Le Chemin Du Roi

Tournament diaries: Opening on the winning side of the trenches.

"Strategical Problems are born in the opening,
which is why it is so important to understand the openings you play."
-Michael Stean

Learning to make the most out of positional chess was something I knew I had to work on, but openings had to take a front seat. Let's delve into the opening part of my biggest tournament game this week, disecting the win against my strongest opponent (in an official setting) of my young Chess.com career.

65th Chess.com Tournament (Under 1100) : My 2nd Round Miracle on board! 

For the past 5 months I've been rying to find the balance in studying chess openings and strategies while living a healthy social life outside of work & chess can be daunting. Having heard all about the dangers of the Sicilian for inexperimented players versus opponents of higher caliber, I tried dodging it... but my ignorance caught up to me. You might probably know -  but I didnt - that when you decide to start using the King's Pawn opening, you should be aware that it is literally the door that opens the way to the Sicillian. I went to sleep less dumb and now I choose my path wisely, from times to times.

When I throw care to the wind, I enjoy playing the Scandinavian defense, but the caveats of this style is also dangerous when facing more experienced opponents. Unbeknown to me, I had stumbled upon a great move which is noted as such in the "Modern Chess Openings" encyclopaedia. What surprised me even more was that this line for black wasn't marked as a "theoric move" by Chess.com.

For those familiar with the Scandinavian defense for Black, we take on the center pawn and let the gates wide open. When this round started I met this player who was above 1200 (having gained ELO since the start of the "1100 and under" tournament). This made me realize there would be no easy way to open the games without getting in danger of losing the "line wars".

1. e4      d5
2 exd5  Qxd5



Here there is no surprise or we wouldn't be in the Mieses-Kotrc variation.

3. Nc3

This move is said to be the last theoric move of the game, whereas the current "Modern Chess Openings" clearly states that :

3...  Bg4

is an interesting move, and is in fact listed as :

3... Bg4!?

when it is inside what is known as the Portuguese Variation (note [o], on pages 378-380)



the rest goes as  such, from a Firmian-Vescovi, Bermuda 1996 game. They note is as  being "very entergtaining, [...] allows Black fine play for the pawns" :

4. f3     Bf5
5. c4     e6
6. dxe6    Nc6!
7 Be3    Bb4♱
8. Nc3   Qe7

Another line they list is the "more testing" game of Smirnov-Vlassov, Aeroflot Open 2003:
5. B5♱!    Nbd7
6. c4     e6
7. dxe6   Bxe6
8. c5       c6

Personally, not knowing the theory and only going by the basic Mieses-Kotrc variation, I ended up not faring as well during the opening. My goal was to take my opponent outside his known territoty. Deciding to change the landscape and surprisethem with an uncommon approach, I stumbled upon that move starting the Portuguese Variation, 3... Bg4

The following my shock you, knowing that I won the game in hindsight will make you spill your drink if you look at the 200+ ELO deficit I was trying to negate by thinking outside the box.

4. Qxg4            Qc6+
5. Be2               Qxge4

There you might have a stroke or want to slap me for such carelessness. But I had removed his most dangerous piece from the board in less than a dozen total moves.

6. Bxg4     Nf6

There they take it back as quick as it was done slaying their queen.
7. Bf5       e6
8. Bd3     Nc6
9. Nf3     Bc5
10. Nb5   Nd5


And from here the madness was only beginning...
11.  0-0          a6
12. Nbd4       Nxbd4
13. Nxb4d     Bxbd4
14. Be4          c6
15.  c3           e5
16. d4          Bf4
17. Bxf4       Nxf4
18.  Rae1      f5

The trades were relentless but I kept creeping up to negate any advantage, no matter what expectations the adversary had they were forced to dig deep.

19. C2         O-O-O

And with the second Castle being established for protection, getting ready for some more excursion into enemy territory. The opponent wasn't expecting the development but it helped once we got to the deeper middle game, trust me!  We will call it a day for now.
Next week : we progress in the same game, on the theme of "Middle game warfaring"!

Thanks for reading these adventures about the chessboard with me!

<< Simple Chess (New Algebraic Notation)>> p. 102
Dover, USA, 1978 / 2002 / 2021 [ISBN-13: 978-0-486-42420-0]