[Event "2024 Lancaster Congress"] [Site "Lancaster Royal Grammar School"] [Date "2024.08.10"] [Round "2"] [White "Cherrington, Josh"] [Black "Richmond, Charles J"] [Result "1-0"] [WhiteElo "1631"] [BlackElo "1561"] [ECO "A04"] [Opening "Reti: 1...e6"] {This was my second game in the 2nd Lancaster standardplay Congress. The Congress was overall quite poor for me, as I found myself unable to concentrate in a lot of the games. This is probably what I would consider to be the only "good" game of this congress for me, given that I played 2 brilliant moves including a queen sacrifice, with an overall accuracy of 98.8% The game started as most of my games do with white, with 1.Nf3 and 2.b3} 1.Nf3 e6 {My opponent played 1.e6, which is a solid but more passive approach than other main lines.} 2.b3 d5 3.e3 Nf6 4.Bb2 Be7 5.d4 b6 6.Bd3 Bb7 7.Nbd2 Nbd7 8.O-O O-O 9.c4 $10 {This is a theoretical / book position, that has been played before by a fair amount of grandmasters and titled players. Black's response is fine, but takes the game out of known territory} dxc4 $146 10.Nxc4 c5 11.Rc1 cxd4 12.Bxd4 {Nxd4 was a more agressive approach that is still sound. The bishop was good on b2 and the f3 knight could have been centralised. I opted for this approach since the Knight on f3 can be great for a king-side attack} b5 13.Ncd2 a6 14.Qe2 {Qe2 initially feels like a mistake, since Ba3 forces white to either relinquish control of the C-file, or lose a tempo after Ba3 Rc2 Rc8. However this isn't bad as Rxc8 Qxc8 takes the black queen off of an important diagonal} Ba3 15.Rc2 Rc8 {This contests the file and i am forced to trade} 16.Rxc8 {Bxc8 is simply the loss of the tempo spent moving the bishop to b7, and the tempo that will be spent putting it back on b7, so black takes with the queen which is the best move but removes the queen from the d8-h4 diagonal} Qxc8 17.e4 {This move takes central control and threatens to kick Black's only active defensive piece from a good square} Re8!? {This creates space for the king in the event of some kind of attack. I believe that black saw that a Greek gift was possible after e5 and the Knight moves, so wanted to create space for the king. However this move allows e5 and the attack is better than black anticipated.} 18.e5 Ng4?! {This knight is simply a target now. It was slightly better on d5 even though Black's kingside is weak too in that line} 19.Bxh7+!! {If Kxh7, Ng5+ wins back the piece as the queen then takes on g4. Black was better off taking the bishop in this position as it will be an important piece to restrict the King's space in an attack} Kf8? 20.Ng5! Nh6 21.Qh5 $16 {White has a considerable advantage (~1.5 points) due to this kingside attack that has built up. Black's next move is a blunder that allows a checkmate in 2 moves, which I found instantly.} Be7?? 22.Qxf7+!! Nxf7 23.Nxe6# {Smothered checkmate is on the board, resulting in what was sadly my only win of the tournament. This game was one of very few games where I knew that I played almost perfectly as soon as it was over.} 1-0