Interclubs in Belgium, 2015-2016 (the league)

So this year, the Brussels Chess Club leading team (of which I play board three when I'm in the country) is a serious candidate to make it back to the third leagues (we're at fourth now) - its only serious opponent seems to be the Café Pantin new group - which boasts only 2100+ FIDE members (while ours has almost everybody just below 2000, except for one player who breathes these exalted airs). 

We played round two today - and won 3.5-0.5. Check out my game here - a model positional game in the best tradition, which I'm sure you'll just love. Exchanging the right pieces, creating the right weaknesses and just choking the poor guy to death. 

Our team did well on round one as well, winning 3.0-1.0. I believe that we'll also overcome Pantin (I know that these guys are reading this now!!) and make it to third league come season's end!

Maybe I'll include my round 1 effort - which was a remarkably smooth win, with some nice (though pretty basic) tactics. Maybe I won't, as my opponent's play was pretty naive. 

This game, though, is something to be proud of - as a bystander could watch the position, for a long time, and at a superficial glance, think that white has chances, that maybe the game is equal - where this was very far from being the case. Take a look - 

Thanks for posting! I enjoyed your game and annotations. 26...Bb3 must have been devastating psychologically as well. He thinks he has got you trapped, when actually the joke is on him.

That's exactly right. I almost felt bad to rain on his parade... :-)

Have you considered Ba4 instead of Rd7? Looks like white would not be able to take Nxa7 because Ra8 traps the knight (b3 Be8 does not help). After retreating Nc3 you have Bc2 and since white king is still on g1 the pawn on d3 is undefendable.

Anyways, good technique and nice game!

Playing in a team is a good way to gain experience, especially on the higher boards where you face tougher opposition. You also feel the responsibility for team's result and fighting till the last chance (in an individual tournament we sometimes take things easy and accept draws in playable position or resign before trying all possible resources).

Wish you returning to the 3rd league!

Very good catch, <Dzikus>. Your suggestion does seem to win the d3 pawn by force, as with 29...Ba4 we attack the knight and no longer allow him the "luxurious" b5 square, eyeing both a7 and d4.

I have totally failed to consider this move, because at that point, Kf1 wasn't part of my calculations.

Had I seen that the king was coming, I might have understood that time was of the essence, and played as you suggested, with gain of a crucial tempo over that knight - a tempo that would translate into that extra pawn.

As an aside, had I known at that point that he was soon going to play Ke2??, blocking in his rook and inviting me to play ...f5-f4 with a blockade on his doubled pawn - I would definitely stick to my own line of play, as the resulting position turned out to be much more advantageous for black than the position after the win of the pawn as you suggested...

So game three happened yesterday. I decided to follow a recommendation that appeared here on chess.com just a couple of days ago - but misplayed and botched it completely. I did win nicely in twenty moves, and I have now 3 out of 3 in the league. 

Our team beat the other team 4 games to zero - and is leading the leagues with six match points out of a possible six. 

The only other team with six points is - you guessed it - Café Pantin.

Does coffee actually taste better when you add that little 'tick' over the last 'e' in "Café"? 

I suppose it does - as the 'little tick' looks a bit like the steam rising up - or maybe even the great aroma - from the hot cup... So Café rather than just "Cafe Pantin". 

So Café Pantin also have six match points - but they 'stammered' a little, as they only won THEIR match by 2.5 to 1.5 points - the narrowest margin possible!

As a result we have overtaken them in the ratings. The third team after us has already just four match points, and down it goes. 

As only one team will make it up to third division at season's end, our own match with the Pantin team (scheduled to round six, 31/1/16) is of special interest in our little league world... I'll be there and let you know how it went. 

For now, here's my modest effort from yesterday (and I do recommend that you check out that video from the top paragraph!)

Three games are missing from this thread. All three of them are losses. Maybe I will post them at some point. 

The first one was the game against the Cafe Pantin Club - some people follow my "chess life" and probably wonder how come I'm playing AGAINST Cafe Pantin, this being pretty much my regular playing venue... 

