Donal’s mad game!

For those of you that might have missed this in the comments, here is Dob’s mad game anotated by his opponent, Ciaran Ruane, from our recent match against St Benildus.

Ciaran Ruane (1552) v Dónal O’Boyle (1631), Heidenfeld Trophy, 01/02/2004

1.e4 e6 2.d4 a6
Out of book on move 2. Hurray!

3.Nc3 b5 4.Bd3
Strangely, I had played this position before; in an Ennis game in 2009. I didn’t remember it though.

4…c5 5.d5
I wasn’t sure what to play here. 5.dxc5 Bxc5 just helps Black develop and 5.Nf3 cxd4 6.Nxd4 looked a little off to me with the bishop on d3, though this turns out to be a common line in the Kan Sicilian. Seeing as he hasn’t developed any pieces, trying to open the centre seemed logical.

5…Bb7 6.Nf3 b4 7.dxe6 (D)
I didn’t see the need to go for 7.Ne2 exd5 8.exd5 Bxd5 though after 9.Nf4 Bb7 10.0-0 my lead in development must be at least enough compensation for the pawn. (More than enough according to the computer, and better than what I played).

Taking the knight looked very dangerous so I expected something like 7…dxe6 8.Ne2 Nf6 9.Ng3 which I thought should be fine for me.

7…bxc3?
“Let’s have some fun” said my opponent. And he was right!

8.exf7+ Kxf7 9.Ne5+ Ke7 10.Bc4
This was as far as I’d calculated before leaving the knight hanging. 10.Qh5 is hit with 10…Qe8 which looks annoying.

10…Qa5?!
I’d expected something like 10…cxb2 11.Bxb2 Qa5+ 12.c3 (The computer prefers 12.Kf1) 12…d5 (This is a horrible move; the open e-file and d-pawn will do for Black’s king. 12…Nh6 is much better and leaves the position roughly even according to the computer) 13.exd5 when the position is still weird but the second pawn and wide open Black king should be good for me.

11.b3
I wanted to play 11.b4 to stop the discovered check with tempo but I thought that after 11…Qxb4 the attack on the bishop would stop Nf7 but the computer finds the fantastic 12.Rb1 winning the bishop on b7 as 12…Qxb1 loses to 13.Bg5+ Nf6 14.Qxb1 with the bishop hanging and Nf7 still threatened.

11…Nf6 12.Nf7 d5
We’d used a combined 2 1/4 hours at the stage. After 12 moves!

13.Nxh8 dxc4 14.e5 (D)
I thought this was really strong (and the computer agrees gratifyingly, telling me that I’m 4 pawns better). My basic plan is to make his knight move so that I can play Qh5 and get my knight out of the corner. With approximate material equality, his king wide open and his queenside pawns comically bad, I’d have to be better.

(KB note – at this stage, neither player bought his opponent a pint of Guinness. Down with that sort of thing! As an aside, isolated tripled pawns are genuinely known as an Irish pawn formation, with the internet suggesting that this may be a reference to the Holy Trinity, or may be a Paddy Irishman-type joke, or there’s a story that Éamon Keogh was involved, as he so often is. Chess is strange.)

14…Ne4
The knight doesn’t have any good squares to go to. 14…Nd5 is no improvement with 15.Qf3 and 16.Bg5 coming. 14…Ne8 and 14…Nfd7 allow 15.Bg5+ when Black is in huge trouble and probably getting checkmated. The computer actually wants to give up the knight and play 14…Qc7 which makes some sense, getting the queen back into the game, but isn’t an easy move to play and anyway White is still much better.

15.Qf3
Pinning the knight onto the loose bishop and threatening 16.Qf7+

15…Nd7
Otherwise one or other of the bishops will hang after Qf7

16.Qf7+ Kd8 17.e6
But now the knight hangs instead.

17…Be7 18.exd7 Kxd7 19.Qf5+
So with an extra exchange, safer king and better pawns, you’d think this would be a handy win but against the bishop pair and the advanced c3-pawn, it’s not as trivial as it might seem.

19…Kc7 20.Bf4+ Kb6 21.Qd7 (D)
KB note – it was around about here that Drogheda’s board 2 commented that the position was as if all the pieces had been thrown up in the air and landed at random.

Bd8 22.Nf7 Ka7 23.0-0 Qb6 24.Nd6?!
This was probably a mistake. 24.Nxd8, getting rid of the bishop instead of the knight, makes more sense.

24…Nxd6 25.Qxd6 cxb3 26.Qxb6+ Kxb6 27.axb3 Be4
Now his bishop pair is a bit tricky to deal with.

28.Rac1 Bf6 29.Rfe1 Bf5 30.Be5 Bg5 31.f4 Bh6 32.g3 g5 33.Kf2
33.Bxc3 gxf4 didn’t look so good, especially with only 15 minutes left. Computers of course don’t care about time trouble and 34.Re5 fxg3 35.Rf1 Bg6 36.Rf6+ Kc7 37.hxg3 is handy enough for White apparently.

33…Rd8 34.Red1 gxf4 35.gxf4
A swap of rooks is inevitable as Rd6+ winning the bishop is a threat. The c3-pawn is doomed now too so the win should be easy from here.

35…Rd2+ 36.Rxd2 cxd2
My opponent had only two minutes left at this stage, and his next move loses a piece.

37.Rd1 Bxc2 38.Rxd2 Bxb3 39.Rd6+ Kb5 40.Rxh6 Bc2 41.Rh5 Kb4 42.f5 1-0