You talk about stressful, strange nights… I got to the match quite a bit early, thought I’d help Matt set up, and What do I see? Everything already set up and ready to go. Wow, I thought, Matt is on his game today. Then, I find out that USCL commissioner, and world traveler, IM Greg Shahade is going to pay us a visit. My first thoughts, darn, no Fritz display on the back wall of the playing room… for our audience only… players aren’t allowed to look up. My next thought, what did we do wrong? Did someone complain? Is Jorge going to be fined?

As it turned out, all the anxiety was for naught, as the minute I met Greg, I felt as if I had known him for years. He is an amazingly charismatic person and very easy to like. Not at all the !@#$%$# that Jorge and Matt had described to us. He even lowered himself to engage me in a game of 5-minute chess, which, of course, I was obliged to loose… league rule 1406.7… “no person associated with any team shall upstage the commissioner”.

But, for all his friendliness, Greg definitely has an air of authority about him. For example, he immediately claimed Chris Bird’s spot in the back of the room as his own and began setting up his PC. Well, Chris was furious and objected to being relegated to the back room. Whereupon, Greg threatened to forfeit our third board, Marc Esserman, if Chris insisted on yapping further… league rule, 1309.6… “the commissioner may forfeit anyone, anytime he wants, for any reason.”

With that resolved, Greg… or the “Commish”, as he likes to be called (actually, he asked us to call him Sir.)… settled in to monitor league games and observe what was to be a closely contested match between the Boston Blitz and the Baltimore Kingfishers. Then came the Commish’s next demand… “I need food! I’m starving!”… no problem Sir… pizza was on order… league rule, 1735.6… “If the commissioner visits a league site, his favorite food must be provided by that site’s host.”

Mercifully, the match started… and a furious machine-gun tapping could be heard from the Commish’s corner of the room. Who knew the Commish had taken a speed typing course… would it disturb the players?… not at all, in fact, it turned out to be Boston’s secret weapon in this very close match.

The first to take advantage of this secret weapon was fourth board and noise sensitive NM Ilay Krasik…
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I arrived early for this match only to find that Matt had setup even earlier and, to my surprise, Jorge was there as well.  Now this is unusual, I thought, as Jorge tends to appear just before the start of the game or even late.  He was pacing a bit and thinking.  “What’s the plan?”, I asked.  “I’m thinking of playing a Najdorf,” he countered.  Then tentatively added… “Only thing is, I could get mated…”

I didn’t know at the time if this plan of all out aggression was a good or bad thing; but, it seemed catchy… as the players arrived, they all seemed strangely determined and focused.  I wasn’t worried about Jorge’s little joke… he was loose as always.  But, other team members seemed a little tight… even angry… and no joking.

Just before the match was to start, we were all standing outside and Matt offered, “Good luck with Sergey.”… as Jorge opened the playing room door.  “Sergey?” Jorge questioned.  “Yeah, Sergey is his name.”…  Jorge looked incredulously toward the ground as he turned to enter… “Not Sergey” he mumbled.

I wondered… had he prepared for the wrong Erenburg?

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I found myself daydreaming, in almost a trance-like state, during this match with the Baltimore Kingfishers. Why? Because I was watching the very strange and tense struggle between SM Jorge Sammour-Hasbun and FM Tegshsuren Enkhbat. Don’t try to say this at home; we are professionals.

I was thinking… what a strange and pretty style Jorge has… yes, “pretty.” I could only think to compare it to Muhammed Ali… and all of a sudden… I was in Zaire and the crowd was chanting… “Ali! Ali! Ali!” A younger Ali would dance and drop his left daring his opponent to throw the right haymaker… then he would lean back avoiding the blow and whirl his right in big circles shouting “that all you got, Sucka?!” Then a flick of a jab and a quick right and, BOOM!, the fight was over…

Whoa! Sorry, I’m back now. What’s this got to do with Jorge’s game? Well, let’s take things in order today. First to finish was NM Vadim Martirosov’s game with WGM Katerina Rohonyan. Vadim looked to be winning a pawn in my favorite position…

position after 14…Rde8

Now White can win a pawn after 15.dxc4 as Black cannot recapture due to the Knight fork at d6. Now if 15…Bc6 then 16.Bf6 (see Larry Christianson and Vadim in the analysis video) eliminating the two bishops with advantage.

Vadim chose to win a pawn in a different and slightly and more dangerous way. From the diagram he played 15.Qh5 Bc6 (there is no good way to defend the pawn) 16.Qxf7 Qxf7 17.Nd6+ Kd7 18.Nxf7. White has won a pawn, but he has trouble extricating the knight and eventually cannot hold on to his extra pawn, finally ending up in a drawn bishop of opposite color endgame. (Score 0.5 – 0.5)

GM Larry Christiansen’s game with GM Pavel Blehm was an “edge-of-the-seater”. Just as I would say “Now, how’s he going to win this?” Larry would make another startling move to keep the edge. Check out my favorite positions…

position after 25.f5!

