The French Connection - Part One

 County matches, with their generous provision of time (35 moves in 1hr 45mins + 30mins QPF) do seem to lend themselves to a thoughtful, deep, struggle of a game. The Winawer Poisoned Pawn Variation seems guaranteed to lead to just such a confrontation. My endgames are often so feeble that I wonder if I could have converted the ending at a slower speed. In any case, this line is arguably slightly less sound a gambit that its more notorious Najdorf cousin (1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 d6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Nxd4 Nf6 5. Nc3 a6 6. Bg5 e6 7. f4 Qb6!? 8. Qd2!? Qxb2) and I believe that theory gives white a slim advantage, though it must be lovingly nurtured to avoid catastrophe (see an early blog post from October 2011, showing Young-Doran, e2e4 Gatwick R2.) Here, my opponent is unwise to allow me to trade Queens, but the ending that resulted proved surprisingly difficult. His loss of a second pawn is unfortunate but sets the stage for a delightful conclusion.

 In evaluating my performance: my opening was fine (my opening knowledge went just as far as my database's did, ie: 13... b6!?.) Unusually for this line, I didn't really need to defend except at the very end, when I found the important move 48. Bf2. The committal strategic decision 24. Bxf5 is difficult to call but I still think that on balance it's right. I liked the Queenside play I initiated in the run-up to the time control (the position after 36 moves is a pretty one in my eyes) but I missed a glaring chance to conclude it naturally, 37. Ra8!, yet it still told in the end, with the sub-optimal but nonetheless strong 44. Ra1. That part of the game illustrates the value of active Rooks in endings, and the mating net constructed at the end is also, in my opinon, a nice one.

 The above game, whilst useful in completing Surrey's 12.5-3.5 rout of Essex (to squeeze in my beloved context, it was a home match in the U-140 division which my county currently tops, we had a big grading advantage especially on the lower boards, and lost not a single game), wasn't really my type of French. When I got another one 2 days later, I was able to have some fun...