My toughest opponents yet

Last weekend, I took part in the DCU Open for the second year in a row. I am a former student of DCU, although because I did my masters during Covid, I was hardly ever on campus and this event was not on the main campus. Almost 200 players participated and despite the name, more players took part in the Challengers and Major section than in the Open. Although I considered signing up for the Open, I decided to take part in the Major section for players rated 1650-1900. Interestingly, the average age of participants in the Open section was 27, for Majors 28 and for Challengers only 19.

Double Bishop sacrifice - but does it work?

I opened my first game with the Ponziani, put my opponent under pressure and won a pawn. However, it was a doubled pawn that was tricky to defend and I was behind in development. I defended it with c4 and my plan was to eventually play d3 before my opponent pushed e4, so that I would have a solid pawn chain and could develop my pieces.

My opponent got aggressive and pushed f5 on move 13 but it seemed like he might over-extend himself. I was expecting them to push the e-pawn, but instead they played f4 and followed it by bringing the Queen into the attack. On move 17, I moved my Knight to e4 and was happy with my position. I had developed my pieces and Black pretty much had to take my Knight, which would allow me to undouble my pawns. Not a winning position (in fact the engine says Black has the advantage) but a position I was comfortable with.

Another reason I was happy was that my opponent was spending a long time on their moves. He spent about 30 minutes thinking on move 17, when I thought the response was pretty straight forward. Was he planning some deadly sacrifice? Sure enough, instead of moving his Bishop to safety, he left it hanging and pushed his h-pawn.

I took a while to consider my position, a piece was hanging for free and if I took it, I would be threatening another piece. Black would probably launch a pawn storm and g4 followed by g5 could be scary (in fact if I take on g5, my Queen gets trapped with Bishop to g5). But I had time to move my Queen to safety and without his Bishops, Black's attack wouldn't be strong enough to break through. So I decided to take the Bishop, knowing that either my oppoent was about to launch a devastating attack or I had just won the game.

My opponent responded by sacrificing their other Bishop on move 18 and then I saw their plan. By taking back with the pawn, they threatened my Queen, but if I moved it to safety, they would play g3 and then mate me on h2. Did their double Bishop sacrifice actually work? I studied the position intently looking for a way out. My Queen was threatened but I couldn't move it. But what if I fought fire with fire? What if instead of protecting my Queen, I threatened my opponent's? Pushing my pawn to g3 would just be a Queen trade and obviously in my favour. It also created safe squares for my Queen, allowing it to escape.

Seeing this, my opponent retreated their Queen and the game was effectively over. They fought on to the bitter end but I gradually traded off pieces (I could have won an exchange on move 24, but I was happy to just trade Queens). I promoted my d-pawn and despite my opponent's attempts to play for a stalemate, I won the game.

One small weakness leads to complete defeat

In the second game my opponent surprisingly opened with the King's Gambit, which is not an opening you see that often in over-the-board classical chess. I decided to take the safer route and take the pawn but not try to hold onto it and instead just develop my pieces. As we left the opening, I saw White line up his Bishop behind his pawns, so I brought my Bishop back to do the same. It seemed White was getting ready for a pawn push, so I decided to move first and played d5 on move 15.

Turns out this was a mistake, but after some trades the position was even. However my g5 pawn was a weakness that my opponent targeted. I thought I could defend it with my Knight but on move 24, I realised that it couldn't be saved. However, it was only one pawn and White's King was exposed so perhaps I could still hold on.

On move 28, White put their Knight on f5 and I spied an opportunity. If I moved my Queen to f3, then when the Knight took my Bishop (which I presumed was my opponent's plan), I could give continuous checks to the White King and get out with a draw. But then I realised that White's target was actually h6, which they would take with check, exploiting the pin. My plan wouldn't work so I had no choice but to take the Knight with my Rook.

I saw that White would soon move their pawn to f6, so I decided to take my King out of danger of the pin. However, after I moved I realised that White could still play f6 and I was in fact in greater danger. It was too late to defend and I ended up quickly getting checkmated. My opponent went on to win the section with a score of 4.5/5.

The Great King Chase

In game 3, I again played the Ponziani against the 2nd highest seed in the section and again put my Queen on a4 to put pressure on Black. I should have played d4, keeping the pressure while developing my pieces but I took the pawn on move 4. I made a risky and aggressive move on move 6 by bringing out my Bishop. I was ready to bring my Rook in line with the enemy King and my Bishop had the potential for attacks on f7, so I felt I had a very strong attack. But when Black castled Queenside, all the pressure I built up faded away.

Now I was on the defensive, with few developed pieces and an uncastled King. My Queen got chased around the board as Black developed their pieces while I was still blocked in. I thought I might get some counterplay with my Rook against his Queen, but I ended up having to sacrifice it for the Knight to avoid checkmate.

By move 19, I was getting desperate and my only hope was to launch a pawn storm on the Queenside and hope to break through. To my surprise, my opponent sacrificed their Knight and then traded their Bishop, allowing me to line up my Queen and Bishop against his King. He was threatening my Rook but I was threatening his King and it seemed like I might have a chance of getting a repetition.

I spent a while trying to figure out the best approach. Playing b5 would open things for my Bishop to join the attack as well as giving me another way to check the King, but could I avoid to spend one turn not giving check? So instead I moved my Bishop to give check from g4 which turned out to be a huge blunder. I realised that the Queen could give check on g1 and win my Bishop so I had to waste a precious tempo in moving it back. Had I immediately played b5, if Black had taken the Rook then I would have gotten a draw.

