Levon Altounian Continues His Scorpion Opening Report!

Levon Altounian continues his opening report of AZ Scorpion games. This time he analyzes what went wrong in the Scorpion’s 1.5-2.5 loss to Seattle and what we can do better in our future matches.  You can visit his website to learn more about him and his chess activities.

ARIZONA SCORPIONS VS SEATTLE SLUGGERS

OPENING REVIEW:

Very, very close match that ended badly.

Before the match I thought we are about evenly matched and the games would be very interesting and we would win. I thought board 1 will be the key battle. Sadly, I was right in that the games were entertaining with some interesting opening choices and some complicated tactics but they didn’t end well. I personally hate losing very close team matches- much rather see a real big loss. Then the pressure is off each player in a sense- we all were bad, let’s move on. So far we won then drew then lost a match. If this is an indication of a “business cycle” then we should be winning the next match. I did like however, how players on boards 2-4 handled the time management and the opening choices and subsequent positions for our team ended up above average for this round. Unfortunately, as Alekhine once said “unfortunately God has put a middlegame between openings and endgames”

As always, I’ll first present my prediction/expectations.

This time first 3 boards were nearly impossible for me to guess.

Board 1. Knowing Nakamura and his range of openings, I didn’t want to even guess. If I had to- I would guess some fianchetto system since Barcenilla usually plays English types.

Board 2. I was not what this will be either. I was not in contact with Mark regarding the opening choices but  I thought he will shy away from weird lines he doesn’t know ( like last year’s choice of a Gruenfeld gambit against the same opponent ) and play solid.

Board 4. That one was easier for me to guess. If White plays 1 d4- Leo can play his Benko or something like that and if White plays 1 Nf3, we were thinking of choice for Black. At the end I thought Leo has to chose between 2 systems: Double fianchetto or Queen side fianchetto.

Board 1: GM Barcenilla- GM Nakamura

General Styles: Barcenilla- very organized but limited openings choices and then pretty mixed style between positional and tactical chess.

Theoretical Importance:  6

Novelty: 8

Precision: 6

Opening: Symmetrical English

I really did not understand Rogelio’s choice of the opening. It was too meek for him. I am not sure if he was trying for a draw behind the safety of White’s pieces in symmetrical structure, was hoping for a tiny edge or thought Nakamura will go all out and screw up. From the experience of playing those positions as White for many years, I learned a valuable lesson: You can’t draw them at will and the best way to go for a draw…. is to get an edge. I also got a feeling Rogelio got the “Nakamura bug” where players assume they will somehow get outplayed in a normal game and either go wild or go too passive. I am not sure what “bug” I had last year playing Nakamura but I could feel I am not playing the “normal” way I usually do either. I was just hoping Rogelio is better than me in that sense. The line White chose almost has no game in the database and most White somehow managed to lose. Black’s 11…e5 was some sort of novelty. I didn’t have a chance to ask Nakamura if he knew the line, calculated over the board, got “lucky” it didn’t happen or screwed up, got into it and then calculated it out but white had a super strong looking 12 N:e5. At first glance it looks really good, then turns out Black holds in a miraculous way. Black can capture it with a knight or a Bishop.12…N:e5 seems very natural. Then 13 B:b7 N:b5 14 B:a8 Q:a8 15 f4! (pin) Nd4! 16 B:d4 (isn’t white winning?) Nd3!! (nope!) 17 B:g7 N:c1 18 B:h8 Kd7 19 Be5 Nd4 20 B:d4 c:d4 we arrive by force to an ending here White 2 rooks seem a bit more powerful than Black’s Queen. However, Black had another and very strange but good way to play: 12…B:e5. Would Black find or trust it though? It looks really bad until we continue on. 13 B:c6+ B:c6 14 B:e5 N:b5 15 B:h8 where after 15…f6 it looks increasingly unclear. What is amazing is that a super computer cannot make up its mind about this line either! It starts with “White is winning” and then switches slowly to “unclear” This is what I meant about not being sure if Nakamura calculated this, missed 12 N:e5 complications or that his intuition told him he will be ok. Either way, I have deep faith in Barcenilla’s tactical ability and had he chosen this line, we could have easily seen a very important upset or a draw. I actually somehow believe at some point it would have ended up in a draw regardless of the line Black would have chosen. As it happened, White didn’t play it and it seemed to me he was upset about not doing it, lost his line of thought, got a bad game and then got also low on time. The rest was no fun. Not a typically sharp Barcenilla. Too bad.

Board 2: IM Mikhailuk- IM Ginsburg.

General Styles: Mikhailuk- mixed style with more positional connotations. Ginsburg- mixed style with more “logical chess” mix-up.

