Nieuws

Tegen het sterker ingeschatte Rijswijk wist DD 1 de tweede overwinning van dit seizoen te scoren. Anders dan in eerdere seizoenen (toen DD 3 in de promotieklasse) lijkt handhaving in de hoogste klasse van de HSB inmiddels een reële kans. De wedstrijd tegen Rijswijk bleef tot het laatste moment spannend, toen Elmar Hommes een tijdsnoodsduel tegen Rob van Helvoort met succes (en een beetje geluk) in het voordeel van DD kon afronden.

Alexandr shares his disaster with us: "I played in a very aggressive style (don't know really why, I am feeling extremely creative in chess this season, so I lose a lot of games). In the opening with some tactical exchange I sacrificed the piece temporarily but could get it back. This combination brought me full pawn, which was already passed and menacing on d6. The only problem that this pawn was not easy to defend. As the position was crazy, there were many tactical ways to play and I went on to do it wrong. I tried to sacrifice a piece for the second time to get connected pawns in the center. My opponent got it right and immediately sacrificed two pawns back in front of the king, but importantly didn't allow the pawns to connect. We went into a very complex position as a result with piece vs 3 pawns imbalance.  On top, black king was about to be mated. My opponent defended amazingly well (after all, he is nearly 2200 rated), but used all his time to defend against all king of threats and was playing on increment since around move 25. I had still 40 min left and crazy position on the board. So, I was very positive about the outcome. However, in the time trouble my opponent started to do one best move after another while my choices were not perfect. The game was always around balance but from being slightly better for white it drifted to slightly better for black. The last position before my star blunder:

One of the features of this position is Rxh7 mate, so white was not able to take my rook on b3. If only I could bring this rook to the attack somehow to support other very strong pieces! After I decided that my rook can't really join, I decided to offer it on b4. I calculated some lines after 32. Rxb4, axb4. 33. e4! or 32. Rxb4, Bxd6. 33. Rd7! Bxb4. 34. e4! Both variations sounded quite interesting to me. I am still material down, but who cares! e4 was looking so strong, cuts off the bishop, and sometimes goes to e5! We actually could not conclude during the analysis who was standing better... So, i went on to do my move and I did 32. e4!?? To my horror, I noticed that I forgot to take the knight first. 32. ...Nxd5 followed. The most important piece of mine is gone, mate is not threatened anymore and the rooks are hanging now. This is just losing immediately, as I am just two pieces down with no compensation. From -0.8 evaluation drops to -9.0, so it is like blundering a full queen in one move."