Rolling Pawns

Despite of the bad weather – weakened hurricane that came to Ontario, there were pretty many people at the club. I had Black and played Queen’s Indian, here is the game. I need to study better this opening and stop hesitating to play Bb4 instead of Be7, which takes I think a good square from my queen.  There were nothing special in the opening besides my opponent spending enormous time on each move starting from move 15.

The time difference was getting bigger and bigger and frankly I thought that the game is almost over, not by time, but just because of the unavoidable mistake in the time trouble. But 24. Be4 was the first sign that it will not go so easy. I had to calculate quite a lot. Then he finally made that mistake allowing me to win his two rooks for the queen.

The game was here for taking. The funny thing is that I saw Rd2 after his Qg3 and that I can take on g2, but thought that I give back my 2 rooks, not realizing that in the pawn endgame I will have more pawns, i.e. win. Then when his remaining time reached 5 minutes he started to play very fast and never went below 6 minutes (we had 30 seconds increment). We kind of exchanged roles, with him playing fast and well and me – slow and  not so well.  Still I missed another clear win after 41. Qg5 and then started to play simply bad losing material.

Definitely his revival affected me, I had not much more time than him anymore and also played mostly on increment. Eventually I lost 2 pawns and got my rook out of play. I decided to give up an exchange thinking that maybe I’ll have chances with my rook and bishop against his queen. Luckily I managed to exchange queenside pawns and suddenly he offered a draw, saying that he thinks I can build a fortress.

Shootout confirmed that, 2 games finished in a draw.

It a Russian proverb which I like to use to describe this game.

I come to the club and get a bye. I say to TD that I want to play and after some time I get paired with the guy from the middle section. He plays something like Simagin-Larsen opening, here is the game.

Then he blunders with 13. Nd2 and I see that I can win an exchange. After queens exchange I find a plan with moving “a” pawn and creating a weakness on the queenside. It is successful and I win the “b” pawn. I know he will play Be4 with the idea of sacrificing on g6, he does it. I don’t like arising complications and play protective Rg8.

After rooks exchange I also know beforehand that he will play on the kingside and decide to ignore it. But then it starts to look very dangerous. I think about moving the king and see that wouldn’t help. I feel a “cold sweat” at some point and realize that I probably lost. It puts me almost in the panic mode, my face is probably red.
He is ahead on time too, I have ~22 minutes, he has 10 minutes more.

Something inside me tells me that I have to move the passed pawns.
Then after he gets passed “h” pawn I decide to play aggressive – whatever happens.
I see his Bh7 as a bad move and suddenly the idea of closing the diagonal by rook comes to my mind. I do it after his h6, seeing that we get queens simultaneously, but I also can get another queen.
So it happens. I have a choice of playing 48… Qg6, but think that it gives him more chances for a perpetual if one of my queens is far. After 50… Kc6 he has no more checks.
I exchange the queens and the game is over.

I am happy that I won, praise his play on the kingside, etc.
At home I find that I was winning all the time and his kingside plan was wrong.
It is the first time in my chess life I had so many new queens on the board – four.