't comfortable wasting another tempo to open up the position as my pieces weren't developed yet.
b. move my Bishop? But where can it go to? Bg5? That move doesn't threaten anything.
c. move my Knight on b1? But where should my Knight go? c3 or d2?
d. move my Queen? The Queen is pretty solid as is, holding up the position and over protecting the d4 pawn - which is always good.

Now I look at my Black's camp. Does it have any weaknesses? Yes. The c-file is open. It would be nice to occupy it straightaway with my Rook but how do I that?

Is there another weakness? Yes. Ironically, it's the b5 and d6 pawns that are weak. So how do I put pressure on either of them and improve my position? I decided to lay a little trap.

10. Nc3 (tempting the b-pawn forward) b4 (my opponent took the bait).
11. Na4 (correct, my Knight is heading now for the b5 square where it guards the squares c7 and attacks d6) Bg7 (my opponent needs to castle quickly and bring his pieces out)
12. a4 bxa3 (I thought this move wasted a tempo)
13. bxa3 O-O
14. a4 (now my Knight has a safe outpost) Nb6? (I thought Rc8 looked more threatening as it occupies the c-file)
15. Ba3 (preparing to attack d6) Nc4 (see 2nd diagram)

I took another pause. With this move, Black gave me a marvelous opportunity to take control of the c-file.

16. Qb3 Nxa3
17. Qxa3 Nd7?
18. Rac1 Nb6
19. Rc7 (I am planning to double my Rooks now with Rec1 and increase Black's suffering) e5?? (I thought this was horrible as it locks in his dark-squared bishop and weakens the d6-pawn)
20. d5 (the d6 pawn is now lost - see 3rd diagram)

I proceed to win this game afterwards. It's surprising that Black allowed me so many opportunities to consolidate my position because of a few bad moves.

But then I'll take each win as they come. I'll let Fritz analyse this game once I get home.

Board Visualisation Problems

The morning after.... I logged onto FICS. And played a few games.

I think I am having OTB visualisation problems. For some reason yesterday, I couldn't calculate deeper variations.

But after a few games on FICS, I realise that I do see variations much deeper than I thought.

Take a look for example this position.

I am Black (board has been flipped). Pieces are just about equal. A quick scan on the board tells me 2 things.

White is suffering from weaknesses on the pawn f4 and the square b4. Now a plan started to form in my head.

Loading the game in Fritz shows that Fritz naturally wants to take the pawn on f4 immediately. However, I realised that the pawn is going nowhere and cannot be adequately defended (g3 leads to Bxh3 - fatally weakening White's kingside so I'm in no rush to take it).

What I do want is prepare an adequate defence and prepare an attack. Before I do that, I need to restructure my forces.

My Queen on d6 is doing diddly squat. What I want is to move my Queen to another location where it can adequately defend the a and b pawn. The problem is: if my Queen moves, I've left a gap in square e7 so I first proceed to plug the gap.

23... Bf8
24. Qe3? Qc7 {Not sure what White is doing here - I looked briefly at that White might want to do a c pawn storm to break through the queenside defence but I found nothing so I continue my plan and relocate my Queen}
25. c4 Bd6 {Now my setup is complete}
26. c5 {too little too late} Bxf4
27. Qf2? Bh2+ {I felt this check was necessary as I want to force the King to h1}
28. Kh1 Bg3 {now to drive away the Queen}
29. Qf6 b5
30. axb5 {see second diagram} cxb5
31. Qa6? {this move surprised me but White has to do something about the b5 pawn} a4 {threatening the Knight}
32. Nd2 {forced} Qf4
33. Nf3 Qc1+ {0-1 White resigns as it cannot stop mate}

I'm not overly happy with this game but the game shows that I can come up with a plan and execute it. But why didn't I see any of this yesterday? Frankly, I'm frustrated.