CHESS: A BUMBLED DRAW

I played a game at club level against Fritz Online and remembered that one needed a premium account to export files in PGN format. So I took a screenshot of the PGN displayed on Fritz Online and tried unsuccessfully to use OneNote and Google Docs to convert the image to text. Apparently it can be done but it defeated me. I turned to Google Keep and fortunately it was a very straightforward process. So I pasted the text into ChessX and things worked fine, so now I'm pasting the game into this blog. It's a game I should have won I'm sure but in the end was lucky not to lose, having overlooked a pin to my Queen from Fritz's Rook.

[Event "Casual Match"] [Site "Spring Hill"] [Date "2017.12.23"] [Round "4"] [White "Fritz: set to club player handicap"] [Black "Sean Reeves"] [Result "1/2-1/2"] [ECO "E15"] 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nf3 b6 4.g3 Ba6 5.Qc2 Bb7 6.Bg2 c5 7.e3 Nc6 8.0-0 Rc8 9.a3 h6 10.Nbd2 Be7 11.b3 0-0 12.Bb2 cxd4 13.exd4 Qc7 14.Rac1 Rcd8 15.Rfe1 g5 16.Ne5 Nxe5 17.dxe5 Nh7 18.Be4 Bxe4 19.Nxe4 Qc6 20.Rcd1 b5 21.c5 Rb8 22.b4 Ra8 23.Nd6 Rab8 24.Rd2 Rbd8 25.Red1 Kg7 26.g4 Kg8 27.Rd3 Rb8 28.Rh3 Kg7 29.Ne4 Rfe8 30.Rd6 Bxd6 31.exd6+ f6 32.Nxf6 Nxf6 33.Bxf6+ Kxf6 34.Rxh6+ Ke5 35.Qc3+ Kd5 36.Qd3+ Ke5 37.f4+ gxf4 38.Rh5+ Kf6 39.g5+ Ke5 40.g6+ Kf6 41.Rh6 Rg8 42.g7+ Kxg7 43.Qg6+ Kf8 44.Rh8 Rxh8 45.Qf6+ Kg8 46.Qg6+ Kf8 47.Qf6+ Kg8 48.Qg6+ Kf8 1/2-1/2

It would seem that 39.g5+ was not the best move and that better would have been 39.Qh7 after which it's clearly curtains for Fritz. White has the luxury of not being able to be checked by the Black Queen, even though quite exposed. The g pawn is a shield against the Black Rook but this pawn was lost when I followed the line that I did.

CHESS: Holding On

This is the position that I reached after White's 41st move against Fritz set to Master Level. Here are the moves:

I'd managed to maintain material equality but I'd been in defensive mode for most of the game, and I still was. I was certainly on the back foot. My three pieces were on the back rank and there were various threats looming. I decided to take a break from the game and analyse the situation before proceeding. Fritz's analysis showed that the best way forward for Black was to play 41...exf4, although White still maintains the advantage. The suggested continuation was:

This sequence of moves leads to the following position (constructed using ChessX):

The frustration for Black is that he can't play (in the first position) Nc6 to drive away the White Rook because the b pawn is then lost. In the continuation described, Black does play Nc6 but at a later date. In any case, the key move for Black to regain some sort of offensive does seem to lie with 41...exf4.

Chess Diagrams

In the last few months, my interest in Chess has been rekindled in large part due to http://en.chessbase.com/ and the associated online Fritz Chess Program. However, only premium users of ChessBase can make use of the feature that allows the setting up of positions, important when following through an analysis provided in a chess book. For example, I have a book called 101 Chess Endgame Tips by Steve Giddins. Here is a typical position in which White must try to draw the game and not lose it.

I could not see how to set up the position in either the chess program that comes with macOS or Stockfish that I had downloaded. So I downloaded a program called ChessX, an open source program that I found at sourceforge and found that I was able to set the position easily and play it through as outlined in the book. This is a very useful feature. 

The position above leads with proper play to White having the opposition against the Black King and therefore securing a draw. The proper play is: 

1. Kg3!! Kc2 2. Kf2! d2 3. Kf1! Kd1 4. Kf2 Kd2 5. Kf1 Kd3 6. Ke1 Kc4 7. Kd2 Kb5 8. Kc3 Kxb6 9. Kb4 and White has the opposition and draws. Ultimately, the position will end up as shown below where White must be careful to retreat to b1 where the opposition can be maintained whether Black chooses to move the King to a3 or b3.