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  • Wednesday, June 22, 2022

    Make 'em sweat. Play Basman's Defense

     
         English IM Michael Basman (March 16, 1946) is a prolific writer who has made a lot of contributions to the field of openings. 
         What I like about Basman is that he is particularly known for playing bizarre openings in his own games. Stuff like the St. George Defense (1.e4 a6), the Grob (1.g4), the Creepy Crawly (a3, h3 followed by a quick c4) and the Basman Defense, aka the Borg Defense (1...g5). 
         Besides the Grob which I have played for years, I also like the Basman Defense and play both of them a lot on Chess Hotel. Of course, they both severely weaken the K-side, but the Basman more so because black is already a tempo behind. 
         According to Modern Chess Openings black is only somewhat worse, but that doesn't seem right! One source I looked at asserted that the data gives white a very high chance of winning (almost 59 percent), while black only has a 41 percent chance of winning. That doesn't seem right either because the drawing percentage is zero! 
         Whatever the percentages are I'm convinced that against average players Basman's Defense is not all that bad because they often seem to get totally bewildered when they face it. All in all, it's not a bad defense to keep in your back pocket. 
         The following wacky game is a good example of the kind of fun you can expect when you meet 1.e4 with 1...g5. A game that I liked (Komodo 14)
    GuestTartajubow0–1B00Chess Hotel2022Stockfish 15
    Basman's Defense 1.e4 g5 2.f3 I have met this unusual move a number of times. Stockfish thinks it's OK, but I am always happy to see it. 2.d3 h6 3.c3 g7 4.g3 d6 5.g2 c5 6.ge2 f6 7.0-0 c6 and a draw was agreed. Zelcic,R (2540) -Palac,M (2545) Pula 1998 2.c4 e6 3.d4 a6 4.a4 g7 5.c3 c6 6.e3 h6 7.ge2 d6 8.g3 f6 9.d2 e5 10.d5 e7 and a draw was agreed. Finocchiaro, G (2064)-Faraoni,E (2085) Savigliano 2009 2.d4 This is the usual move and I think it's probably the best. g7 2...h6 3.c3 g7 4.e3 d6 5.d2 c6 6.0-0-0 a6 favors white. Collins,S (2387) -Williams,S (2427) West Bromwich 2004 3.xg5 c5 4.e3 b6 5.f3 Better is 5.Nc3 xb2 6.bd2 cxd4 7.c4 Now, of course, black should play 7...Qc4+ when white would be only slightly better. In the game I chose the crazy Q-sacrifice 7...dxe3 and after many mistakes by both side I eventually won. 2...g4 2...h6 3.c4 f6 4.d3 g7 5.e5 d5 6.xd5 xd5 7.c3 Very, very poor play by white! At least he realized he was quite lost here and resigned! Reed,A-Beilby,K Brisbane 2006 2...g7 3.d4 Yes, taking the P was better. d6 4.e2 a6 5.0-0 d7 6.e3 c5 7.c3 b5 8.dxc5 dxc5 9.c2 b7 10.d1 c7 11.a4 c4 White is better. Madsen,S-Andersen,D (1997) Esbjerg 2007 3.g1 Technically there's nothing wrong with this, but retrograde development can't be good! The best try is 3.Ne5 3.e5 h5 Also acceptable is 3...Nf6 4.d4 d6 5.c4 g7 White is slightly better. 3...d5 4.e5 Better was 4,exd5 d4 I'm proud of this which is also Stockfish's preferred move. Both Ps put a kink in white's efforts to develop his pieces. 5.e2 5.h3 This is actually his best try, but after c6 6.hxg4 xe5 black is doing quite well. 5...h5 Hoping to eventually bust open the K-side and tear his King limb from limb. 5...d5 looked inviting, but fortunately, thanks to white's next move, it's even more effective on move 6. 6.xg4 xg4 7.xg4 The g-Pawn is defended, so... xe5+ the position is equal. 6.f4 His best bet was still 6.,h3 d5 The threat to his g-Pawn is a nasty one. 7.f1 As with his 3rd move retrograde development can't be good so 7.Kf1 is certainly better although white's position is pretty ugly after either move. d3 Question mark! This move is over-finessing. Developing with 7...Nc6 or 7... Bc5 were better options. 8.cxd3 This is just plain bad because his B is locked in. Best is 8.Nc3 and if I retreat the Q white plays 9.Bxd3 and at least the B is freed and he can develop the N. If I play 8...dxc2 after 9.Qxc2 and the Q has to retreat. White can then play 10.d4. In either case his position would be slightly better. f5 9.c3 d7 Black has compensation for the loss of time. White's P on d3 hinders his development. 