Theoretical Importance:  6

Novelty: 4

Precision: 8

Opening: English Opening

The game was a logical clash of both sides looking for long and short-term advantages. Neither side made any mistakes and there were few things I was not sure if they were the best but they looked at least OK ( 9 Rc1?! , 9…B:f5 !?, 10 e4 !? 10…Bg4 !? ). The game basically was not even based on moves but rather concepts. Here is how I perceived it: English Opening- White plays Queen side for an Endgame. Black Plays King side. White changes it all by move 10- gets space but creates a hole, which is good now for Black’s endgame. However, he gets 2 bishops for it. Then White pushes on the King side to go around the weakness on d4 he created while Black occupies it. Black reacts to it by opening the center and creating weaknesses but weakening the outpost and giving white more center and activating white bishops. So who got more? Who knows…..White starts methodically trading pieces to ease the grip so later he can use the bishops. Trades happen… all looks logical but opps! The weaknesses White had didn’t go away and he needed 1-2 more moves to fix them that never arrived. Mark was fast, very logical with no extra moves thrown in to help white solve his problems. Black’s strategy prevails. There was no way to guess who is right about their concepts but I think the experience of Mark prevailed, coupled by Mikhailuk’s feeling that somehow he will find a way out like he did in their last year’s 2 match encounter ( overly optimistic 21 b5 for example ). Mark won a very nice game and took a sweet revenge. Lesson to remember: Don’t mess with experience and tall people with personal blogs.

Board 3: FM Rensch-FM Lee.

General Styles: Rensch- tactical with specialty openings. Lee- also tactical with specialty openings.

Theoretical Importance:  6

Novelty: 6

Precision: 7

Opening: Trompowsky

Even though me and Danny had not spoken about this match-up, I have a feeling Danny felt the same (or similar ) way as I did about this game in terms of opening choice (which I was no idea what was going to be). Here are my thoughts in general way.

1. Danny plays very unstable chess lately. Some great games mixed with some bad games. For example- horrific result at the AZ State Championship.
2. Lee was board 4 last year and our board 4 Warren Harper won 2 very convincing games by playing simple structures with initiative ( more exactly- Grand Prix system both as White and Black ). Now he is board 3 so we should have a good chance.
3. Danny had recent problems with very sharp openings and it makes sense to occasionally play a slower pace chess, which, if last year’s games were of any indication, were Lee’s problem spots.
4. Danny played 1 d4 against Leo Martinez at the State Ch-ship but then “deviated” by playing a main line Benko. I thought then he will play 2 Bg5.He did it this time.
5. Neither of them likes boring, long term chess styles.

With this in mind, I very much liked Danny’s choice of the opening. It seemed like the opening went at least well and Black was getting into time trouble. I think White should have not allowed the Bh3 move and the subsequent bishop trade, which weakened White’s structure.Small structural edge was nice for White nevertheless. But then I have a feeling Danny put caution aside ( 26 Rd3-Rb3 ?! ) and the complications lead to more complications. He should have played some stable ways of defending f2 and slowly advancing the queen side pawns with a small but nice edge. Another plan was moving the King to defend e3, put the rook on h1 and then attack f5 or trade rooks. I would love being white there. Black was a bit lucky to find his Queen side pawn pushes and Danny didn’t find the best way to deal with it. I run it through a computer and it seems to be just even with best play from both sides. The final extremely sad and brutal blunder by Danny sealed the game. I wish Danny simply better luck at the USCL tournaments and to show all of us how dangerous he really is when he plays the way he knows how to play. Come on Danny!

Board 4: Sinanan-Martinez

General Styles: Sinanan- simple, normal chess with set openings. Martinez- more tactical (but smarter chess lately)

Theoretical Importance:  8

Novelty: 5

Precision: 7

Opening: English/ Hedgehog

As I mentioned before, Leo was preparing for the game and had few choices to employ as Black against the system his opening used very frequently. It did work out pretty well and he got exactly what he wanted. The other choices we discussed we will keep for the next matches! White did not know the precise line against Black’s set up, mixed 4 systems together ( b3 Bb2 then Qe3-Nd4, then f3-e4, then waiting chess ) and it looked like the Hedgehog will spring up and crash white. It almost happened until white took on a6 (25 Q:a6). It was lucky for white that 25…Ra8 doesn’t win on the spot. Leo however, should have done it I think anyways, as he always had a draw “in pocket” That line was a topic of a heated discussion duel between Alejandro Ramirez and Hikaru on ICC while the game was going on. He spent a huge amount of time and chose the draw line. Result was not bad and certainly logical, but considering how Black outplayed White, it could have been possibly better.

Good luck to all for the next match! We are still in a good shape.