Last week I left you with this teaser. Appropriately enough, there was a split in opinion. So let's go through what actually happened.
34... Qa1+
I'm a big fan of prophylaxis. So why didn't I employ it here? I should be playing to my strengths, right? Well, this was approaching 3pm on a 4NCL Sunday and the trains were up the creek. I had an offer of a lift to Nuneaton from somebody who had already finished and I knew that, were I to carry on playing past 4pm, I'd lose it. Cabs are expensive, I'm a student. Bite me. The team were going to lose, so I could afford to be selfish.
But yet the engines say this is the best way to play. Mind you, they're fairly selfish too.
35. Kf2 Qb2+ 36. Kg3 Qxc3 37. Qe8+ Kh7 38. Qxf7
Again, there are two clear-cut options here. One is to nab e3 and deprive white of their passer but, in so doing, lose a6. The sequence goes 38... Qxe3 39. Qf5+ Kg8 40. Qc8+ Kh7 41. Qxa6. The other way to play is to simply stop any perpetual fruit. Something like 38... Qe5+.
Split or steal?
Hope that the b pawn will be decisive
Keep the tension this time
4 comments:
OK, I looked long enough to get a gut feeling+little bit of analysis.
My first thought was I wanted to centralise my queen with ... Qe5 but then I thought I wanted rid of the epawn which could cause problems later on and take control of some potentially important squares (f5, for example, if White advances with e3-e4)
After ... Qxe3/Qf5+ Kg8/Qc8+ Kh7/Qxa6 I liked ... b5-b4. My pawn's rolling and while my king is obviously potentially open on the light squares there's no check this move.
Then I thought, why does White take the pawn? Can't he just go ...Qxe3/Qf5+ Kg8/Qc8+ Kh7/Qf5+?
Because of that possibility I decided to play ... Qe5. If I were you, though, I wouldn't take my word for it that that's the best choice.
I'll bag the pawn on e3. Yes, there will be a few checks to deal with but the queen seems to deal with them: Qf5+ Kg8 Qc8+ Kf7 Qb7+ Qe7, for example. Or Qf5+ Kg8 Qc8+ Kf7 Qf5+ Ke7 and that's the end of the perpetual banana. For now.
Bear in mind I'm replying to this from my phone in the Mendips. If white repeats after Kh7, I think black simply goes to f7 instead. It's more vulnerable there but is in pole position for a race to the c file should the queens come off.
It's also worth bearing in mind that, given the transport situation, I wanted to win within an hour - maybe 12 moves or so.
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