Monday, April 16, 2012

Ding Liren Attacking Masterpiece

White to play.
I have been studying IQP attacking patterns with Isolani Strategy: Strengths and Weaknesses of the Isolated Queen's Pawn (Russian Chess House 2012).  So when I came across the game Ding Liren - Lu Shanglei, Chinese Chess Championship 2012, I was really impressed.  Here is a game that combines a number of very typical isolani motifs into a brilliant tactical display.  IM Hector Leyva has annotated the game very nicely at InforChess, albeit in Spanish.  Worth a look.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

It seems to me that 15...hxg6 was a mistake. Kf7 would have rendered white powerless. Chess engines consider the position almost equal, though, and suggest taking the knight. Later analysis shows that coordinated attacks from white would have forced black to free the rook path or be left a piece down.

17...Bxg5 also seemed a terrible blunder. Instead of bringing their own piece into the game, they enable the opponent's. Chess engines say it's ok to take the bishop because of Rf1-f3, which leads at best to another game a piece down for black.

Funny enough, the computer thinks the only problematic move of black's was 21...Nf8. Bringing the queen to f8 would have, again, lost a piece, but avoided mate for a while.

Thanks for the game. It really is beautiful to try to see what you would have done better than a chess master, only to find out why your solutions would have been wrong.

Michael Goeller said...

This game was chosen as the Best of Informant #114.