Losing a Won Game (Analysis Included)

I recently let a winning position slip away from me. One mistake led to another, and another, and then I drew a game which I should have won (but actually lost, though neither of us saw it at the time).

After 19.Qg4, Black is clearly in the lead. While the material advantage is only one point, Black has an extra minor piece for that pawn, no structural weaknesses and all the momentum against White's doubled pawns and exposed king.

So what happened?

It appears your endgame technique needs some work. As you mentioned, letting the king back into play was a mistake. In my opinion (which might be completely wrong, because my endgame technique is far from great!!), you should have tried to get your king to accompany your two passed pawns on the queenside while using your rook to keep your opponent's king away.

I wouldn't have played 19...Rf6. You have an extra piece, you want to exchange the queens so that your king will be able to leave his pawn shield and prevent the pawn from queening. Once done you will have simply to win.

After 19.Qg4 you have an extra piece but your pieces are not active. Your knight is quite well centralized but does not control important squares at the moment. your Bishop is blockading the pawn and cannot move. Your queen is still on his starting square, white's pieces are much more active, except for the f-rook.

White's e6 pawn is weak for the moment, as it is isolated. But white can support it with f3-f4-f5, with a dangerous advanced center, a dangerous pawn, and a lot of space both in the center and on the kingside. With the open g-file it might prove deadly.

With that taken into account I would go for either 19...Qd6 or Qc7, with a preference for 19.Qd6! (queen better centralized and attacking once the e6 pawn). The idea is to prevent 20.f4, threatening either 20....Qf4 or Rf4 to blockade the pawn and bring your pieces to life. Note also that this way white cannot go for 20.Rd1? because of 20...Qxe6. Which means that the only ways for white to get his f-rook healthier is either via Kh1/Rg1 or Rex/Rfe1. the first case piles up on the g-file which can be easily blocked via g6, the second piling up onto his own blockaded pawn.

20...Qa5? As you already said, bad move here. You get your queen out of the action, and you let his pieces rule. For me, 20...Qc7 for control over the d4 square, or Qb6 for pressure onto his isolated pawn. However the pressure is way less effective than on the previous move since he can defend it with his other rook, his pieces being way more active.

I think that even 20...Rg6 was a good move. You force the queen exchange, you keep the pawn blockaded, and you will in any case (you take his queen with your rook and he retakes or he go to capture your rook) have a g-pawn to prevent a pawn support to his e6 pawn. Your king is close enough to the pawn to have a key role in the defense. the more I think of it and the more I like this move, which gives an easier endgame to play.

24...Qxa2. Wasn't Qa4 better? Getting complications in a difficult game is a good idea imo. Aiming for something like 24... Qa4 25.Qh5+ g6 26.Qxh7+ Kf6 (still threatening his queen) 27.Qh4+ and complications to come?

As for the rook endgame, it's one of my weaknesses so I won't analyze it. However I'm pretty sure it should be winning for you.

• Looking back, 18...Rxf3 instead of Rc8 is a missed opporutnity. And you're right 19.Rf6 is probably not the best move.
  
• Neither 20...Qc7 nor 20...Qb6 work because of 21.Nd5!
  
• However your idea 20...Rg6 is a solid alternative to 20...Qa5?? with the line 21.Rxd8+ Rxd8 \ 22.Re1 Kf8 \ 23.Re5 Rd2.
  
• The suggesiton 19...Qd6 is interesting but comes up a little short because of 20.Rd1 Rf4 \ 21.Qh3 Qe5 \ 22.Nd5. The other idea of 19...Qc7 is similar.
  
  
• There is an aggressive alternative in 19...Nd3, which I think is the best move, with 20.Re3 Nf4 \ 21.Ne2 Rc4 \ 22.Nxf4 Rcxf4 to follow.

Right, totally overlooked 21.Nd5!, I did only check about Ne4.

I think most of the lines with 20...Rg6 should break white's initiative, and let your extraz piece win.

As for 19...Qd6 20.Rd1? there is the simple 20...Qxe6 Unless I overlooked something else here too? The testing continuation seems to be 21.Rfe1 but 21...Qxg4 22.fxg4 seems safe for black, even if white's rooks and knight are very active, there don't seem to me that they have enough play to compensate being down a piece.

As for 19...Nd3, I dissmissed that move in my quest for activity because of 20.Rd1. This is the testing move in my opinion, preventing 20...Nf4, and 20...Ne5 (to exchange things and trying to kill white's initiative did not seem to work when I calculated yesterday). This lefts 20...Rf4 which centralizes the black pieces and give him activity. However I didn't like the pinned knight  in the middle of the board, because I didn't like the idea of being forced to go for a Rd4 and 'freeing' the f-pawn. I'm as well piling my canons together to protect a knight instead of attacking weaknesses of controling important squares. I just for those reasons I prefered 19...Qd6!

However, I do think that 19...Nd3 is totally playable here, but as well that it is not the best move.

You're right, 19...Qd6 20.Rd1 Qxe6 is totally playable. It's actually a great way to simplify the position to Black's advantage. Too bad I didn't see it in the game.

Playing accurate moves that keep all your pieces as active as possible (including your king) and limiting your opponents pieces (especially your opponent's king) is crucial for any endgame. Generally speaking, the endgame is easier than the middlegame but is quite sharp in that mistakes are always next door and take out the advantage in a blink of an eye.

