Author: Shay Bushinsky
Date: 23:47:07 09/08/98
Zifroni vs Junior 5.0
=====================
Junior 5.0 scored today (Sep. 8th 1998) a 1.5-0.5 victory in a two
game exhibition match against Israel's Dov Zifroni.
The match took place in the "Sharon" hotel, located in the city
of Herzelia (near Tel-Aviv) and was part of the Herzelia International
Chess Festival.
The opponent, International Master Dov Zifroni (FIDE 2505), is
considered to be one of Israel's emerging chess talents.
Dov, who is now a full time Economics and Law student at the Tel-Aviv
university, had recently won the Czerniak Memorial International
tournament
(FIDE Cat. 10) earning a second grandmaster norm.
He had also been the best performing player in the last European team
championship (held in Belgium) scoring 100%.
The match included two games and the time control was one hour per
player per game. Junior 5.0 was a slightly modified version of the one
that recently played grandmaster Yudasin. It was operated on a
PII/333Mhz
using 40MB for hash. Following are some first hand comments from the
games. You can find the complete game scores appended.
Game 1
------
In game one, Junior had the white pieces and played the English
opening. At move 9, Junior had a "hard time" preferring d5 over dxe5 -
unconventionally closing the position. This decision had turned
out to be in favor of black; While white made some lifeless pawn moves
on the queen side, Zifroni mounted his pieces against the castled white
king
playing: . Ng6, Bh3 and Qg4.
After black had exchanged white's fianchetoed bishop followed by
Nh5 (threatening f5) it looked as if black has a dangerous attack
against
white's king.
Yet Junior found 18. Ne2 and after the foreseen 18...f5 Junior answered
19. h3!
forcing the liquidation of black's attacking pieces. Interesting to see
that if
black would of replied with 19. fxe4 the forced line: 20. hxg4 exd3 21.
gxh5 dxe2
22. Rfe1 Bxe3 21. fxe3 Ne7 22. Rxe2 would of ended in a similar
"drawish" position.
Game 2
------
Game two was well known theory until about move 18 when Junior chose
to
exchange rooks rather than to play rd8 to exert more pressure on the
isolated
center pawn. Just when the game looked like it is heading to another
draw, Zifroni tried to "push things a bit" with 26. Qe4?! permitting the
strong reply 26... b4! taking the advantage. By move 28. white had
tactical
problems trying to defend the pawns on d4 and on b2. White erred playing
28. Qc2?
Junior expected either: 28. Qe2 Bxd4 29. Qa6! (threatening Qa8+) g6
30. Qa8+ Kg7 31. Qe8 Nd5 and white is not worse or: 28. Qd3 (same idea)
g6 29. Qa6 and if Qxb2 30. Qxa4 Qc3 31. Qb3 with an equal evaluation or
29... Kg7 30. Qa8 Nf5 31. Qe8 and black is slightly better
another option for white is: 29. Qa3 Qxa3 30. bxa3 Nd5 and black is
better.
Zifroni missed the powerful 33... Nf5! threatening Nd6 forcing the push
of the extra C pawn and thus felt obligated to walk into a queens
endgame striving to stop the passing extra C pawn
But Junior showed good technique using white's king checks to bring
its king to the aid of the C pawn thus deciding the game.
Never the less, a quick Junior home analysis shows that white
may have missed a draw. Instead of 47. Qb5+? better must be: 47. Qd8+!
and if 47... Kc5 48. Qa5+ Kd4 49. Qa1+ c3 50. Qa4+ and now if Kd3 51.
Qd1+ draws. If instead 47... Ke5 then 48. Qh8+ and the pawn becomes
beyond the black king's reach.
-------
Zifroni's comments after the match were extremely positive:
"I enjoyed playing Junior - It was my first experience playing it
and I found it interesting - I will be looking for more opportunities
to do so in the future!"
Amir felt that the games were "clean" and that Junior performed
well.
As a closing comment I would like to thank the Herzelia municipality
for sponsoring the event, especially Dr. Shlomo Kandelstein the chief
organizer and of course our opponent Dov Zifroni. Thanks to Packard
Bell for providing the hardware for the match.
-- Shay Bushinsky
[Event "International Chess Festival"]
[Site "Herzelia, Israel"]
[Date "8.9.98"]
[Round "1"]
[White "Junior"]
[Black "D. Zifroni"]
[Result "1/2-1/2"]
1. c4 e5 2. Nc3 Nf6 3. Nf3 Nc6 4. g3 Bc5 5. Bg2 d6 6. O-O O-O
7. e3 a6 8. d4 Ba7 9. d5 Ne7 10. Qd3 h6 11. a3 Bd7 12. b3 Qc8
13. a4 Ng6 14. e4 Bh3 15. Kh1 Qg4 16. Be3 Bxg2 17. Kxg2 Nh5 18. Ne2 f5
19. h3 Qxe4 20. Qxe4 fxe4 21. Nd2 Bxe3 22. fxe3 Rxf1 23. Rxf1 Nf6 24. a5
c6 25. Nc3 cxd5 26. Nxd5 Nxd5 27. cxd5 Ne7 28. Rd1 Nf5 29. Re1
1/2-1/2
[Event "International Chess Festival"]
[Site "Herzelia, Israel"]
[Date "8.9.98"]
[Round "2"]
[White "D. Zifroni"]
[Black "Junior"]
[Result "0-1"]
1. Nf3 d5 2. d4 Nf6 3. c4 e6 4. Nc3 Be7 5. Bg5 h6 6. Bxf6 Bxf6
7. e3 O-O 8. Rc1 c6 9. Bd3 Nd7 10. O-O dxc4 11. Bxc4 e5 12. h3 exd4
13. exd4 Nb6 14. Bb3 Re8 15. Re1 Bf5 16. Qd2 Qd6 17. Rxe8 Rxe8 18. Re1
Rxe1 19. Qxe1 Kf8 20. Ne4 Bxe4 21. Qxe4 a5 22. a3 a4 23. Ba2 Nd5 24. Qc2
b5
25. g3 Ne7 26. Qe4 b4 27. axb4 Qxb4 28. Qc2 Bxd4 29. Nxd4 Qxd4 30. Kg2
g6 31. Bc4 Kg7 32. Qxa4 Qxb2 33. Qd1 Nf5 34. Qf3 c5 35. Bxf7 Kxf7 36. g4
Qf6 37. gxf5 Qg5 38. Kf1 Qxf5 39. Qb7 Kf6 40. Kg2 h5 41. Qc6 Kg5 42. Qd6
Qe4
43. Kg1 c4 44. Qd8 Kf5 45. Qf8 Ke6 46. Qe8 Kd5 47. Qb5 Kd4 48. Qb6 Kc3
49. Qa5 Kd3 50. Qa6 Kd2 51. Qd6 Qd3 52. Qf4 Kd1 53. Qb8 c3 54. Qb3 Ke2
55. Qe6 Kd2 56. Qa2 c2 57. h4 Ke2 58. Qe6 Kd1
0-1
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