2018 Denver Open Report

I’ll quickly chronicle the five games which helped me finish undefeated and win clear first in my section, 5-0.

My first test was against Dean Brown, a player from the Colorado Springs area who was a strong opponent:

Dean Brown v Sulleiman Omar

https://denverchess.com/games/view/17555

As I like to do, I challenged Dean immediately with the Scandinavian Defense, Portuguese Variation. Although it is an unsound defense for Black, I am of the belief that if theory does not exist on a line which appeals to you, it is up to you to go research the lines and make your own theory. We have such powerful tools in this day and age that we can basically play any line, prepare for the variations, and use our minds to understand the resulting positions and plans. Thankfully, Australian Grandmaster David Smerdon has done the bulk of the work in exploring the murky waters of the Scandinavian with 2…Nf6, but admittedly I have not had ample time to dedicate to his book while I was studying other openings. So I’ve played the openings with Black imperfectly but ended up with good results simply because I understood the general ideas.

4.f3: The most critical response. I had a sudden urge to smile when I finally had an opponent willing to play what is a sort of direct refutation of this defense but requires a high degree of precision from the refuter. This is where I planned to notch my wins in this tournament.

5. Bb5+ is a variation which I unfortunately did not get to study over the last two weeks. It’s another critical variation rather than 5. c4 which would have given me exactly the kind of game I want where White pushes pawns for 6 moves while I develop rapidly. Dean opted against this sort of continuation. 

6…a6. The main line here goes 6…e6 but thankfully, after reading up on the line, I saw that my choice a6 was also quite playable.

10. b3. I found this to be the first inaccuracy. Dean did not want to push d5 right away and permanently give up the c5 square, as that would play right into my hands. However, in this variation, I do know that you cannot weaken your dark squares so terminally and expect to castle hassle-free. In this game, Dean paid for this extra securing of his center in the form of rampant dark-squared weaknesses and crippling development lag.

12. Ba3. I saw this as a weak move. Another key idea in these variations for Black is to pick off White’s dark-squared Bishop, and it usually involves an exchange sac. Here, Dean gets my dark squared attacker for his own defender, but it does not solve the problems of his exploitable weaknesses. Additionally, Dean isn’t ready to play d5 yet and his center needs to be supported with something like Be3, after which I would have had problems developing my Bishop. Dean solved my problems and still remains unable to play d5 due to his development issues.

14. g4 So Dean wants to play d5, but this move is wrong for a couple reasons. First of all, d5 is not threatened because the pawn is pinned to the pieces behind it, since Dean still hasn’t connected his Rooks on move 14. Secondly, g4 is an obscene weakening of the King’s position, magnifying Dean’s dark squared weaknesses and giving me a hook on the fourth rank to immediately begin my Kingside attack. He must have believed he was trapping my Bishop but when I calmly responded with the attacking move …h5, Dean began to see that d5 was not viable and his King was in trouble. In a way, I got what I wanted out of the opening, which is to get White to push pawns instead of developing pieces. These complications are a direct result.

16 fxg4 is an interesting way to capture, but I had already calculated all of this before I pushed h5. I continued with the fun Bishop sac: …Bxg4. Dean saw that his King would be totally compromised if he recaptured with his h-pawn and tried to complicate matters with the intermezzo 17. Rxf6, but I had already calculated this line and in the end he loses an exchange to a triple fork with both Rooks and the King. And of course all of this action happens on (you guessed it) the dark squares. After the dust settled, Dean realized his position was on the verge of total collapse and gracefully resigned on move 21.

My next opponent was the interesting character William Wolf, who I’d played at last year’s Denver Open. At the time, he out-ranked me by several hundred points and decided to take a nap in his hotel room after hitting the clock on the first move. After a hyper-aggressive Reti gambit against my quiet French, he found himself in a very losing position, but I blundered a complicated position and settled for a draw by perpetual. No doubt this year he sat at the board eager for revenge, but his chance was short-lived:

https://denverchess.com/games/view/17557

William sat across the board from me this year in a totally different position. This time I outranked him by a few hundred points. I sat next to him in the first round and saw him play a very solid Sicilian Defense and notch a hard-earned victory in a pretty long game. I thought to myself: perhaps he’s playing more solid chess now and scrapped all the sharp, blitzey stuff. So my plan right away was to lure him into an extremely sharp, tactically poisonous game. For the first time in tournament play, I played the Trompowsky Attack, and just as I thought, he played the most aggressive line which I had studied in great detail just the night before the tournament.