The following position exemplifies "nxavar"'s point. In the game, I played a4 when my position called for something more energetic. A more assertive line was found in the post-game review. Can you play it?

I chose a plan like Qd3, f4 (for f5) with the rooks to come in. The center is closed, we have a space advantage. Black's counterplay should be on the queenside but he has to know what to do with his knight before to start anything. He might therefore have more future in removinf his knight, and going for a b7-b6 and c6-c5 center undermining idea. So taking space on the kingside with either an attack or cramping black's game should be nice.

Maybe the manoeuvre Ne2-f4 might be synergic with that idea of invading the kingside, as it brings a piece and frees the c-rook to help prevent black from quickly counteerattack in the centre. f4 might help to hold the e-pawn until the time is right for a f5 break, and we can keep a knight to defend the d4 pawn, so that if he tries to open-up by swapping the c-pawn for the d one, we will have a centralized knight blockading his center pawn, which both guarantees us good activity in the center and a closed nature of the center, so that our kingside moves wouldn't be "counterred"

I would start these plans with the piece manoeuvres, so that I don't weaken my kingside until I know my plan will succed faster than black's counteerplay in the center.

Now I will look at the solution you give.

In your solution, I prefer 5.e6!. Quest for complications when black's pieces have inferior activity. You have the time to play Bd3. And Bd3 has the problem of cutting d3 as an escape for your c5 knight (against b6). Which means that in your variation after 5...Bxd3 (exchanging the bad bishop for the good one) you have to go for 6.Xxd3, and black can go for the Nc7-e6 manoeuvre to hold the center, attaking the weak d4 pawn, and preparing the c5 breakthrough.

The position you show seems good for white but I have the feel that it will evolve into a slightly better position for white with counterplay for black.

I think there's a misunderstanding here. The activity of the pieces is of paramount importance specifically in the endgame. In the middlegame, controling important squares and bunch of other strategic concepts is also important. Just keeping your pieces active in a middlegame doesn't help much. They need to be "controling" or "aiming" at important squares too and their position must be relevant to what's going on on the board. Also, in the middlegame there is not so much space for the pieces to move which means that all pieces, except the knights of course, will eventually be a little "inactive".

The position of your pieces is always important, don't you agree nxavar? Many concepts will direct your strategy at any stage of the game, but triumph depends on pieces - whatever their colour - being positioned to your advantage.

1.Qd3 Nc7 2.f4 g6 leaves the position contested. The g2 bishop is still not contributing very much and is now without a way to meanfully enter the game. Meanwhile Black is generating counterplay on the queenside. From here White has a few options (b3, h3, Nxe6) which, as far as I can see lead to drawish positions at best.

1.Ne2 Nc7 2.Nf4 Nd7 3.Nfxe6 Nxe6 4.Nxe6 Qxe6 simplifies the position without conferring an advantage. White still needs to put the g2 bishop on a better square while command of the queenside has been lost.

1.Bf1 Nd7 2.Na4 Nxc5 3.Nxc5 Bf5 4.Qf3 Qg5 5.Bd3 White has all the momentum and a strong advantage against Black's poorly coordinated forces. If the bishops swap on d3, White will have attacking prospects on the queenside against which Black will need to organize an adequate defense. The beautifully positioned c5 knight is ready to strike. Playing 5.e6? gives Black the advantage after 5...Nxe6 6.Nxe6 fxe6 since 7.Rxe6?? Qxc1+.

1.Bf1 Nc7 2.f4 Nb5 3.a4 Nxc3 3.bxc3 is also advantageous for White. If Black retreats with 3...Nd7, 4.Nxe6 fxe6, White's pieces are all coordinated to destroy Black's weak queenside pawns. If Black plays 3...Nc4, White can turn up the heat with 4.Qc2 Qc7 5.Bd3 g6 6.Bxc4 dxc4 7.Qa2.

My plan would be to play b3 first to limit the activity of the black knight on b6 and then play Rf1, f4, and move a knight to the kingside (not neccessarily in that order, my play will be determined from what my opponents next moves will be). The fiancettoed bishop can never be bad (there are exceptions of course). In the worst case it can serve as a permanent defender to the king. As you can see from my 1st and 3rd suggestions I like prophylactic thinking.

The b6 knight is not threatening anything so why do you need to limit its activity? Playing b3 is too passive and gives Black time to improve their position with Nc7. Not to mention that b3 does nothing if Black decides to reposition the knight via d7.

The fianchettoed bishop is not bad but it would be much stronger on f1 or d3 as we have seen. Bf1 is the best move.

Repositioning the knight on d7 is not good since it has no good squares to go to from there. We can also avoid the exchange with our knight on c5 by moving our knight away. Regarding the bishop move, prophylactic thinking is a really strong strategy concept. You need someone to guard your back while you will be conducting your all-out attack. There are other pieces to do the attack with, and fiancetto is a good position for a bishop.

Well it happens ya know, you're not a perfect human to always make a perfect and precise move.

GM Valeriy Aveskulov mentions at his site (chesstao.com, articles section) that a famous chess axiom says that "the most difficult part of a chess game is to win a won position". He continues by saying that his experience confirmed that.

As Fischer said once to a novice, a slight advantage is not a won game-it must be perfected