In the previous post, we had an example of what we could call “active prophylaxis”. In that particular example, the king move was defensive but also offensive, as it created a threat.
The position we are going to study in this post is, in my opinion, a fairly difficult exercise. The way I see things, exercises can be really nasty - you can only see a snapshot of the game, contrarily to the players who knew what they were thinking before reaching the position. A friend of mine gave the wrong assessment of the position suggesting that White was better. Indeed, White has a strong initiative and Black has to be careful - yet, I knew that Black should not be worse because all the previous moves I played were pretty principled ones; he could not know this, but I did.
Let’s start our assessment trying to understand why White has a powerful initiative [for the sacrificed pawn]. The reasons are multiple. 1) He already completed the development and his pieces are more active than mines, and 2) Black’s queen is almost trapped. This is the typical position where your sense of danger should turn on. For White, is enough to play g3 and h4 to force Black’s queen to h6 and then strike with the powerful Bc1. Bang! We don’t want that to happen, but how to stop it? My friend could not see a way and therefore, suggested to simplify the position with 1…Bxe5 2.Bxe5. The problem is that in the arising position now White is indeed better. For example, 2…Nd7 3.Bc3 Nf8 4.g3 Ng6 5.Bg2 Qc5 6.h4 looks a bit claustrophobic for Black.
The good news is that, although dangerous, the idea of g3-h4-Bc1 is slow and Black has time to react. Notice that we are again mixing in our reasoning several tools: evaluation, calculation, method of comparison, and prophylaxis. I enjoyed it very much when I found the move over the board, and my opponent - a Hungarian IM, seemed to be impressed too. I played 1…Na4! defensive prophylaxis.
The point is that the bishop cannot threaten to go in c1 and defend the knight at the same time. He has to make a decision, as 2.Bc1 is effectively answered by 2…Qxe5, White opted for 2.Ba1 Bd7 starting to reorganise my undeveloped pieces, 3.g3 Bxe5. Now we can capture the knight, as after 4.Bxe5 Be8 my rooks are connected and my bishop is not along the way [possibly 4…f6 or 4…Qe7 could have been even better].
White has to demonstrate that his initiative is not gone and that he still has compensation for the pawn. The game continued with 5.Qc2 Nb6 6.Qb2 Rd7 7.h4 Qg6 8.h5 Qg5 9.Bf4 Qf6 10.Re5 Rad8 11.Kg2.
If my calculation and my evaluation were more precise, I would have seen that Black can win a second pawn fearlessly with 11…Rxd3 12.Rxd3 Rxd3 13.Be2 Nxc4 14.Qa1 Nxe5 15.Bxe5 Qd8 16.Bxd3 Qxd3 17.Bxg7. I stopped here and missed that I can win another pawn with 17…Qd5+ Kxh5 and there is no reason to fear any checkmate on g7 because of Qg6 next.
Instead, I fear ghosts and played 11…h6?!
Black still has a slight advantage, but nothing more than that, and the game ended in a draw.
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