10.e4 With his position already cramped the sin of moving a piece a second time in the opening is exacerbated. 10.d4 c6 11.b5 Black is a P down, but has compensation in his active position. 10...c6 Hoping to play the juicy ...Nb4 which white prevents. 11.a3 0-0-0 12.e2 h4 This is in line with the plan of busting open the K-side and tearing his King limb from limb mentioned on move 5, but it was not the strongest move according to the engine. 12...xd3 This attacks the N on e4 and there is really no good way to defend it. 13.2c3 d4 14.e2 14.b5 xe4 15.xe4 xe4+ 16.e2 xe2+ 17.xe2 black has won a piece. 14...b6 Stockfish assigns black about a 1.5 P advantage here, but in reality it's probably about half that and there is no clear way for black to continue. Therefore, practically speaking, I still like 12...h4 13.b4 xd3 14.2c3 14.c5 was just a smidgen better. c4 15.b2 e6 16.b3 xb3 17.xb3 White is getting untangled and the danger of an attack on his K has disappeared. 14...xe4 Of course retreating the Q to d4 keeps the pressure on, but this crazy Queen sacrifice looked like too much fun to pass up. 15.xd3 It was surprising to discover in the postmortem that white's advantage is only about one Pawn according to Stockfish. Komodo 14 on the other hand puts white's advantage at two Pawns. That, too, was surprising because Komodo's evaluation is usually about half ogf Stockfish's. xd3 16.e2 This is a mistake because now the evaluation by Stockfish drops to 0.00. 16.xg4+ e6 17.f3 f5 18.e4 d4 White has picked up a P and black has no real threats. 16...e6 17.0-0 h6 18.f2 Better was 18.Bb2 f5 19.b3 This loses the game because it leaves the N undefended. Black is now able to generate a very strong attack while white has two pieces (the B and R) that are nothing but bystanders. 19.b2 g3 This is what I would have played, but Stockfish likes 19...Be7 which leads to nothing definite. 20.hxg3 hxg3 21.f3 xe2 22.xe2 h4 23.e4 e7 24.d3 dh8 25.f1 Black has no effective way of continuing the attack and white is just slightly better. 19...g3 20.f3 xe2 Materially black has two Ns and a B for the Q, more than enough compensation, but more importantly, white's R, B and Q sontribute nothing to the defense. 21.e3 cd4 Adding the other N to the fray. 22.c3 xe3 23.xe3 I now have a R, B and N vs. the Q...an even better material advantage than before. gxh2+ 24.xh2 h3 25.gxh3 g4 Black can win in a number of ways. 25...g8 is also good. 26.b2 f3+ 27.h1 xd2 28.c3 According to the engine best is 28.Qxd2, but only because it avoids an immediate mate. c2 29.c1 xc1+ 30.xc1 c4 and I'm informed that black has a mate in 11. 26.b2 f5 27.c3 27.f2 eventually loses the Q. xh3+ 28.g2 h4+ 29.g1 e7 30.d4 g8 31.f1 f5 32.e2 d3+ 33.d1 h1+ 27...xh3+ 28.xh3 xh3 29.xh3 The complications are over and black, a piece up, can win as he chooses. d3+ 30.g4 Black mates in 5, but retreating to g2 loses the B. g3+ Obvious. The problem is I only had about 90 seconds left on the clock. The time limit was 8 minutes plus 2 seconds. 31.h5 h3+ This gained two seconds! Black still has a mate in 5, but the B has to join the battle to pull it off. 31...e7 32.g1 xg1 33.d3 g6 34.a4 g7# 32.g4 g3+ 33.h5 Here I had to use some of my remaining time to figure out that I needed the B in the action, but I still didn't see a mate and my opponent, who had about 2.5 minutes, was moving instantly. I began wondering if I was going to lose on time! e7 It's mate in 3, but I still didn't see it. 34.c1 g6 I had about 10 seconds left. 34...g7+ was my intended move, but I realized he slips out of the mating net after 35.h6 and with only seconds left there was no way I could move fast enough to avoid running out of time in a completely won position. 35.d4 35.xc7+ delays mate one move. xc7 mate next move. 35...g7# Just for fun I ran a Chessbase Centipawn analysis on this game and the scores were: White Centipawn loss = 72 (Average), Black Centipawn loss = 25 (Expert/Master). Pretty meaningless for one game, but interesting nonetheless. 0–1

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