Be that as it may (I'll start playing for them next season, happy now?!), I lost a very instructive game to Thomas Mayr, rated around 2140 FIDE, from a Petroff with 5. Nc3 (I was black) - a line which I wasn't familiar with, and neither was he - but he played much better, pressed for the initiative all over the board, and squeezed my pieces so much that I had to sacrifice a pawn around move 20, just to get a bit of breathing space. 

I arranged the sacrifice in such a way, that the extra pawn wouldn't be meaningful in itself - but Thomas kept outplaying me also after that, showing that his understanding of the position was superior to mine. At some point it was simply too much and he won the game. 

The other two games that I lost, were another story altogether. 

Two opponents, one rated 2000, and the other 1940 (if memory serves). I got clearly winning positions against both of them - up material, crushing position - only to blunder it all away in one move, which took the position in both cases from a clear win to a clearly losing position. 

In both cases the losing move was played way too fast, on impulse, while I had plenty of time on the clock and in absolutely no hurry. 

Too much blitz maybe?

In one game, I was playing fast because I was "trying to pressure" my opponent, who was in time trouble himself. A classical error...

In the other game, I didn't even have THAT excuse. Just pure impulsiveness. I felt that the position was winning, that I was going to win no matter what I do, I let go of the sense of danger, and just blitzed away. The positions were winning, but not yet in a "blitzable" way. There were still many things to consider on the road to the win. 

After the last loss, I decided that next time I play a tournament game, after I consider everything there is to consider and decide on a move, I'm going to count to thirty before actually playing it - and only if during these thirty seconds no new ideas came to mind, and I didn't see any immediate problem with that move (the thirty seconds are dedicated mostly to a blunder check - which would prevent the blunder in both cases, and in many other cases...) - only then and right then I execute it on the board. 

So today's game was a success - I played the whole game, never blitzed and never blundered (that I know of...)

The game itself was really nice. I sacrificed a couple of pawns in order to get the good knight against the bad bishop in an endgame. Later my opponent (a lady today) missed some ideas and resources which could have drawn the game for her - and gradually went under. 

I didn't "give myself the opportunity" today to blunder it all away by one thoughtless move, played on impulse.

Time allowing, I may (or may not) post an annotated version of this game. I still have those three losses to post here as well. Maybe I will get to that also at some point. 

Today was the last league game. Our team came second - and Cafe Pantin finished first - with a perfect score, if memory serves. Impressive!

Counting to thirty - so long as I have at least thirty minutes on the clock (we play with a thirty second increment from move 1). After that - it's counting to as many minutes as I have on the clock, but no less than six. 

You know what? 

It works. 

I applied it to the last couple of games against CP6033 (counting not to thirty, but to ten - this being rapid. with a ten second increment...) - and indeed, these two games were also free of obvious, immediately game losing blunders. 

I still entered a tactic in that last game, which had a hitch on the sixth move from where I calculated it (with few minutes on the clock), so that in the computer sense, allowing it was "a blunder". But that's not what I'm talking about. It's dropping a piece in one move, it's allowing a one-move threat that shouldn't be allowed (a threat that actually can't be answered and which has dire consequences...)

Will I apply it in the new match against Robert_New_Alekhine?

Is that even a question :-)

And here is today's game

For the concept that won this game for me  - the good knight vs. bad bishop endgame and "imbalance" - I owe thanks to chess.com, to IM Silman, to the diamond membership program and to chess mentor (and again, to some excellent courses by IM Silman) - who instilled this idea in my mind. 

This isn't the first game - both competitive AND blitz - that I win using this device - and I never used it in my life before the last half-year, that I can remember. 

Strange - from a database I'm now learning that 10...e5 may have been the first original move in this game - everything was already played up to that point on a number of occasions, with seven other moves having been already tried in this position (instead of 10...e5) and black actually doing quite all right - although in this game I felt a bit cramped. 

Maybe the explanation is that black does get some K-side initiative, as possible compensation for his cramped state elsewhere. 

Another reason to switch to the Cafe Pantin team next year: how often is it that you get BLACK in six out of seven games in the league?

I was wrong actually. The last round is today - and yes, I'm BLACK again.