Screw drawing him, play for the win!

Got my next game tomorrow. The guy did the TrainingBot spam thing to his history so I have no idea this time what opening I will face. He's probably looked through my history and seen what I've been playing, to which my reaction is basically:

can you not browse your opponents games some other way? On FICS there is the "hstat" command which gives a summary of a players last few hundred games. It won't show you the games, just the colours, ECO codes and results, but that should be enough to get at least some idea of what openings to prepare. There's also ficsgames.com (not maintained by FICS) which keeps stats on basically every game played there, and stores at least the last 500 games for each player. It's hard to believe there is no equivalent to either of these on ICC.

You can use "search" on icc, dunno if it has a rating floor. This is a good reason to keep your account anonymous so otb opponents can't prep based on your icc games (it does happen these days).

I think the 'search' function on ICC only shows games played where at least one person is titled. So I can find all my games vs IM, GM (FM?) players but not vs anyone else.

Chris, if you go to the round pairings page (from the league homepage on the right 'Round 2' 'Round 3' etc) then find your game, you can click on your opponent's name and see all their T4545 games. Here's your opponent

http://team4545league.org/players/di...player=Chatica

Click on any of the scores (1-0, 1/2, 0-1) and you'll get the replay.

http://team4545league.org/pgnplayer/...r.php?ID=35400

Your opponent played a blackmar diemer in the first round. Obviously this works better vs opponents who have played more seasons because then you can see more games. Like my opponent this round:

http://team4545league.org/players/di...player=adh2050

Dire showed me some other way to examine a few games - but I can't remember it right now

I played my normal Scandinavian and he sprung the Blackmar-Diemer gambit on me which I haven't played in about 3 years, so I got crushed

I will say this, looking at all these weird openings people spring on each other gives me some ideas - Blackmar-Diemer indeed - LOL -

looks like the U2200's got a bye - got a match on Sunday afternoon - will have gotten about 4 hrs sleep but hey, no one lives forever

RB

well, that was a waste of an hr - fruck -

rb

I just had a hilarious game vs Andres Hortillosa - I hadn't realized that he was my opponent before the game. I've actually given Mr. Hortillosa **** on the chesspub forum for authoring an Everyman book touting his great improvement methods when he's only semi-regaining his former strength. Here's the book (Link). And here is his USCF rating history (Link) To be fair to this guy, I'm sure most of us would jump at the chance to have a book published so the real fault lies with Everyman Publishing.

Here's the game. http://team4545league.org/pgnplayer/...r.php?id=35385 I love how he apparently decided ahead of time that he would do nothing but attack my king(side). Strategically it was uninteresting, but there were a TON of tactics to calculate through.

Hahaha, I have nothing to say about the man besides that that is one damn flashy book cover!

Nice work swingdoc, well played. I bet makes Dire feel all warm and fuzzy inside to see someone playing crapopeningbot moves get crushed

hahaha, oh man. I hadn't checked out the game itself yet. Yeesh!

Great job! [he had it coming]

don't know him personally but I've seen him at the Chess Castle in Minneapolis a couple times - (think he's a Minneapolis guy) - there's a lot of 2000 members at the CC - can't say anything about him or his results but we like him down there

choked another one in record time - gotta admit when I start out 400-500 points down every round, it's hard to find the motivation to give a rats ass. Next time I'll just let someone else play the U2000 level

ok, he was only 350 points higher then me - and he dropped a pawn on a supposed mouse slip - but I made a counting error that took me two minutes after the fact to figure out - my head just isn't in this game right now, guys - sorry

RB

Sorry to hear that, Whiskey FWIW, you were dominating through your 14th or 15th move. If you want a week off, I'm willing to play one week but only if you're burned out. You really shouldn't feel any pressure to play well for the team or anything like that. My goal is to use this as a fun way to improve. And if I feel too much pressure to perform for the team, then I can't do that. So please, try to relax and have fun and remember - you're just as good as most, if not all, of your opponents.

The one thing I've noticed in your games is how fast you play. One of the very best pieces of advice I ever got was when a master told me that the outcome of almost every game between class players is decided by move 20. I was previously blitzing through the opening moves and then trying to settle down and think. Once I took the time to start thinking even before I 'needed' to, my results improved. You only used 21 seconds/move for your first 18 moves. Maybe try a simple thinking checklist in order to slow down? I like: 1) what are his immediate threats? 2) what good things did his move do for his position? 3) what bad things did his move do for his position?

Anyway, just a thought.

I did play this one quick - I don't know how he hung that pawn - whether it was accidental oversight or a mouse slip like he suggested - (this when he played Qa5 and tried to take it back - I declined cause I didn't think he would move the queen next time or wasn't sure where it would go to - I think he realized it was a screwup after moving - nevertheless I neither give nor receive takebacks) -

but I did miss that counting and dropped a minor piece (it took me two minutes to realize it post-exchange) - and all I knew was I had a 12 hr shift from 6pm-6am and wanted to nap before it started -

the schedule is actually a real pain in da butt - we get our pairings right in the last 24 hrs before I start 4 days of consistent work - having a real time getting them scheduled when I'm not sleeping, or having to get up after a few hrs of sleep to play them

Mostly I think I'm just frustrated seeing such high rated players

rb

That makes a lot of sense. Let me know if there's anything I can do.

I just won my game:

http://team4545league.org/pgnplayer/...r.php?id=35390

I usually don't play open sicilian games, but this one went pretty well.

Nice job Uitje, although I'd love to bash this g3 sicilian business - you left black seemingly very confused so I guess I can't say too much.

Great game, Uitje! Your opponent was actually on our team last season cause we had to pick up a random at the last hour in order to get the team registered on time.

This is my 3rd Nc3 Bb5 Sicilian in a row. **** this ****.

whenever I see stuff like that I find myself wondering who wrote the opening article they're all referencing

I'm playing at the moment if anyone wants to kibitz. My opponent blundered a piece for two pawns earlier and now I have to convert this RRN v RR endgame. He offered me a draw a minute ago which is a good sign hopefully

Got it. He resigned because I was going to win another pawn. Not a particularly interesting game really but I'll post it in a bit. He played well below his 1917 ranking.