Casual Chess | SWITCH SIDES mid-game! 🔀♟️🤩
#switchsides #fourknights #otb #casualchess #fun
I’ve recently been a little less active with making new videos and articles. We’re rapidly heading towards the end of the year, and I’ve been quite busy at work, and have been following the World Chess Championship between Ding and Gukesh! 🤩 As it was held in Singapore, it meant that the broadcast ran from 8 PM Sydney time, one of the few times that an international competition is at convenient hours for Australians!
So, congratulations to the young Gukesh, our 18th World Chess Champion! I was personally rooting for Ding, but Gukesh is deservedly the victor.
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A week or so ago, Mrs Chess Noob and I were out at a local bar for a few drinks and dinner. I brought along a portable chess board (the Chessnut GO) and we played this rather fun game while a little bit tipsy. Mrs Chess Noob is much more of a beginner chess player and so, we allowed a rule so that she could change colours, swap sides, at a time of her choosing!
Part 1: I have Black
https://www.chess.com/analysis/library/4LGe9atQc6
The game started as a Four Knights Italian (1. e4 e5 2. Nc3 Nf6 3. Nf3 Nc6 4. Bc4). Those of you who are a little further along your journey would know that this opening isn’t that good for White as Black can force an opening exchange where Black must play accurately (4… Nxe4 5. Nxe4 d5!).
On turn 6, White must find (6. Bd3) to keep the equality, but this is not obvious for beginner players. In fact, in the Lichess community database (6. Bd3) has been played in in only 17% of games from the position!
Unfortunately, Mrs Chess Noob seemed to play in a style of wanting to keep or build tension with (6. Bb5??), which was a blunder! In the subsequent few turns, my d-pawn becomes a MONSTER: capturing one knight (6… dxe4), then another (7… exf3), and then a pawn (8… fxg2)!
We had a bunch of trades and in the middlegame, I made a tactical mistake having missed Mrs Chess Noob’s attack down the g-file against my castled king. I don’t calculate well after a few drinks! 😅
Luckily for me, neither does Mrs Chess Noob and rather than punishing me by “placing pressure on the pinned piece” with (17. Bh6), she saw the idea but executed it incorrectly with (17. Bf6??), blundering the bishop (17… Rxf6)!
Part 2: Switched to White!
https://www.chess.com/analysis/library/3SnCuEGSM4
It was at this point that Mrs Chess Noob challenged me on whether I could win the position with White, and switched sides!
So, what to do? Stockfish gives an evaluation that the position is favouring Black at better than [-5]. White is up substantial material; they have an extra bishop and two pawns. Tactically, a potential that I still had was the semi-opened g-file controlled by one of my rooks and so, if there is any chance at all, it is to attack down that file!
Black naturally responded to (18. Rdg1), the rook battery by pushing forward their g-pawn (18… g6). However, this lends itself to a simple tactic that we’ve seen already in this game – place pressure on the pinned piece! This time, it can be achieved by striking forward with the h-pawn to destabilise Black’s g-pawn. First, we had (19. h4) and then (20. h5).
And in the position, Mrs Chess Noob played the very natural (20… g5) but now I had (21. Rxg5+)! Stockfish still evaluates that Black is technically fine at [-5], but the dynamics have completely changed. On turn 21, the only human response for Black is to move the king, and there were three legal king moves: Kh8 (best), Kf7 (okay), and Kf8 (blunder). Unfortunately, Mrs Chess Noob chose incorrectly with (21… Kf8??)!
With (22. Rg8+!), the rook skewers Black’s king to the a8-rook, winning at least that rook. Unfortunately, Black blundered again with (22… Kf7??) as (23. R1g7#) was perhaps a surprising ladder mate! Good game, GG!
The big takeaway from this game is to try to find tactical threats to keep up the pressure when in a losing position, as it creates the opportunities for your opponent to make a mistake, and thus, get a reversal. Furthermore, consider playing this chess variant against an opponent who is weaker in strength as it’s lots of fun!