5…g5 The correct response here is 5.Nf6. This idea with g5, although common in many lines against the Trompowsky, is absolutely wrong here and drops a piece. Critical is that Black’s 3rd move c5 gives White a target on b8 with which to liquidate his Bishop in the case of g5, so the counterattack against the Bishop doesn’t work. William didn’t see this and in an astounding 2 minutes of play slammed his king against the board and extended his hand, exclaiming aloud in the silent room that he doesn’t want to play a piece down. I shook his hand, chuckled, and put away my set. 

Bill O’Neil v Sulleiman Omar

Perhaps the most controversial of my 5-0 performance this tournament. Bill and I have played before and remain friendly regulars of the Denver Chess Club. In the 3rd round, time control should have been changed to increment instead of delay. For whatever reason it slipped my mind and I set the clock to delay, clueless about the different requirements for round 3. Regardless, Bill did not verify anything wrong with the clock until he flagged on move 41 in a worse position. After speaking with the T.D, it was determined that I could offer a draw by agreement but that the result would stand since both players consented to play by not bringing up a complaint in the early stages of the game. Bill felt penalized by my ignorance of the time control change and asked if I wanted a draw. After some consideration, I declined in light of the fact that Bill shared the blame for not verifying the clock setting at the beginning of the game. We both had the same amount of time and played what was a pretty good game of chess where I came out with a better position and a 33-minute time advantage. It’s probably one of my more interesting games in this tournament:

https://denverchess.com/games/view/17565

5. b3 Although this lines is not detailed in Smerdon’s book, I have faced it enough to have done some research. My analysis prior to this tournament showed that the best response is the multipurpose 5…Bc5, piling up on f2 and preventing d4. 

6…Ng4 An inaccuracy. Here I should have played Ne4 and not Ng4. It’s important in the coming complications to have the Knight influencing White’s Queenside dark squares since they have been weakened by b3. The open e-file is not an immediately exploitable asset.

9.d5 Although this looks like it’s dropping a piece, it’s in fact normal in these lines to allow this piece fork. The crucial difference was that my Knight should have been on the stronger square e4, so at this point my opening choices are put into question.

14. Ne4 a strong move, and the strong square where my Knight should have been. I had assumed that Bill’s Knight on d2 was obligated to stay in the defense of his King, but this is a strong piece fork that leaves me with three attacked pieces.

14…Qxa1 Thankfully I had this resource. The Knight fork on c2 regains the Queen.

14…Nc2+ In this sequence I am able to liquidate the pieces and win a Rook and two pawns for the two pieces, a common imbalance.

22. Ne5 I felt like this was an inaccuracy. Bill lost a tempo and had to move his Knight back to f3, giving me extra time to mobilize my Kingside pawns.

26. Rc8 Although this looks like an aggressive move, I felt very relieved that Bill gave me g4 here. I think this is where he started to lose the game.

29. Ke3 the King is too bold against the two Rooks…

31. Kd4 at this point I started to look for a mating net. I was happy to see after engine analysis that I had played an almost perfect middle game.

33…Red8 Threatening mate on d4. b4 looks forced.

37…axb4. An unfortunate blunder. Foolishly, I had tunnel vision here and didn’t even consider that Bill had a Knight fork on c6. Much better was the devastating 37…Rxb4+. Although this slowed me down, even down a piece I was still in a winning position since Bill’s pieces were all passive and he was stuck in a sort of Zugzwang. His Knight is stuck guarding the d4 square, his Rook is stuck guarding the Knight, his Bishop is confined to staying on the a6-g1 diagonal, and his King is practically stalemated. I think I can just push my other passed pawn and Bill hasn’t got any play. He  flagged on move 43.

