Nova Daily - 11 March 2025

Hi!

This blog will not have much of a flavour text. On the evening of this game I'd be out, which doesn't leave enough time to transcribe my thoughts, let alone analyse the game.

It was a nice game in the CK. I wasn't too sure about my play in the early middlegame, but once I obtained the initiative in the queenless middlegame it was one-way traffic.

I have a nice chess achievement to share: I improved my Survival top score. It's now 62, with the first 61 solved correctly.

My thoughts:

The inaccurate development scheme by my opponent helped me establish a queenside blockade and activity in the centre. There were times when my opponent should probably have kept the centre closed.

Model games:

9.Ne1 certainly was a complete novelty that no-one had ever thought about before. It's not all too bad in the end, though, but black's game should be easy from there. The analysis below will point this out clearer.

Going one move further back, the position has been played a few times by high-rated players. It's  theoretically important to note that the move-order in the beginning of these games usually follows that of the Two Knights variation. This means that 5.Nxf6+ exf6 6.d4 leads to a suboptimal version of the Tartakower-variation. If white players want to justify the Two Knights against the Tartakower, they'd have to employ an alternative to the early d2-d4.

This high-level game would make a good case for black's play in this variation:

https://www.chess.com/games/view/14052909 

The analysis:

The game was far from perfect: both sides had a lot of improvements. However, I do think that white's collapse in this game was rather typical, if not for this opening, then for the way to deal with enemy initiative.

What to take away from this game?

1. In order to justify the Two Knights against the Tartakower, white has to search for alternatives to the early d2-d4. 
2. The bishop development into c4 is not necessarily bad, but it can often serve as a target for black's piece play.
3. Related to the point above: 10...b5 wasn't black's best. The point is that it loosens up the queenside while diminishing the number of targets that I have. It's good to take a leaf out of Carlsen's book and don't make too many pawns in positions like this.
4. On the other hand, I could have tried to disrupt white's queenside structure with b5-b4 on multiple occasions.
5. It's clearly necessary to repeat the point: develop all the pieces first before making committal pawn moves. I did this in a lot of English games (an opening that begins with the c-pawn, which doesn't help development) and now I'm also doing it in the Caro-Kann (also an opening that begins with the c-pawn, which doesn't help development either).
6. Related to the point of development: white lost this game because he neglected to bring his pieces into play. On move 21 and move 25 white played the knight into the strong square d5, and on both moves white should have played a necessary alternative (21.Rd1 and 25.a5 respectively). Apparently white was so concerned with putting the knight on d5 as quickly as possible that he refused to listen to the demands of the rest of his pieces. Thanks to this, my rook could enter white's position without further ado, which derailed the coordination between white's pieces even further.