12 thoughts on “Major Open: week 1 games

  1. Nice writeup, interesting games. I agree though that you should try to play out interesting positions. You’ve definitely got a solid positional play style and good preparation, even if just a little more would have maybe given you an even better standing here or there, but you can of course never prepare for everything.

    1. Thanks. I appreciate your thought about my style – that’s one of the things I’m interested in learning about while reviewing these games.

  2. I had breakfast every day with your round 2 opponent. His take on the game was that he used a very normal approach in the English and Black just collapsed without ever getting any decent threats going. There’s an old game which is worth looking up to see how Black can make those positions work. It was between Keene (yes that Keene) and the late Stein of the Soviet Union. It was played in the Hastings 1967/68 tournament. There have always been allegations about that tournament that the 4 GMs of whom Stein was obviously one and Keene wasn’t, had come to an agreement that they would share places first to fourth. The Keene game was one that Stein had to win. In those days Keene was considered an expert on those English positions and was writing a decent book (Flank Openings) on them and other Nf3 or c4 things.

    Here’s a link to the game http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1158250

    1. I think in general the kingside attack plan is often not the best one in these English KID positions. Dembo suggests a central approach with c6 and d5 in some lines, though the game you’ve linked me to looks like a good example of a kingside attack working.

    1. Yes. I thought that keeping the bishops on with e.g. 38…Bf7 wouldn’t leave me any real winning chances, and 38…Bxe4 seems to be a draw too.

  3. It appears (to me anyway) you’d be a tempo up if 38…Bxe4 Hopefully you’ll reach a similar juncture again and can try it out 🙂

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