“The end of a melody is not its goal: but nonetheless, had the melody not reached its end then it would not have reached its goal either.”

― Friedrich Nietzsche

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gm  Arizmendi Martinez, J.L

im  Forcen Esteban, D  (2543)

TCh-ESP Div 1 Linares 2015.8.10  Position before Black’s 40th move.  I prefer Black here, whose long term prospects look better because of his better pawn structure and control of the d-file. Besides, I don’t see any constructive plan for White. HOWEVER, in exactly this type of position Black can not afford to let his guard down as White has a lot of firepower in play aimed at his adversary’s King…indicated now is 40…Nc6! 41.Qg3 Ne7! , protecting against Queen invasions via g6.  Instead, with the same idea in mind (but a different Knight path: N-d7-f8) Black made a serious error:

40…Nd7(?)

Often we succeed in finding the right idea, but fail with respect to the move order associated with this idea…chess can be a cruel game sometimes!

WHITE TO PLAY AND CRUSH!

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gm  Degraeve, Jean-Marc

gm  Edouard, Romain

French Ch  Saint-Quentin, 2015.8.10  Position after 30 moves. White had earlier sacrificed an exchange in return for the initiative. Now that all of his pieces have secured excellent squares, it is time for White to strike…

WHITE TO PLAY AND CRUSH!

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TCh-ESP Div 1 Linares 2015.8.10  Forcen Esteban, Daniel–Arizmendi Martinez, Julen Luis:  White can crush with  the immediate 41.Rxh6+! gxh6 42.Qg3! when mate can only be avoided at great cost: 42…Nc5 ( no better is 42…Rd5 43.Qg6+ Kh8 44.Qxh6+ Kg8 45.Re4! etc ) 43.Qg6+ Kh8 44.Bf7 etc.  In the game continuation White played the equally decisive line (actually, just a transposition of moves) :  41.Qg3! and the game ended even faster after 41… Nf8?! 42.Rxh6+! 1-0  It is mate next move.

French Ch  Saint-Quentin 2015.8.10   Edouard, Romain–Degraeve, Jean-Marc: 31.Nh5!! (threatening Nf6) 31…f5! Best try  32.Qh4! (Maintaining the threat. Also good enough should be 32.Qg5) 32… Qb2 33.e5! dxe5  And now the simplest way to finish the opponent off is 34.Nf6+! BxN 35.Qxf6 Qb7 36.d6! Qf7 37.Ne7+ Rxe7 38.dxe7 Be6 39.Qxe5 Qxe7 ( 39…Re8 40.Bf8 Bxa2 41.Rd1 and finally Rd8; note that after 34.Nf6+ if instead 34…Kf7 then simply 35.NxR wins outright )   In the game continuation White played much less precisely with 34.Ne7+(?) Kf7! when Black is still alive.  Infact, after some more imprecisions White even lost the game!