Improvement plan game #8

Another game where I lost to a stronger opponent as black. As usual I will offer my thoughts without the assistance of an engine to try and figure out where I went wrong and if I missed any tactics.

So the question to the experts is.... did I lose this game because of the early knight move to bring the c pawn forwards (it never moved after this), by miscalculating the opening exchanges and losing a pawn somehow, by not taking the bishop around move 8 or 9, or by taking the knight at move 15 instead of the influential bishop? What is the one thing I need to take from this loss?

I would not have played Na5, Be6 or Bg4 seems a more natural move, particularly as white was ready to meet Nxc4 with Nxc4 keeping his pawn structure intact. Having said that, once you did play Na5 you should certainly have captured Nxc4. Na5 serves no other purpose than to do this so by not capturing you got the worst of both worlds.

Also c6 would have bern better than c5, then you could think about playing d5 and solid central expansion. c5 left a gaping hole on d5 (a light square) which was compounded by the fact that you declined to capture the light squared bishop Nxc4.

 My own preference on move 6 is to avoid playing Bxe3 (just my personal preference) due to the opened f-file and the amassing of White's pawns at the centre (like a giant snowball).

14...Nxc4 looks better than what happened in the game, though Strangemover has mentioned about playing Nxc4 earlier in the game.

I am not sure if 20...Re6 in an attempt to double the rooks and to try and bully the d6 pawn can be considered due to 21. Bd5.

27...f6 must be played in light of the coming attack; moving the king on its own with 27...Kg7 is not safe enough.

At the end of the game. the Black knight remained on a5. The enemy king is now on the kingside, while the Black knight is unable to do much, not even capturing White pawns.

Was there a #7?

Oops, no. I will post up the next one as #7 whenever that may be

 11... Bxf3 deserves consideration: 12. Nxf3 Nxc4 13. bxc4 exd4 14. exd4 Nxe4 or 12. Rxf3 cxd4 13. exd4 exd4.

I have no idea what white was thinking when playing 9. b3? - it doesn't really do anything.

In your variation sure because you have an extra piece but who on their right mind would play 18... Bxf7+?? with white. Anyway, You are correct that 17... dxe5 should have been played.

Hi Dan, I think it is excellent what you are doing: playing longer games and asking for feedback, especially about your loses.  You already have several strong players commenting regularly, and you can only improve if you keep doing this and take the advice seriously and sincerely (as opposed to lip service, say).

Not much to say that hasn't been said about this game, but I'll give you this general tip: in more closed and slow positions, it's often more important to find the right plan (and then stick to it) than to find any one given move.  Because  your opponent played d3 and you played d6, the centre was closed.  You need to find a plan and then run with it.  Maybe you try to advance in the centre with c6 and d5; maybe you try to gain Queenside space; maybe you trade your Bishop for his Knight and try to block the position up; find a plan and stick to it, and you'll get good results.

In your game, there's confusion between your moves.  You play Na5, hitting his Bishop and trying to get a Bishop-vs-Knight advantange.  Then you play c5 ... which rather blocks the position and is less good for Bishops.  It does play on the Queenside, though ... and then you play Bg4, where the Bishop can't help any Queenside play and at best can trade itself for the Knight ... after you tried to trade your Knight for his Bishop...

Do you see what I mean?  You want to have a guiding plan to help you in more closed positions, where there aren't immediate tactics to orientate on.  Here's an example game I played which illustrates this.  I'm not claiming to have played perfectly, but I played pretty well with constant focus on a particular plan, and it made for a fairly easy victory.

I hope the example helps, Dan, and good luck on your chess journey.  I look forward to seeing your future games and improvement.

Thank Q Smithy Q

I am glad you think what I am doing is a good idea. I worry that I am posting too regularly and perhaps annoying other members, but the responses have been great from the better players, regularly giving detailed advice and examples. While there is a lot to take in and go over this has helped because I am playing less and thinking more. I have also tried to take the major points on board and I have also tried to look deeper in my own analysis and comments. (Not sure if it is coincidence but on the 1st of the month my rapid rating was 1237 and now it is 1348?)

Anyway I am working hard and I understand what you are saying about sticking to an overall plan as opposed to one particular move. I will try and think about this more in my future games.

My worry is that my plan is flawed from the start and sticking to it my be completely the wrong idea!

Yes your example illustrated your point very well , thanks

 Thank you Gingerninja for your time and thoughts - highlighting the d6 pawn issue I created for myself along with the poor choice of capture at move 15. The more I see this game being analysed the harder it is for me to watch!! Cheers bud.

NelsonMoore - I agree and understand all the points you have made, some pointed out earlier but you may not have read those. Thank you for your contribution. Yes the main question I asked in the original post was should I have taken the bishop with the knight? As you mention in point 4 you state this was a key error, although it was my intention to solely move the c pawn and not take the bishop at this stage of the game.

I think looking at the game again following the various posts here, I see now the c pawn moved to the wrong square which is something I didn't pick up in my own analysis but many better players have spied straight away. I shall definitely consider this error in future as this is a fairly common opening pattern.

the reason Bxd5 was 'a million times' better than Bxf3 wasn't because Bxd5 was so good but because Bxf3 wasn't very good evidenced by the trouble you got yourself into. I should've made that more clear in my annotation

thanks for your comment/ reply you clearly respond well to criticism. 

While it's true that something like 9... c6 would be more to the point, I don't think 9... c5 is that bad. I'm pretty sure black is not worse after that move. gingerninja2003's analysis in post #13 contains several mistakes. For example after 10... Nxc4 11. Nxc4 why not simply 11... exd4 12. exd4 Nxe4? Surely only black can be better after that?

Could be 10...Nc6 is worth a lot of consideration. You want to force or at least persuade d5. This pretty much kills the Bishop on c4 and eliminates any pressure on your e5 but here white always has to keep an eye on e4 and maybe even e3.

The one thing for black to keep an eye on is a Knight posted on f4 and or c4 attacking your d6.

Somewhat similar ideas can be seen in the Hubner Nimzo Indian and the Panno King's Indian.

Yes or 11... Nxe4 looked good to me

It's commonly known that you usually shouldn't let your bishops be traded for a knight.  Best to trade the bishop for the bishop, or trade a bishop for a knight.  You can see after this game how one bishop can prove to be a very pesky piece when backed up by a queen and rook battery on an open file.

I think you just needed to just follow basic principles here and just take the bloody bishop.  I don't know why you didn't take.  Perhaps you thought the knight was better here, however, I beg to differ, as your knight on the edge had very few moves.  If you are going to commit your knight to the edge of the board like that at the very least you should get compensation for it by letting it be traded for a bishop later on.  That's all I am going to say.  Knights on the rim are usually bad, and it's usually bad to let your bishop be traded away for a knight.  Usually.  No chess rule is right 100% of the time.  Remember that.  Part of becoming a better chess player is knowing when to break those rules, and knowing when to follow them.  I think this game demonstrates that in this case you should have followed them.  Lesson learned.

Yes Daybreak, definitely the overwhelming message with this game! Take the bloody bishop!

No I didn't intend to leave my knight on the edge of the board, it was a temporary move that became permanent! From my notes you will read that I wanted to move the c pawn forwards and then bring the knight back to it's original square - I had the opportunity to do this at move 10 but went off over to the other side of the board with my bishop and left the knight alone for too long. By the time white played Bd5 at move 15 (NOW I understand why he played that move!!) my knight became completely trapped. 

Move 10 wasn't the move to play at that time, first I should have fixed the knight issue - not by bringing it back to c6 - but with Nxc4