I played the “Maybe I can win a pawn …” guy from the movie Searching for Bobby Fisher.
His name is Asa Hoffman and I played him on chess.com
The Player
Last month I played a blitz game against a pretty interesting person. His name is Asa Hoffman, and besides being a FM (FIDE master), an opponent of Fisher himself, and a staple in the New York chess scene for many years, he was also portrayed in the 1993 film Searching for Bobby Fisher. While he was originally supposed to play the role himself, the writers had their own character in mind. Not surprisingly, he ended up declining the role.
The Game
The game was played about a month ago on chess.com. Its definitely no masterpiece (actually I played pretty awful and its 3+0 time control), but given how interesting my opponent is I thought I would share it anyway. While the result was a draw, I have to concede the fact that I am a much worse player. Besides being beaten soundly in a second game, Asa is 78 years old and still playing well. The full game is here:
1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 c5 3. d5 e5 4. dxe6 fxe6 5. b3 d5 6. e3 Nc6 7. Bb2 d4
The opening is the Czech Benoni. Incidentally, my opponent wrote a book on this opening. While the move 7.Bb2 seems innocent enough, I already have a losing position. The aggressive move d4 which can be reinforced by e5 which completely locks down my position making development difficult.
8. Nf3 e5 9. exd4 cxd4 10. Be2 Bb4+
After Bb4+ I have no choice but to play 11. Kf1. The plan is to mitigate the damage of not castling by playing h4 for eventual counter play of some kind. The main problem is that black naturally castles and his rook and my king are on the same file, which is bound to be an issue. If I try and block the check with any Nd2, black then has 11. Nd2 d3 12. Bf1 and I have a pawn on d3 I cant get rid of and a king in the center of the board.
11. Kf1 Bf5 12. a3 Be7 13. Qd2 Ne4
I play Qd2 and again do not consider any aggressive moves. Ne4 gets played and I lose a tempo for no reason.
14. Qc1 O-O 15. Nbd2 Nf6 16. b4 e4 17. Nh4 Bg4 18. Qd1 h5
More attacking moves by black. The black rook is now even more of a threat in the position after a move like e3. After h5 I can fork the rook and bishop with Ng6. Basically, blacks idea is: I will sacrifice my rook, get my queen on the f file, remove one of your defenders (the white bishop), and get my knight to g5. All of this puts immense pressure on the f2 square.
19. Ng6 d3 20. Bxg4 Nxg4 21. Nxf8 Qxf8 22. Qe1 e3 23. Nf3
I manage to add another defender by playing Nf3, which is pretty much forced. Black blunders by playing Nxf2. Yes, you can get the exchange back by playing Nxh1, but white is off the hook, and the passed pawns might be weak if major pieces can exchanged. The better option for black is just to maintain the pressure and play Bf6 looking to exchange off for my only decent piece which is the bishop. Position is equal here.
Nxf2 24. Qxe3 Nxh1 25. Kg1 Bf6 26. Qe6+ Qf7
The computer doesn't like like Qe6+ and I give a bit of an advantage back to black. My intention is to go to an endgame where blacks d3 pawn may be weak.
27. Qxf7+ Kxf7 28. Bxf6 gxf6 29. Kxh1 Rd8 30. Rd1 Ne5
Ne5 by black is is smart. I took and he may be able to reinforce the the pawn on d3 with e4. Nd2 may have been a better idea.
31. Nxe5+ fxe5 32. Kg1 Ke6 33. Kf2 e4 34. Ke3 Ke5 35. Rf1 d2
My endgame plan didn't quite pan out, blacks king reinforces his passed pawns in time. Black has a slight advantage (and also 2:21 vs 1:11 on the clock) but blunders it with d2. Finally being aggressive costs him. The only line that makes sense gets played out. He must know that d2 is over extending, but it doesn't make sense that you would want to exchange the a3 pawn for the strong d3 pawn.
36. Rd1 Rd3+ 37. Ke2 Rxa3 38. Rxd2
The position I was talking about.
Rc3 39. Rd5+ Ke6 40. Rd4 Ke5 41. Rd5+ Kf6 42. c5 Rc2+ 43. Ke3 Rxg2 44. Rxh5 Rb2 45. Kxe4 Rxb4+ 46. Kd5 a5 47. Rh6+ Kf5 48. Rb6 Rh4
Current time on the clock is 1:31 for black and 0:30 for white. Position is even, but it looks good for me at first glance. Blacks king is sidelined and I am eyeing that b7 pawn so I can push the c5 pawn. Black blunders with Rh4. Another bad pawn exchange. My h2 pawn is not going anywhere soon, and the b7 pawn is the only thing stopping the c5 pawn advance.
The reason it looks good to me is because this variation is very hard too see once Rb6 was played.
48… Rxb6 49. cxb6 Kg4 50. Kc5 Kh3 51. Kb5 Kxh2 52. Kxa5 Kg3 53. Kb5 Kf4 54. Kc5 Ke5
After Ke5, black is just in time to block whites king from capturing the final b7 pawn and promoting the b6 pawn leading to a drawn position.
49. Rxb7 Rxh2 50. Ra7 Rd2+ 51. Kc4 Ra2 52. Kb5 Ke6 53. Rxa5 Rc2 54. Kc6 Ke7 55. Ra7+ Kd8 56. Ra8+ Ke7 57. Ra7+ Kd8 58. Ra8+ Ke7 59. Ra7+ 1/2–1/2
I draw by repetition since I cannot find the win in time with only 8.8 seconds left. There is a way to slowly push the pawn up and win, but it is a time consuming process. Asa had the decency of not flagging me which he likely could have done.
Conclusion
It was a 3+0 blitz game, so realistically there is not much to take away from the game. If I had to mention some points I would say that measured aggression (and sometimes even unmeasured aggression) is a successful strategy in blitz chess. Besides opening up winning opportunities, it takes much more time to think of a defense compared to an attack. Of course, time is a valuable resource in blitz chess.
The other point I would mention is that you should think about the positional importance of the pieces before exchanging. So Asa’s two major blunders that cost him the game were positional rather than tactical. Really, a few moments of positional thought could save you the game with no calculation required. Just ask yourself, at a high level, what are the pieces actually doing? For example, if my knight controls X important squares and your bishop controls none, why am I exchanging it for your bishop? Part of that understanding comes in time, but I believe most beginners can benefit from that train of thought.
