Game Analysis Asia Square Singapore 11th July 2018
Brad vs Ashton 0.5-0.5
Playing in a Fog ... Attitude in Chess
It's been a long long time since my last blog post. Much has happened in my life in that time, primarily a new opportunity career wise has arisen. Right now I'm on a holiday break in Taichung Mountains where the mist is very much reflective of my ...
Pressure makes things happen
Pressure has a way of making things happen. In my game on the White side of an open Sicilian, I identified in post mortem that I missed ways to keep tension and pressure on my opponent. Example 1: White to Move Here I relieved tension with 2...
Work on Defence
Defensive skills is one of the biggest weaknesses in the game. Trying to find a balance between being active, solid, passive. They're difficult problems to solve (just not natural to defend). A case in point is on my 29th move for Black, where...
Passed Pawns Must be Pushed
An extremely instructive ending where my opponent missed an excellent chance to obtain decisive advantage. I learnt much from this tough ending in terms of Rook ending play, Bishop pair vs Knights and attacking and defending. White to Move ...
Avoid Passivity
I was happy with my play on the Black side of an English opening, where I managed to place enough pressure on both e3 and c4 to ensure weakness and an eventual win. The game is a good illustration of what can happen if you defend passively, and is...
No Risk, No Reward
An absolutely disappointing game by me on the Black side of a Sicilian Sveshnikov. Not so much for the result, but more so I accepted a draw in a position where there was still a lot of fight. Whilst the assessment should be equal, there is play f...
Losses Reveal Our Innerself
Losses reveal holes in our thinking. Congratulations to my opponent for their excellent play. I learnt much from this defeat, and hope it stands me in good stead for the future. Primarily it is priority. I have my priority entirely wrong in th...
Diagonal Fight
The major take away from my game on the White side of the Richter Rauzer would be the trouble an early Qa5 leads to. Tempos in harassing the Queen to g6 and then fighting over the d5 square. Black heads to instant trouble when he collapses on ...
Dangers of the d5 Sveshnikov Outpost
Whilst my game on the White side of a Sicilian Sveshnikov isn't very rich with ideas, I think it's illustrative of why Black plays 8. ... b5 to prevent White's Knight from regrouping Na3-c4-e3-d5.
Give to Get ... Problems of Being Stingy in Chess
My postmortem on the Black side of a Sicilian Richter Rauzer highlighted to me that I am very frugal with my chance. I don't give to get. At a critical juncture on Black's 19th move I had the opportunity to sacrifice a pawn for an open file and ti...
Harmony in my Chess
The biggest thing I've taken away from my game on the Black side of a Sicilian Richter Rauzer is being aware of harmony in my game. I recently gave a talk on Smyslov, and the underlying theme was harmony. My 26th move Ra4 lacks any piece harm...
Wrong Coloured Rook Pawn and the Urge to Always be Active
An interesting game in terms of material imbalance, defence and theoretical positions against an opponent I'm having a lot of trouble with. After 24. Bf1 I'm actually not sure if I have any advantage despite being an Exchange up for a pawn. ...
Crumbling Sand ... When all the pawns disappear
Am at a crossroads with the Black side of a King's Indian Defence. As if the Exchange variation isn't getting me down, then it's the Bayonet attack which I can't seem to get anything going. The following game is a case in point. In trying to ...
Missing the Pawn Centre
Massive congratulations to my opponent in outplaying me. I learnt much from this defeat, particularly for how Black orchestrated the ... c5 break to converting an Queen ending a pawn up with minimal risk. More so, the research into the opening...
Preservation
The biggest lesson i got from annotating my game on the White side of an advanced Tarrasch French is the preservation of the light squared Bishop. I deviated from theory with 18. Bg4 rather than Bg6 and I wondered what is the difference. Ultim...
Bright Side of the Road
Van Morrison's classic seems apt in describing what side of the board to play on. In principle, don't play on the side you are weaker. My opponent's 26. c4 unnecessarily weakens himself, allowing awkward pressure against his pinned King.
The Dam
Pawn breaks often feel like holding back a dam. Unexpected cracks can be destabilising. Playing on the Black side of an Advanced Caro Kann, we were headed for an uneventful draw till mutual pawn breaks livened things up, with Exchange sacrifices u...
Dry as a Desert when pawns are exchanged
Knight Life
Lame title and not much of a better effort in maintaining my blog. Simply I have taken on too many correspondence games to give them adequate quality control and a backlog of games to annotate have swamped me.
Minority falls Short
Sometime Love just ain't enough. Sometimes one weakness isn't enough. On the Black side of a Caro Kann I obtained a risk free position in the implementation of a Minority attack. Philosophically I'm trying to think of a way to have created a 2nd w...
Octopus Knight
It has been a long time between decent victories. I loved playing this particular game due to the material imbalances and positional nature. There is an old adage that a Knight on the 6th rank is often worth a Rook, and Black should have consi...
One Piece Stands Badly
The old adage that if one piece stands badly, the whole position stands badly, certainly rang true for my game on the White side of a Sicilian Sveshnikov. I was very impressed with my opponent's (may have been a machine, given his account was susp...
Castling Into "It"
An enlightening loss on the Black side of a Tarrasch Defence. This game highlighted me the important of positional understanding of which pieces to trade and which to keep. More so, the paradoxes of Chess when one is defending. One may think one...
Keeping the Fire Burning
There comes a critical moment in every Chess game. I'm appreciating better when to sense that moment, largely through annotating and analysing my games in post mortem. Any move that drastically changes the pawn structure is clearly going to be...
