First Round Excitement and Jitters

Welcome everyone to the Queens Pioneers' Blog. I appreciate everyone who is taking the time to read this :) This is IM Alex Lenderman from the Queens Pioneers Team, along with two other IM's Eli Vovsha, Dmitry Schneider, and our manager GM Alex Stripunsky. This is my first year in the US Chess League, and I think this was a good year for me to start playing in it as I seem to finally have the ability to have more fun when I play chess. The league seems to be a good way to do this, playing in a nice, calm setting while also a competitive and "wanting to win" atmosphere. Even before our first match I felt some jitters, as while I have some experience playing in team events, like Amateur East once a year, I never had played in anything quite of this nature, where every game is against a strong master.

I didn't even know whether I would be playing in our first match, but fortunately Alex Stripunsky put me in, and I was eager to get started, get the jitters out of the way, and to play the best that I could from the beginning. I knew I was playing a very dangerous and experienced International Master, Richard Costigan, from Philadelphia. I was White and based on rating, with more than a 200 point advantage, it seemed like a must win for me from a team perspective. However, I really did not want to look at it that way. For me, it was about doing the best I could in giving my A-game under all circumstances and not worrying about the result too much and also keeping close tabs on how my teammates were doing. I knew that Richard has had some great results in the league against some very strong players like Charbonneau, Krush, Zaikov, etc..., with Black, so I knew it would be no easy task, especially given that I traditionally have a bad history against players who I don't know well. Fortunately, here I was able to prepare ahead of time and was very happy with my preparation, as having been able to find all of Richard's games, I felt I had a good grasp of what he was comfortable and uncomfortable with. He is a Semi-Slav player against d4 and c4, and against e4, he plays both e5 and the Scandinavian. I figured Richard would prepare for me and would know that I usually play e4, and since lately I have been working on widening my repertoire, it looked like a great time to play d4. This would be something unexpected, and I decided on playing a safe Semi-Slav line where I felt I would likely have a slight advantage no matter what he played since I'd have the lines worked out ahead of time.

It started off as planned, with 1. d4!? d5 2. c4 c6 3. Nf3!? (Nc3 e6) Nf6 4. Nc3 and now 4... g6!? This was quite surprising, but a little disappointing. Richard must have had the sense that I had prepared for him so he played a less popular line as I haven't seen a single game from him before in this line. I know when people generally play g6 intending Bg7 while playing e6 as well, it tends to create distinct weaknesses, especially on f6 after the pin with Bg5, so I decided to pursue a plan to hopefully exploit that. I played 5. cxd5!? cxd5 (Nxd5 e4) 6. Qb3! (Probably the best move in the position), keeping both Bg5 and Bf4 as possibilities while also making a very useful move, pressuring d5, and hindering the development of the c8 bishop, which often has trouble in these Queen Pawn openings. 6... Bg7?! then followed which I felt gave me an easy road as I think 6... Nc6!? 7. Bg5 Na5! seems more interesting where I'm not sure if White has much of an advantage. It continued 7. Bg5 Be6 (if instead 7... e6 8. e4! dxe4 9. Bb5+! +/- as Black then has too many weaknesses). Richard's move was more interesting, his intention seemed to be instead of playing a torturous position where he would have to defend, to go all out for complications and hope for the best. He then sacrificed a Rook after 8. Qxb7 with 8... O-O!? (8... Nbd7 9. Bf4 stopping Rb8 gives White a big advantage with a healthy pawn). This made the position quite stressful for me for the rest of the game, but I was fortunate to have good defensive resources and some good moves up my sleeve as I was able to hold the Rook. Things were pretty crazy for the rest of the game, but I tried to remain calm, use my time, and calculate everything appropriately. You can find the rest of the game here, and if you have any questions for me or about the game, feel free to send me an email or post a comment here :)

This game was a grind, and I give Richard a lot of credit for his brave, uncompromising play which made the game exciting and made me work hard for the win. Luckily, it all paid off for the team as I was able to score the first point in the match, which we ended up winning by a close 2.5 - 1.5. Even though everyone was telling me beforehand that my game was a must-win, had I had taken that approach, I might have put too much pressure on myself and not have played a great game. Always remember, all that matters is that you do your best :) I'm looking forward to writing my next blog :)

Alex Lenderman