Rediscovering the Evans Gambit

When I started playing chess seriously in the mid 1980's, the Evans Gambit was well an truly a sideline opening. Rarely seen at the top level, the general consensus was that Lasker's Defence had put it our of business long ago. In fact the only player in my immediate circle who used it as a regular weapon was David Austin, who had some quite good victories with it.
The status of the Evans suddenly changed when Kasparov dusted it off and used it as a surprise weapon against his top 10 rivals. Suddenly it was back in fashion, at least for a while. But once the novelty wore off, it again declined in popularity, possibly condemned  by the cold hard logic of the modern analysis engine.
To be fair, the other reason it tends not to get played is that 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 isn't always met by 3. ... Bc5. 3. ... Nf6 is a more fighting response, so much so that 3.d4 is now often the mainline if 3.Bb5 is not played (again Kasparov had a big hand in this).
But just today I reached a position where I could play an Evan's, albeit via 2.Bc4. Initially I was surprised I even got to this position, and despite not being a serious Evan's player myself, the temptation to play 4.b4 was just to great. Fortunately I remembered enough of the general ideas behind the opening (sac all your pawns!) to play the obvious moves, and with a little help from my opponent scored a win in a manner that shows how dangerous it can really be as an opening.


Press,Shaun - Unger,David [C52]
Street Chess, 05.09.2015

Watch the closing doors

The 2015 World Under 20 Championships is under way in Khanty-Mansiysk, and while I am sure the chess will be of a pretty high standard, the highlight for me so far are the tournament reports. "Watch the Closing Doors" was the headline from round 2, and I assumed this prefaced a story of some unfortunate GM being mangled by an automated building, but I was wrong.
"Watch the closing doors" was a chess expression that I was previously unaware of, as was the need to "slam the wicket", which was part of the same comment. I am assuming that the 'author' of these wonderful expressions was probably an automated translator, and that the whole thing made a lot more sense in Russian. Nonetheless, without making fun of the hard working bulletin editors, I recommend checking out the tournament bulletins at http://wjcc2015.fide.com/ , both the see how the tournament is going, and to revel in the colourful prose used to bring these games to life.

Aronian wins 2015 Sinquefield Cup

Lev Aronian has won the 2015 Sinquefield Cyp after a final round draw with Veselin Topalov. Going into the last round with a full point lead, Aronian put himself out of reach of the chasing pack after Topalov took a draw by perpetual. This lead to a few more draws with Carlsen, Giri and Vachier Lagrave all getting to equal second after halving out. The other player to join them was Hikaru Nakaumra, who beat Alexander Grischuk in a game that had a very interesting finish.
The win for Aronian seems to be a popular one, with most chess fans applauding one of the nice guys of elite chess (although most of the top 10 could be considered 'nice' these days). After a poor run of form over the last 12 months ot so, the win by Aronian adds yet another factor into the 'who will play Carlsen' question.

Nakamura,Hi (2814) - Grischuk,A (2771) [B51]
3rd Sinquefield Cup 2015 Saint Louis USA (9), 31.08.2015

Spring is here

Ah spring. For some people the 1st of September signals the return of warm weather (in the Southern Hemisphere), unless you happen to live somewhere like Canberra. Spring in Canberra is a bit of a trap, where the first 6 weeks are almost as cold as winter, then it gets windy for a bit, and then summer turns up 5 weeks early!
But because we adhere to a set of seasons that kind of make sense in London*, Spring also marks the return to outdoors play for Street Chess. Ignoring the fact that it is probably colder in the first 2 weekends of September than the last 2 weekends in August, Street Chess will once again be played in City Walk, Canberra City. My tip for people planning to play in the next few weeks, dress like Scott of the Antarctic. But if you cannot do that, be prepared to invest in plenty of mulled wine and hot chocolate.

(* I actually heard a suggestion on the radio this morning that Australia should move to a 6 season system, with the Winter/Spring crossover being called Sprinter!)

The queen versus bits

This mornings (Canberra time) round of the Sinquefield Cup saw a number of interesting games, with Aronian taking a full point lead after beating Nakamura, and Carlsen losing to Grischuk. At the bottom end of the table the Anand v So game was also interesting, with Anand giving up his queen for rook and piece. Despite materialistic chess engines thinking this was a bad deal for Anand, he did have plenty of weak pawns to target and the game ended in a draw.
Of ten the decision to make a trade like this depends on two factors. Either you hope to co-ordinate your remaining pieces, or you hope to target the weaknesses in your opponents position. If you can do both then the end result may be in your favour, but if you have one but not the other, a draw may instead be the outcome.
In the following classic game Richard Reti plays a Queen for Rook and Minor exchange, banking on his connected rooks and active minor pieces to provide him with play. He even gets some threats against the White King, but with Rubinstein is able to cover any weak points,the game eventually ends in a draw, as Black is clearly taking a repetition.


Rubinstein,Akiba - Reti,Richard [E68]
London BCF Congress London (1), 1922

Andras who?

GM Simon Williams is a very witty and entertaining writer, as well as producing a large number of videos of his chess exploits. Often he will take on challengers on chess.com, recording both the games, and his running commentary. He seems to be a good sport about this, as playing and talking can often be quite difficult to do at the same time.
In one recent video however, he met his when paired against IM sendmeyourbestgames. At first Williams had no idea who he was playing, but even when he did find out, he still didn't know who he was up against. What he was unaware of, was the IM sendmeyourbestgames was in fact Canberra IM Andras Toth. That he was up against quite a strong player slowly dawned on Williams as he went down to two quick defeats. Even in the third game he was on the back foot for most of it, until Toth blundered into a mate, allowing Williams to at least finish with some dignity.
The video is quite fun to watch, and Williams was very gracious in his defeats. Apart from the comedy vale, they also contains a number of good tips on playing certain openings (The Dutch, not the Kings Indian, and the Dragon), and what to do, and not to do, when you are going down in flame.
There are a whole series of these clips btw and after you watch this one (embedded below) who might want to check out the clip of Williams playing the Bongcloud opening on a dare!

Your morning hack

From last nights Sinquefield Cup


So,Wesley (2779) - Nakamura,Hikaru (2814) [E99]
3rd Sinquefield Cup 2015 Saint Louis USA (6.4), 29.08.2015