Author: Jim Monaghan
Date: 18:46:53 05/14/02
Hi everyone,
In Horizon's current series of test games, the following game was recently
played:
[Event "Computer chess game"]
[Site "JUBBY"]
[Date "2002.05.02"]
[Round "2"]
[White "Horizon 3.1"]
[Black "King of Kings 2.02"]
[Result "1-0"]
[TimeControl "40/900"]
1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 d6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Nxd4 Nf6 5. Nc3 a6 6. f3 e5 7. Nb3 Be6 8.
Be3 Be7 9. Qd2 Nbd7 10. g4 h6 11. O-O-O b5 12. h4 Nb6 13. Qf2 Nfd7 14. Kb1
Qc7 15. Nd5 Bxd5 16. exd5 Nc4 17. f4 a5 18. fxe5 dxe5 19. Nd2 Nxb2 20. Kxb2
Ba3+ 21. Kxa3 Qc3+ 22. Nb3 a4 23. Ba7 axb3 24. Rh3 bxc2+ 25. Rxc3 b4+ 26.
Kxb4 cxd1=Q 27. Bb5 Qxg4+ 28. Rc4 Qg6 29. Qc5 Qf5 30. Ka5 h5 31. a4 Rf8 32.
Qb6 Ke7 33. Rc7 Rfd8 34. Qb7 e4 35. Bc6 Rxa7+ 36. Qxa7 Ke8 37. Kb4 Qg4 38.
d6 e3+ 39. Ka3 Qg6 40. Qxe3+ Qe6 41. Bxd7+ Rxd7 42. Rc8+ Rd8 43. Qxe6+
fxe6 44. Rxd8+
{Black resigns} 1-0
In this position:
[D] r3k2r/2qnbpp1/7p/pp1Pp3/2n3PP/4B3/PPPN1Q2/1K1R1B1R b kq - 1 19
KOK 2.02 uncorked 19... Nxb2!? A speculative knight sacrifice in the style of
Tal. A sequence of forced moves followed. Then:
[D] r3k2r/B2n1pp1/7p/1p1Pp3/6PP/Kpq5/P1P2Q2/3R1B1R w kq - 0 23
Hori's 24. Rh3!? giving up a rook is surprising. Engines like Yace and Crafty
consider this to be a serious error. What's amazing is that Hori's king
continues to march up the queenside. Black "thinks" it's up a number of pawns.
But, in reality, Hori establishes a devasting pin on the black knight. This ties
KOK up, his QR is blocked off on the a-file and his KR is locked in by his king
who is busy defending the pinned knight. Hori's king is safely surrounded by
friendly pieces and the BQ cannot attack alone. In the end, the pin proves KOK's
undoing.
A few questions/comments:
A) Is KOK's 19... Nxb2?! a correct sacrifice? Or should the solid 19... Nxe3
have been played?
B) Is Hori's 24. Rh3!? a valid defense? Or should the prosaic 24. axb3 have been
played?
C) In this position:
[D] r3k2r/B2n1pp1/7p/1B1Pp3/1K4PP/2R5/P4Q2/3q4 b kq - 0 27
I think KOK should have castled and gave back the knight with a wild, but
perhaps roughly level position. Instead he played 27... Qxg4+? and after 28.
Rc4 the BQ moved to 28... Qg6 and the opportunity to castle was lost after
Hori's 29. Qc5!
So, I believe that (A) and (B) above were played correctly by both engines. The
losing error occured at Black's 27th. But I'm not sure ... The game was played
on an AMD Athalon 1.6. My Cel-300 :-( and me are not sure on the above
evaluations.
A really amazing game. Not at all easy for engines to evaluate.
Kind Regards,
Jim
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