Curtains vs PoG

[TimM]

xorbie:

[ QUOTE ]
16...d4
17. Qf3 Re1
18. Rd1 Ne4

[/ QUOTE ]

19.Bb2 is bad (19...Ng5!) but he has 19.Be3 winning our d-pawn because of the pin against our queen.

Strega:

[ QUOTE ]
Two pawn islands vs four, ouch... could be bad.

[/ QUOTE ]

Yeah but one of our islands is a passed extra pawn that will be hard to win back. And we have alternatives too.

Stephen H:

[ QUOTE ]
What happens after
16 ... d4
17 Qf3 Qd5

[/ QUOTE ]

Both of those lines after 18.Qxd5 and 18.Rd1 look good for white. Our d-pawn is very weak. If we do play d4 it needs to give us something very quickly or we will just lose that pawn. If we can't get his queen off that f3 square shielding the king it's hard to do anything that's worth the loss of this pawn. He just has to watch out for Ne4-g5 but that's not hard to prevent.

aaronk56:

[ QUOTE ]
16...d4
17. Qf3 Re8
18. Rd1 Nd5

[/ QUOTE ]

19.Rxd4

[The Yugoslavian]

curtains,

How long are you spending generally to go over each move so far?

Yugoslav

[grando]

I vote Re8

[aaronk56]

I still favor d4. Can we get a poll started?

[Stephen H]

The more I play around with d4, the worse it seems. At best I think we lose the pawn - that's not very good.
I've basically convinced myself that Re8 is the way to go, although Rc8 seems fine too.

[dmk]

either way, we probably followup w/ the other one anyway

[chuckleslovakian]

Curtains plays 16.b3

1. c4 e5
2. g3 Nf6
3. Bg2 c6
4. d4 exd4
5. Qxd4 d5
6. cxd5 cxd5
7. Nf3 Nc6
8. Qd3 Nb4
9. Qb3 Bf5
10. Nd4 Be4
11. 0-0 Bc5
12. Nc3 Bxg2
13. Kxg2 Bxd4
14. Qxb4 Bxc3
15. Qxc3 0-0
16. b3

Curtains

PoG

[curtains]

[ QUOTE ]
curtains,

How long are you spending generally to go over each move so far?

Yugoslav

[/ QUOTE ]

So far....most I've spent on a move has maybe been 5 minutes [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img] But I haven't been in danger of losing where I need to make some big calculations just yet. Actually a spent quite a bit of time on Qb3...that was maybe my longest think. I wanted to go Qd1 instead but got scared of a few problems involving my a2 pawn. Perhaps my fears were irrelevant. Maybe spent 10 minutes on that move?

[The Yugoslavian]

Okay, sounds like you're spending about as long as I assumed you would be.

One other question. How do you like being able to read your opponents' thoughts throughout the game? Have you been paying attention or do you figure they're not important? I'd imagine it helps give you a pretty decent edge vs. if POG did it behind closed doors.

Yugoslav

[curtains]

[ QUOTE ]
Okay, sounds like you're spending about as long as I assumed you would be.

One other question. How do you like being able to read your opponents' thoughts throughout the game? Have you been paying attention or do you figure they're not important? I'd imagine it helps give you a pretty decent edge vs. if POG did it behind closed doors.

Yugoslav

[/ QUOTE ]

Ive made a conscious effort not to read too much in the past few moves.