Author: Jeroen Noomen
Date: 04:34:38 01/03/98
Go up one level in this thread
On January 03, 1998 at 04:20:02, Jeroen Noomen wrote: >Yesterday the first matchgame between Karpov and Anand took place. >A very interesting position occurred after the 25th move: > >Karpov-Anand (1) Slav Defence >------------------------------ >1. d4 d5 2. c4 c6 3. Nf3 Nf6 4. Nc3 e6 5. e3 Nbd7 6. Bd3 dxc4 7. Bxc4 >b5 8. Bd3 Bb7 9. 0-0 a6 10. e4 c5 11. d5 Qc7 12. Bc2 c4 13. dxe6 fxe6 >14. Nd4 Nc5 15. Qe2 Bd6 16. f4 e5 17. Ndxb5! (This appears to be much >stronger than Nf5) axb5 18. Nxb5 Qb6 19. Nxd6+ Qxd6 20. fxe5 Qxe5 21. >Rf5 Qe7 22. Qxc4 (Karpov was still playing very quickly, so I suppose >this was all in his home preparation) > >22. ... Rc8 First interesting moment. I analysed the game in progress > with Rebel 9 and it hesitated between Nfd7 and Ncd7. > Rc8 never came up. Is there a program that plays Rc8? Rebel 9's actual choice was Ncd7. Not Nfd7?, this loses because of Bg5. My mistake, actually the choice between Ncd7 and Nfd7 came at the next move. I did some testing with The King 2.54 on a Pentium 200 MMX: It likes 22 ... Ncxe4 (depth = 10), although this seems very risky to me. Variation: 22 ...Ncxe4 23 Bf4,Rc8 24 Qb5+,Kf8 +0.42 for Black. After 22 ... Ncd7!? The King gives 23 Bd2!? with the idea of Bb4. Still, the score is only -0.17 for White (depth = 10). >23. Qb5 Ncd7 Here 23 ... Nfd7 is an alternative. According to The King there follows 24 Bg5,Qe6 25 Rd1!, score +0.37 in favour of White. >24. Qxb7 Rxc2 >25. Bg5 Qd6!! This is what it is all about! Rebel plays Qxe4 or > alternatively Rf8, but that seems to fail to save the > game. F.e. 25 ... Qxe4 26 Qxe4 Nxe4 27 Re1 and the > resulting pin is awsome for Black. This last statement is correct. After 27 Re1,Rc4 28 b3!,Rd4 29 Rf2! (Or Bh4!? Rebel 9),h6 30 Rd2!,Rb4 31 a3,hxg5 32 axb4,Ndf6 33 Rd4 the ending should be winning for White. Still, I didn't find a convincing refutation of Rebel's second choice 25 ... Rf8!? After f.e. 26 Re1,Qe6! (The King) Black intends Qb6+ or Kf7-g8 with a very obscure position. Is there a win somewhere after 25 ... Rf8? >26. Qa8+ Kf7! Of course, this is the point! Somehow Anand managed > to find something at the board, sidestepping the > home-analysis of Karpov! I am very impressed. The King and Rebel favour 26 ... Qb8 27 Qxb8 Nxb8 28 Bxf6 gxf6. I suspect this might be better for White, but is it really that much!? >27. Qxh8 Qd4+ >28. Kh1 Qxe4 >29. Rf3 Rxg2!! Beautiful! >30. Kxg2 Ne5 >31. Qxg7+!! A fantastic shot by Karpov, still leading to a better > endgame for White. Rebel and The King play this as well. >31. ... Kxg7 >32. Bxf6 Kg6 Perhaps Kh6 is better, but I didnot analyse this deeply. >33. Bxe5 Qxe5 >34. Rg1! > >Now Anand managed to win the White b-pawn, leading to a very difficult >endgame. After more than 100 moves Karpov went on to win it. Actually Anand won the a-pawn, not the b-pawn. >My question: What do other programs think of 22. ... Rc8, 25 ... Qxe4 >25 ... Rf8, 25 ... Qd6!! and 26 ... Kf7! ? Amir, Robert, Thorsten, Chris, Don and others: What do your programs think of these interesting positions? Regards, Jeroen
This page took 0 seconds to execute
Last modified: Thu, 15 Apr 21 08:11:13 -0700
Current Computer Chess Club Forums at Talkchess. This site by Sean Mintz.