Sulleiman Omar v Timothy J Mendoza

Going into round 4, I looked at the standings and saw that the underrated Timothy Mendoza was crushing it, upending much higher-rated players to cruise to a 3-0 start. So naturally, we had to play in round 4. I had the White pieces and was expecting 1. d4 Nf6, because it’s all anyone is playing these days. Who can blame them? It’s the most flexible reply. My game with Tim started exactly the way I expected. My strategy this time, however, was to face off against my opponent in a classical defense where I could flex my knowledge of opening theory and draw on my positional experience. And so instead of falling back on the Trompowsky with 2. Bg5, I opted instead for the more classical approach 2. c4. Tim played a Nimzo-Indian defense:

https://denverchess.com/games/view/17566

6…Nf6 It is my understanding that in these positions Black normally exchanges Knights instead, opting to regroup and attack the center with c5. After the game, Tim told me he spent the remainder of the game paranoid of the e5 push with tempo. On the contrary: not only was I not interested in giving up the d5 square, but if Tim had simply exchanged Knights, retreated his Bishop, and played for c5, the game would have been much more challenging for me.

11…Bc6 An odd maneuver. I had hoped to provoke something like this with my last move. 

12…b6 Here Tim is definitely playing with fire. Immediately I can threaten to trap the Bishop with Nd2 and start putting uncomfortable pressure down the c-file. I thought the correct response after I played a3 was b5, getting some breathing room for the Bishop. But instead:

13…Ng6 and Tim’s opening blunder gave me an easy win. Although to be completely honest, I almost did not notice the Bishop on c6 hanging. Thankfully I had played an active move with a3 so I was winning a piece in either case. Tim retreated his dark-squared Bishop and I instead won the Bishop on c6 clean, and more importantly put an annoying blockade on c6 with my Queen. Tim resigned and I had 4 out of 4.

Sulleiman Omar v Davin Yin

This was perhaps the most critical game of the tournament for me. With 4 points in the 5th round I was pretty much guaranteed to take home some prize money, but in order to win clear first I had to at least draw this game. However, it was super tempting to go for the 5th win and so I played for a win. Besides, my brother had finished tied for 2nd place with a few other players at 4 points, so stopping Davin from reaching 4 points meant a little more money in my brother’s pocket. It’s always good to keep it in the family. :) Davin is a formidable opponent who is regularly seen winning first place in his group at the bigger tournaments in Denver. So I knew I had my work cut out for me and I’d have to work hard to beat him. Some quick research had shown that Davin likes to play the King’s Indian Defense as Black, and I’d spent the bulk of the last month putting together an extensive study on the King’s Indian for White with Bg5 and e3 (known commonly as the Smyslov variation). So I opened with a Trompowsky with the explicit intention of transposing to a Smyslov KID, and Davin cooperated:

https://denverchess.com/games/view/17567

2…d6 Here I was happy to see that I’d get what I wanted: a system Davin was probably unfamiliar with and a tactically dry game with more emphasis on theory, position, and strategy. I knew Davin was extremely tactically sharp and this type of game makes it highly difficult for the King’s Indian player to get such complications. However, I played it safe and played 3. Nf3 to avoid any early e5 ideas. I was confident that Davin wouldn’t switch gears and suddenly respond with Ne4 after already committing to a solid setup with d6, and I was correct.

5. Nc3 and the e4 square is under my control, staying that way for most of the game.

9…exd5 This was the correct move to fight for advantage for Davin. If he doesn’t at some point pull the trigger, then I might soon take on e5 myself and cause complications for him. I was sure to respond exd5 myself in order to keep the e5 square under my control with a pawn while I instead covered e4 with pieces.

10…Nb6. To me, a questionable decision. The Knight isn’t very useful on b6 and should instead keep aspirations of hopping to the strong square e5, prepared by playing for the c5 break. But it’s certainly playable, and logically Davin wanted to develop his light-squared Bishop, always a problem Bishop for Black in these positions. But Davin had a coherent plan, developing with tempo with 11…Bf5.

