The Best Games of a Chess Coach: A Surprise in the Dutch Leningrad

In today’s article, part of the „Inside the Master Mind: The Best Games of a Chess Coach” Series, I chose to show you my very good theoretically-based win with black. This game was played in the third round of the international chess festival for youths in Varna, Bulgaria in 2005 and my opponent was the strong and experienced young master Ivajlo Enchev, who had become Bulgarian champion for kids and youths numerous times so far. Since I had won all of my games so far in the competition, my goal for this tough game with black was to choose a reliable opening system that will help me equalize the game and score at least a draw as a result. I knew that my opponent more often chooses to play as his first move 1. d2-d4 and therefore decided to surprise him with an unexpected opening variation I had never played before in a tournament game. That was the Leningrad Variation of the Dutch Defense. This opening system is not very popular these days, because it is alleged that there are a lot of good continuations for white, in which they can get at least a strong pressure in the center and a better position. Nevertheless, I knew that in this kind of positions, black receives a very flexible deployment of their forces and has a lot of opportunities further in the middlegame stage. Besides, I had been developing one new and very unpopular variation in this system for black, which seemed to be very solid and truly interesting. Moreover, taking into account that my opponent will be less prepared for this new variation I was about to play, I decided that this is the best strategy for my next game.

Voila! It is almost impossible to lose because of theoretical inaccuracy in a system you have been preparing for so long.  Nonetheless, this is still possible if your opening system does not have a good foundation of ideas and plans to follow during the game. Fortunately, this one had and as a result from the opening surprise, my opponent could not cope with the problems in the arisen situation and eventually chose an incorrect plan. Overall, with precise play, I managed to win the game and also to get the first place in the whole tournament!