Be Alert!

 

    A while back I was facing an online opponent who happens to be rated around 2100 OTB and met his Petroff Defense with 3.Nc3 hoping to transpose into the Four Knights Game but he opted to play 3…Bc5 (they always do!) and I was out of my book knowledge. 
     Things went pretty well and the game was dead even until the early middlegame. That’s when I couldn’t come up with any ideas and started playing slightly inferior moves while he built up his position on the Q-side where both our Kings happened to be. The result of this drifting on my part was that  I was soon hopelessly lost. I was about to resign, but then noticed a threat…my first one in the entire game. Fortunately Black fumbled and fell into a mating net. A lucky escape.