Blindfold Mania Part 2

Blindfold Mania Part 2

Now, I am not the best at maintaining series. But I was looking over some of my older blogs, and I found a blog from October that was titled "Blindfold Mania Part 1". In that blog, I had played against a beginner stockfish with the pieces set as blindfold, and I was rated as a 1667. Fast forward to March, and I haven't released a sequel. 

The Sequel

In this game, I was autogenerated the white pieces against the "intermediate" engine with an estimated rating of 1200. 

I opened with the opening that I usually open with (try saying that five times fast). c4, and stockfish responded with e6. I played Nc3, and black opened the center with d5, resulting in a pawn trade. I played d4 to prevent any forward motion, and we both support our d pawns with pawn structures. 

We both continue with the development of our pieces, with black deciding to develop his bishops before his knights. I also fianchetto my light squared bishop and castle short, while black pushes his h pawn. So far, I've been able to keep up with the position blindfolded.  I knew that black hadn't developed his knights and rooks, and that his bishop was pinning my queen. 

However, as black continued advancing his h-pawn, I make the mistake to develop my queen first, before stopping the advance. After black played h3, my bishop was pretty much locked out of the game. So when black played b5, I thought I would be able to break out with Nxb5 and queen takes back with check to fork the king and pawn and threaten to take black's rook. However, I missed that knight takes  b5 leaves my other knight hanging.

There was only one move to save the position, which I was able to find, as I could remember that black developed the bishop to a strange square, so I took the bishop with check and kicked the bishop out with the rook. Additionally, black blunders by attacking my queen with the bishop, leaving the b7 square vulnerable. However, I didn't remember that the rook was trapped in the corner and slid to c3. 

I was able to kick out the bishop with b3, but I decided to fianchetto my dark squared bishop, as I wasn't sure how to move forward, but this accomplishes very little, as my pawns are blocking his vision. However, it looks like stockfish didn't know what to do with its knight as it started mocking me by moving its knight back and forward. 

But then, I had a luckily break with e4, breaking the center, especially with black's king in the center. Black makes a blunder by playing Ke7, allowing exd5+, which is a discovered attack. Soon, I am able to make a second discovered attack, allowing me to capture a knight. But what is crazier is that d5+ is Mate in 11. Now, I obviously didn't see +M11, which I can't even see when I'm playing normally, instead, I took the knight as any blindfolded person would.

Now, I had two doubled pawns that were nearing promotion, but before that, black had attacked my queen. So I lined up my queen with my bishop and began attacking the enemy king. I still didn't know, but I still had forced mates that were very long sequences. However, I ended up trading queens, as I was up material with pawns about to promote, but I blundered my rook a few moves later, forgetting where the opponent's bishop was. 

Now, I was still winning because of my pawns, but the rook was preventing them from promoting. Can you find the best move to prepare for promotion?

I was able to win material with Rxe6, which was a brilliant move. My first brilliant move blindfolded. However, black decided to not take back and the rook stayed on the backrank. 

Thus, the game continued with me being able to capture black's rook and promote to trade a pawn for a rook and knight. I still had a far advanced pawn and was up a queen in material. I also had a forced mate that I was not going to find blindfolded. 

The game continues, as I try to finish the game. I do blunder my passed pawn, but I am able to prevent black's last plan, which is a back rank mate. My dark square bishop is able to control the backrank squares and interfere with the rook's path. Soon, black does blunder. Can you find the final move of the game?