TCC-37 Round 4 Games

In my game with Marius, he mistimes his move c5 and the position is level. On move 20...Bd5 he grabs a poison pawn and loses a piece and the game.

Fellinger had a chance to stay in theory with the interesting move 8...c4 but wanders off with 8...Qb6.  He plays 9...0-0 but taking the time to grab the b-pawn with 9...Qb2 would make the resulting positions more level.  Instead he allows Vadim to win a pawn with 10.Na4 getting a grip on the position and winning more material later.

Mazzotta - Mennella was a Petroff that was level.  Mazzotta tries to keep some play in the position by attacking in the opposite colored bishop middlegame but 22.h4 allows Mennella a chance to get a dangerous pin with 22...Rd3. Instead 22.f6 forcing the bishop to retreat followed by 23.h4 would have given him the attack he deserved.  Mennella gets into a bit of trouble with 22...Rd1 instead of pinning the bishop.  Instructive is 25.Bd4.  The point is that the dark squares are the key to this attack.  For example, 25...Bf5 26.e6 clearance! f6 27.Bf6 Qg5 28.Rxf5! Qxg3 29.Kxg3 gxf6 20.Rxf6 leads to a winning ending. Dominick's 25.Bg5 is still dangerous. James plays Re8 and allows a similar dark square clearance with 27.e6!! and the silicon give Mazzotta over 6 points! Dominck had an easy win and as so often happens the stress of continually having to find accurate moves to win sometimes wears us down and we lose our way!  James is to be credited with continuing to fight and look for counter chances. 

King - Larsen was a bastardized London and King decided to give his young low rated opponent no respect and sacrificed his knight for 2 kingside pawns.  Ryan does not oblige him and instead plays a pawn down. King wins a piece, trades down and wins.