Thursday, April 13, 2017

2017 Red Bull Round 4 Jerry Baker, 2130 - Anton Taylor, 1999 Nimzo-Larsen Indian (A01)

2017 Red Bull Round 4
Jerry Baker, 2130 - Anton Taylor, 1999 
Nimzo-Larsen Indian (A01)

1. b3 Once again Jerry uses his primary Larsen weapon. I naturally respond with the "Indian Knight" move as I have had success with it against b3. 1. ... Nf6 2. Bb2 e6 3. c4 d5 4. e3 c6 This move seems solid but not particularly energetic or challenging to white. I have to be careful of falling into slav lines that I do not know well by transposition. Jerry stays in Larsen territory so he probably doesn't know the Slav lines either from his side. 5. Nf3 Nbd7 6. Nc3 Bd6 7. d4 O-O 8. Bd3 Re8 9. O-O e5 I was very uncertain of this natural advance during the game. As it turns out there are some Grandmaster games in the position after e5. On the shoulders of giants here. 10. dxe5 Nxe5 11. Nxe5 Bxe5 12. Qc2 There is a game between Karpov and Gelfand where Karpov plays 12. Be2 here. This doesn't seem to change the assessment much. It is an equal position with chances for both sides. Jerry's Qc2 is also in the database but here we begin to diverge from masterful chess together. 12. ... Qc7 13. h3 dxc4 14. Bxc4 b5!? Black must find a way to get the pawns rolling or his majority will mean very little. Komodo of course thinks the idea is inferior to other moves but I like it from a practical and energetic viewpoint. 15. Be2 Bb7 16. Bf3 a6 17. Rac1 c5 18. Nxb5?? A terrible miscalculation. This game came immediately after Jerry had taken a beating in the previous round. He was moving quickly and I'd say with a great deal of certainty he was experiencing what you might call a "blow-up". It was not his day. 18. ... axb5 19. Bxe5 Rxe5 Now he sees that he will not regain the piece (as he would have had I played 19. ... Qxe5??). 20. Bxb7 Qxb7 21. Rfd1 h6 Not the greatest move but a good practical move to remove all the back rank ideas from white's head. It would be sad to play well as get back rank mated in time trouble at the end. 22. Rd3 Rc8 23. Rcd1 Ree8 24. f3 c4 25. bxc4 bxc4 26. Rd4 Qb6 27. Kh1 And in a time scramble we play on for several more moves and I hold things together. 0-1

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