However, disaster struck for us when two players never showed up for a lift. As a captain of various teams this has always been my worst nightmare; this was the first time it had come true, and attempts to contact them by mobile came to nothing. Later it transpired that there was one case of crossed wires and one of amnesia, but that had to wait until the next day. For now, we were in a huge hole, 0-2 down in a 6-board match before a move had been played. Our only consolation was that in normal circumstances we would be big favourites: 209-191, e180-177, 186-177, 159-152, Def-158, Def-145. Indeed, they responded to our reduced number by switching their boards 4 and 5; the alternative pairing would have been a lot more dangerous.
As it was, I played a junior, Matthew Wilson (152), who is one of our 4NCL players. Recently I'd had the opportunity to see him in action at the 4NCL Rapidplay, where he played the board below me in the team section. Whilst I had to admit he was resourceful, this was only because he had to be: some of the positions he got out of the opening were simply appalling, and his games were anything but elegant. The stories I'd heard of Downend B's previous league matches tended to reinforce this view, but I tried to temper my gut feeling that I should win if we played: that was rapidplay, his league performance was almost 170, and I was wary of being drowned in tactical tricks (his apparent strength) if I failed to get something substantial from the opening. But no point wondering: with our self-imposed handicap I could hardly do anything other than go all-out for victory:
If you'd offered me a 3-3 draw (WWDDLL) whilst I was in the car sans two of my players, I'd have taken it. But it is obvious that we could easily have had more, or less, if the game had followed a more natural course.
My collection of chess books perhaps has a disproportionate number of games collections, and I've identified two types. The first is comprised of games where the hero wipes out everyone in sight with a series of fantastic blows, usually against relative unknowns (Cafferty's books on Tal and Spassky spring to mind). I've said before that my favourite books of this genre are by Fischer and Botvinnik. They have the odd brilliancy too of course, but the games they show are hard-fought, bitter struggles all the way; sometimes they draw or even lose. Of course, no-one would put this in a best-game collection - the technique from both sides was just too poor - but chess is a fight, and this was certainly a toughly-contested game.
It's fair to say I was provoked by the opening - my desire to punish it resulted in the rushed ...d5 break, whereas the quieter ...Nh5/...f5 plan would have been sounder whilst still serving my desire to push forwards. It's annoying that my insistence on forcing the play resurfaced here; I thought I had cured the problem but it's always lurking, waiting for when I'm a little wound-up. A few moves, some dodgy calculation and a lot of wasted thinking time later, I found myself a pawn down for almost nothing. Now I finally started playing!
I would be a much stronger player if I could access my elusive top gear in positions that aren't close to lost, but this is another longstanding ailment. Here my persistence did the trick; apparently the situation created enough pressure for white to lose his way, as I got back into the game and even reached a won Rook endgame - but by then, the adrenaline rush of my fight for survival had worn off, and the last push to convert it proved beyond me. This scenario is a particularly painful one - knowing what the outcome should be (the textbook example is a vintage one) but not how to bring it about is quite embarrassing. Later I tracked down this scenario in Levenfish/Smyslov, who, sure enough, use Alekhine-Capablanca as their model. Essentially, I was following the right path before I inexplicably erred with the ...a4+/...Kb4 plan; instead the natural ...Rf5 would have won, as demonstrated in the notes. So close and yet so far...
All told, not a game worthy of gracing the top division of a local league, but it's worth just as much to the match result as the higher-quality encounters. I decided to save myself as a reserve for our next match, which we lost 2.5-3.5 to South Bristol A a few days ago. All being well, I shall be back in action tomorrow, when we return to Downend to take on their A-team.
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