Hello all. I made a few mistakes in the beginning endgame, that lost me a lot of pawns. At this point I do NOT feel like doing the boring, inevitable endgame where he forces an exchange, or I have to sacrifice a rook to stop oncoming pawns. I see an alternative. Was a right to do this, or were there ways to win the game in my position?
Was I right to force a draw?
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I'll look at the whole game briefly.
Your opening annotations reflect a lack of opening study (the first 5 moves are all fairly normal.) Which is good, really, indicates that you're trying to follow principles. It's refreshing to see such comments, and they make sense on the whole.
I think 7...cxd4 8. Nxc6 bxc6 is a better alternative. 7...Nxe5 8. dxe5 would allow white an irritating (but not passed, look at f7) e5-pawn. Likewise, after 7...Nxe5 8. Qxe5 Qxe5+ 9. dxe5, his e-pawn is not isolated (f4 protects it nicely in some cases) and can be quite strong eventually.
Personally, I don't think 10...Bd7 11. Bxd7 Kxd7 is too dangerous. You don't get to castle, but your king is centralised and fairly safe as white lags in development. I daresay it can sit on e6 safely... but yeah, quite risky.
Your variation at move 12 makes no sense. White can play 14. Bxc6 or 15. Bc2. There is no bishop trap here.
Now the main issue. 24. Bxh7+ was his first chance to do so, and he took it. Now how does black react?
25...a5 preserving your pawns seems necessary. Your passed pawn is in no danger on d4 yet, and is even protected by your bishop.
27...Rxd6 28. Bxd6 Rf6 29. Bc5 d2 seems to be a better defence; 30. b4 Ra2; 30. Be3 Ra6 31. Bxd2? Rd6 and the pawn is safe, etc.
28. R6xd3 b4 29. Bd6 just looks good for white, as does 28. R6xd3 Rxf4 29. Rxc3 Re2 30. Rf1. White is winning here.
30. a4 is good for white, after which 30...Be1 31. f3 holds and white can slowly unravel himself with Kf1 for instance.
Instead he allowed the draw. White had many chances to secure a win here. Good job seeing that you could hope for a draw, although white made many poor moves to allow this (Be3 or f3 or Rf1 or Kf1 among other options at several stages would have prevented your ...Rfxf2.)
27...Rxd6 28.Bxd6 Re8 looks good for Black. The threat is d2 followed by Re1+.
29. Bf4 d2 30. Bxd2 Rd8 and Black wins the bishop for two pawns.
I suspect that White should play 24. Rd3, keeping the threat of Bxh7+ in reserve.
Thanks for the advice!
I seemed to think that there was a bishop trap where there was none. Oh well. I have learned that a passed pawn should be pushed all times where it is not reckless to do so. (I.e. making it impossilbe to support.) and to protect the square the pawn will move to. I probably should've decided to preserve the pawns I had.
27... Rxd6 looks good actually. I should've done that, but I thought that I needed to conserve material.
If others think I'm wrong correct me on this opening. I feel he kept mentioning how important it is to develop his pieces yet both players fail to do so. Both use double knight moves wasting time. Blacks knight makes a trip to the other side of the board and one other thing the castle on move 18 which in many lines is ok but for proper development in most cases is way to late.