In this article I will commence, in earnest, my analysis of the game I began looking at in The Wrong Strategy. In that article I just gave the moves of the game and some very brief and general comments. Here I want to pick things up after white’s 14th move: 14.g4.
In my previous article I criticised this move by white, because white is (in my opinion) attacking too early. Note that white is not fully developed - the king is still in the centre; with pawns having been moved on the queen’s side of the board, it is unclear where the white king will find safety. White is presumably relying on attacking with the king still in the middle of the board (which is possible in some positions although, I fear, not this one), but black has an initiative on the queen’s side, and the oncoming pawns there are threatening to rip open the position. White may be thinking of castling king’s side, but I think this too is very risky: the centre is not permanently closed, because black still has the …e6-e5 pawn break (or …f5-f4 if white plays gf) available in reserve.
By comparison, my pieces are not fully developed either, but my king is relatively safe, and so action on the queen’s side can proceed.
The first diagram shows the position after 14.g4, and the starting positions for discussion.
Here, in the game, I played 14.f4, not wanting to allow the opening of the g-file. However, what I failed to realise was that I was worrying about nothing! It will take white too long to organise enough pressure down the open file for it to be a problem. In the meantime white will have to worry about black’s counter-play.
Fritz has many suggestions at this point, but the one I like best is the simple 14…Rb8. For example:
14…Rb8 15.Ng3 b4 16.gxf5 exf5 17.Rg1 bxc3 18.bxc3 Rb2 (black need not hurry to take the pawn on c6!) 19.Nh5 Rf7 - see second diagram.
White seems to be in a lot of difficulty here, because I can see no way to defend white’s c6 pawn, which black’s e4 knight is about to take. Mind you, I can’t see that there is any hurry to take this pawn even now - black can just take the pawn or make further build up moves!
Note that black can not play 17.Rb1 (to oppose the infiltration of black’s rook), because of 17…bxa3 18.bxa3 Nxc3 - see third diagram.
Soon I will come back to this position and take a deeper look. However, so far it looks like I missed a simple and effective opportunity in this game.
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I think you should consider white exchanging on b4 instead of allowing you to capture on b3. E.g. 17.cxb4.
Alan,
Yes I should. When I first looked at this line I made the mistake of thinking that white taking on b4 just makes things easier for black. However, following your comment I looked at the lines, and realised it isn’t quite so easy! I’ll take a look in an article fairly soon.
- Mark.