Redressing the balance

My last league game of 2017 was in the CCF Superleague for Castles. We were playing against King Pawns, a team which I've enjoyed ridiculous luck against over and over and over again. They must be sick of me by now! Nevertheless their superior depth made them favourites: 187-170, 180-165, 99-162, 93-147.

Whilst the 4NCL had taken my 'live' FIDE rating over 2000 for the second time, I had to win this game to finally get it up in lights. Black against Nick Edwards (165/1863) wouldn't be the easiest way of doing it, since I always get bad positions against him, but pride was at stake against a Wallington club-mate. It would be an understatement to say that I rode my luck at times, but the King Pawns voodoo prevailed in the end:

Perhaps it would be best to just laugh and move onto the next game, but let's linger. Our opponents could console themselves with the match, since we could 'only' draw an even more lost position on the board above me, so 1½-2½ (DWLL) once again. Perhaps this is the year we finally get relegated to an appropriate division!

My very uncharacteristic opening choice didn't work in the end, but if I'd found a good 12th move it could have been a very different story. Ultimately the gamble failed, and my own weaknesses made themselves felt. Playing this sort of chess places a burden on each side which proved too much for either of us to bear: the damage caused by his strolling king was cancelled out by me missing 14. Nge2 and allowing him to reach the middlegame. After that came an endgame among the very worst I've ever been involved in. After I wasted 4 tempi transferring my king from a perfect position to the wrong side of the board, White lost control of my imagined counterplay and even let me trick him into a lost pawn ending.

I wrote against Jackson above that "all one can do is believe, be stubborn, avoid any further stupid mistakes, and above all keep giving the other side hoops to jump through - maybe the stress will tell in the end" and I stand by that advice. After the reverses I've had this season, I felt I deserved a break eventually - and this was what was necessary to finally beat Nick for the first time!

And with that, it was time to take a break for a month. I was behind the information desk at the London Chess Classic for the third and final time, and utterly exhausted by the end, crippled for a fortnight afterwards by a monster cold. All those hours as a spectator are great for restoring the chess hunger though, and I revived just in time to return to the board after Christmas. Truly the only cure is the next tournament...