12. Bd3 I was happy to exchange these pieces since one day I want a strong Knight on e6 and this is one of the pieces which could challenge that outpost. I also knew Davin might be opposed to exchanging pieces since a win would have got him clear first place whereas a draw means he has to share 2nd with other players. I think it’s for this reason that Davin responded indecisively with 12…Bg4. I was happy to play Nd2 and ask Davin’s pieces how they were going to pressure my loose pawn on d4.

13…Qd7 another sharp move. Davin most likely saw that his Bishop was trapped but I was positive he intended to sacrifice it on h3 to play for a win, which is in the spirit of the mainline King’s Indian. After much thought, I decided I was not interested in giving him two very important pawns in front of my King for his Bishop and to allow his Queen to infiltrate with an aggressive posture. At the very least if I had to give the piece back, it would not be wise to give Davin such a majority on the Kingside. I played 14. f3 instead and decided that if I don’t want to win the Bishop with complications, I can at least make it look stupid on h5 and continue to stay solid.

15. Rad1. In hindsight, a silly move. I should have recognized that there was too much traffic on the d-file to make this an effective square for the Rook and that Davin would not be able to quickly generate overwhelming pressure against d4 anyway. This Rook definitely belonged on the e-file.

15…Nh7 a telegraphed move, but a strong one. Davin wants to mobilize his f-pawn and since I have to defend d4 now he would be able to get it in.

17. b4 To me, a small victory. I give my pieces more space on the Queenside and shut down any ideas of c5, which I found to be the critical break for Black in these positions. Davin is somewhat obliged to play the prophylactic 17…Kh8, which he did, and so I regain the time I lost having to defend d4.

18. Nb3 preparing ideas of c5 and freeing up my Bishop from its responsibility to d4.

19. Ne2 eyeing the f4 square, but Davin found the strong move 19…Qg5, and now I had to reroute my pieces to the Kingside.

21…Rad8 I felt this was too little too late for the c5 break. If I had wasted a move playing Rad1, then Davin certainly wasted a move playing Rad8.

25. d5 Looking back at the game I felt like this was a definite mistake on my part. I had been playing the last several moves for c5 and instead played d5, giving aggressive life to Davin’s pieces. I felt that I had sufficient control of the e5 square and then just gave it away. Also, it seems looking at the game that my control of the center had a close correlation with the state of the open e-file, which Davin was in control of. Davin continued with the aggressive plan I handed him:

27…Qe3+ Davin played this sequence of moves very quickly, no doubt dying of thirst for tactical opportunities. Luckily, despite my concessions I had a very solid position and his other pieces were quite awkward. There was nothing major to be gained from the sequence, and somehow my misplaced Rook on d1 ended up saving the day.

30…Na4 an annoying move. It seems Davin’s Knight on b6 did get a unique opportunity to create problems after all. I had to play cautiously since I’d given away most of my advantage by this point. 

38. f4 it was around this point that Davin got up and left the board, no doubt to check the standings and ask his counsel if he should offer a draw. (I would still win clear first with a draw and Davin would be guaranteed second place prize money) However, I knew that I had two small advantages in this endgame. My Knight and King were both more aggressively placed. When he came back and continued playing, it was obvious that he wanted to somehow scratch a win out of this and take my first-place spot, but I just didn’t see how. White is definitely the choice color here and I was sure he’d misplay the ending, simply because it’s much harder to play for Black. I was correct.

62. Qg2# after carefully calculating everything up to mate and making sure to give Davin extra moves by freeing up his d-pawn (a trick to avoiding stupid stalemates), I was able to use my Queened pawn to deliver mate. Davin was my toughest opponent all tournament and it was great to get to play him in the last round. I was glad to have the White pieces and use my preparation to dictate the flow of the game, which certainly took him out of his comfort zone and into more positional chess where the moves aren’t so straight-forward. Going 5-0 in this tournament was exhilarating, and next year I hope to be sharp enough to contend for money in the open section. You’ll see me at the next Denver Open!

Sulleiman Omar  04/18/2018