What a brilliant concept. Larry seems to specialize in this break (see his week 2 game with GM Ibragimov). Now if 25…exf5, Larry picks up the kingside pawns and keeps the attack after trading rooks and checking on h8 with the queen. And, if 25….gxf5, White has a big edge, for example, 26.Rh4 Kg8 27.Rh5! and White wins.

So, GM Blehm played 25…e5 to stop the onslaught leading eventually to…

position after 32.f3!

Of course, Black loses the king and pawn ending if he trades… Why didn’t I see that? It would have made me more relaxed. At least I could have left my seat to get a coffee.

Finally, the game boiled down to this winning (for White) king and pawn ending. Larry was a little low on time. Yet, normally, he wouldn’t miss it. He confessed after the game that he was a bit tired after all the work he has been doing on the World Championship tournament. Take a look…

position after 50.h5!

Another great move by Larry. Now, GM Blehm was forced to play 50…b4 because 50… gxh5 51.axb5! simply wins for White.

After 50…b4 Larry quickly played 51.h6 which only draws. Do you see the win? Neither did anyone at the match. But, Fritz shows that 51.hxg6! is a winner… leading, through various move orders, to the position below…

Analysis position

If I knew how to spell Zugzwang, I would say this is such a position. Black must advance his pawns… b3+ after which White will take and soon check on f7 winning. Too bad… but, still, a great game, Larry. (Score 1-1)

Now, on to Ali’s… I mean Jorge’s game. Boy it’s hard to get out of a fantasy. First, Jorge drop’s his left… daring his opponent to land the big right, in my favorite position…

position after 11…h4

I don’t think I have ever seen this position arise out of a d-pawn opening. Jorge offers a pawn and his opponent, FM Enkhbat, takes it… leading to some dancing. By that I mean Jorge seems to make unusual moves and let’s his clock run down… Why? He is just one of the best speed players in the country (heck… the world) yet he seems to get into time trouble on purpose… I swear… that’s the dancing part. He makes his opponent think he can win, as he explained jokingly after the match… “First you trick ‘em, then you stick ‘em!” (Typical Ali tactic, let your opponent pile up points while you dance!)

All the dancing leads to this position…

position after 19…c5

White is in no real danger here. He is up a pawn and the game is just about level. Yet, White is lured into trying to “trick” his all too tricky opponent.

And after, 20.e3 cxd4, White mistakenly recaptures with the Queen because he thinks that Black has not seen far enough… 21.Qxd4 Nc6 22.Na4

position after 22.Na4

White is threatening mate with Nb6+ but Black merely leans back while whirling his right and thinking… “that all you got, Sucka?!”

I remember that I was thinking after each move in this series… “Oh, Jorge wins… No! Jorge loses… Oh, no Jorge wins… etc…” Well, it was late and I couldn’t think straight. But, you get the idea… I never saw Jorge’s great move… 22…Nxe5! 23.Nb6+ Kc7 24.Nxd7 Nf3+ 25.Kd1 Nxd4 26.Nxf8

Which brings us to the coup de grâce… that’s French… and probably spelled wrong.

position after 26.Nxf8

The trick… Black plays 26…Nf3 and White’s knight is doomed.

Of course, a flick of the jab… then a quick right… and BOOM! Down goes Enkhbat. All I can remember now is hearing the crowd chanting… “Jorge! Jorge! Jorge!” (Score Boston up 2-1)

This put a lot of pressure on Ilya to draw his game and win the match. Ilya has been in a bit of a slump… in his own words… “too much Internet and not enough over the board” has made him a bit rusty. Of course, Matt handicaps Ilya by always making him play Black… probably because he is a grinder as we see in the hedgehog position below from his game with WIM Tsaagan Batsettseg.

position after 18…d5

Black has played what should be the equalizer. White tries to confuse things with 19.cxd5 exd5 20.Bf4 Bd6 (perhaps 20…Qa8 is safer) 21.Bg5… threatening to win the knight.

position after 21.Bg5

During the game, I thought that the piece sacrifice 21…dxe4 would give winning chances for Black and, at least, keep things dynamically equal. Fritz thinks (yes, Fritz is alive) that either 21…Be5 or 21…dxe4 would be slightly better for Black. Let’s look at what could happen after the piece sacrifice…

21…dxe4 22.Bxf6 Nxf6 23.Qxf6 exf3 24.Nxf3? Be7 trapping the queen (both 25.Qe5 or 25.Qd4 is met by 25…Bc5)

Analysis

position after 24…Be7

I think I’ve said this about Ilya’s last game… who, but a computer, or a GM, could see all this… a case of playing too good for your own good.

If you’re not a computer, you would probably play as Ilya did, saving the knight with 24…Nh5, but leading to a much inferior, and eventually losing, endgame. A good game by both Ilya and his opponent WIM Batsettseg. Match drawn, 2-2.

See you next Wednesday, our Monday night match was moved.

I’m off to my fantasy world… where was I?… Oh yeah…