I chased the Black King around the board with my Queen but he kept slipping away and had enough pawns to hide behind to stay safe. Even winning an exchange did little to close the massive material gap between us. I had hopes on move 40 that if Black took with the Bishop then I could give enough checks, but instead my opponent took with the Rook. This meant we were almost even in material - until he gave check and won my Bishop. I couldn't threaten his Bishop as that would get me mated, so I tried to run but the Black Queen soon caught me.

Sacrifice a Queen to win a Queen

In my 4th game, I faced an opponent I had played two years ago, so like then, I played the Sicilian against him. On move 7, he traded his Bishop for my Knight in order to double my pawns, I trade I was happy with as it strenghtened my dark-square Bishop. I was able to trade off some pieces and my doubled pawn, leaving me with open lines for my Bishop.

White's Knight was pinned by their Rook and I hoped to win it by moving my Queen to g5 on move 16 (also threatening mate) but it wasn't to be. I dodged some dangers (had White played g4 they would have eventually trapped my Queen) and the potential for a Queen-Rook fork on move 21. Instead White's Queen lined up behind their Knight and got ready for a discovered attack, so I prepared by defending my Bishop with my Rook.

On move 24, my opponent launched an attack but not where I was expecting. He sacrificed his Rook on f7 with the idea of winning it back leaving him up a pawn with my King exposed. Interestingly, the engine says that if he made the sacrifice a move earlier he was winning, but in this case it was a blunder. I gave the position a lot of thought and I realised that White's Queen was hanging so when I took his Knight on move 25, it wasn't a Queen sacrifice, it was a Queen trade.

As the dust settled after the trades, my Rook was still pinned but White couldn't add any extra pressure so even after losing the exchange, I was up a piece. White's Rook picked up two pawns, but so did my Bishop. However, I knew it was vital that we didn't trade too many pawns so I played b4 to preserve the pawn. Defending it with my Bishop was an ugly move but it was important to keep the pawn and not let White trade it for their a-pawn.

After that I used my Rook to put on pressure and prepared to slowly bring my King forward. This is why the extra pawn proved so valuable, the White King could defend the Kingside pawns or the a-pawn, but it couldn't do both. The White Rook gave me some checks, but by move 43, I was able to hide my King and potentially march it forward to pick up the Kingside pawns. My Rook was still threatening and my Bishop could join the attack so I just had too many targets that White couldn't defend against them all.

White had some final checkmate threats that I had to be aware of, but once I moved my King, my advantage was just too strong. My pawns couldn't be stopped from promoting so my opponent resigned.

Just hold the line

In my final game, I played against the highest seed in the section, a player with an intimidating rating of 1960. I knew there was no hope for me to win, so I went in with the simple plan of trading everything and going for a draw. I played a standard and unremarkable Italian opening and quickly traded off his Bishops for a Knight and Bishop.

My opponent got aggressive with the pawns on move 14 so I hit back with c6 to activate my Bishop. I got a little worried on move 19 that Black might be able to double my Kingside pawns if I didn't take with the Knight or win f2 if I did. But then I saw that if Black did take on f2, I could force a Queen trade and win a piece.

Instead, we traded off and I built up some pressure against his pawns while I held the opportunity for a discovered attack against his pinned Knight by moving my Bishop. I won 3 of his pawns and he won 2 and then I offered a draw. Not because I thought he would immediately accept but to let him know that I was up a pawn and was willing to sit back and play defensive. According to the engine, I missed a winning opportunity on move 25 by threatening the Knight and then sacrificing the Bishop, but the idea never crossed my mind, I was only aiming for a draw.

On move 29 I had a good move that chased the Black Queen away and seemed to leave the Knight potentially vulnerable. But I didn't see anything winning so I repeated and to my surprise, so did my opponent. After the game he told me that he would have gone for a repetition here, but to my regret I didn't repeat. Instead, I saw that the Knight had no safe spaces to move to, so I got excited and thought I was winning it. It turns out that the Knight was trapped but could sacrifice itself in a way that left my Bishop undefended. The trade almost certainly would have ended in a draw, but I didn't like how open it would leave me or my doubled pawns.

Instead I decided to keep the position as it was and I still could have gotten a draw if it wasn't for move 33. I decided to chase the Queen away and it didn't seem to matter whether I used the Queen or the Bishop. I decided the opportunity for a Queen trade was better but my opponent responded with a tactic that revealed I had made a terrible blunder. Black took with their Rook, a move I never considered, which defended their Queen while leaving mine undefended. I had just lost a piece.

The game wasn't completely lost, but I figured I couldn't just play defense because eventually Black would use their two Rooks and Knight against my pawns (although perhpas this was the best strategy). So I counter-attacked against g7. If I didn't have to spend a tempo on move 36 or if taking g7 was check, then it would have worked, but instead it ended with a trade off.

The game still wasn't over and I saw that it was vital to stop the Black Knight from getting to f3, the main way Black could attack. I made my move and then to my horror realised that I had moved to the wrong square. Out of tiredness after a long weekend, I had made the equivalence of an in-person mouse-slip and moved my Rook to a4 instead of a3. At this point, the game was over. I gave a series of checks and had hopes for a possible stalemate trick, but I couldn't stop mate.

Conclusion

Overall, I'm pleased with how the tournament went. Despite losing more than I won, I feel I did well against much higher rated opponents. I am disappointed that I narrowly missed out on a draw in the last game, but I'm pleased that I even got into that situation. I gained 14 points with a performance of 1772, one of my best tournament performances yet. Before this weekend, I had never faced a 1900, now I have faced 3 and played well against them all.