In these days, the Horde Chess World Championship of Lichess is taking place. I bring you the most interesting, cool, and teaching games and positions from there. This is part 2, which concludes the 3rd and 4th rounds of the competition. You can see all of the games on a website specifically prepared for this, Follow the Horde World Championship.
In round 3 we saw very unbalanced match results. In fact, most of the matches ended with 0 point to one of the parties. With that round the house level was finished, and round 4 was the first knockout round, in which 8 players found themselves out of the tournament.
Openings
In the game BADBOYYY-The_Knight_of_Spring, after 1. h5 a5 2. h4 d6 3. d5 e6 4. d4 exd5 5. exd5 Nd7 6. e4 axb4 7. axb4 dxc5
Typically this opening continues with 8. d:c5 B:c5 9. b:c5 (or 9. d4!?) 9… N:c5 with a plan of 10… N:a4 leading to a-file side intrusion. Instead, white chose the creative new move 8. a3?!, which protects the b4 pawn while not allowing the intrusion. After 8… c:d4 9. c:d4 Be7 10. e3, white’s position seems just fine.
In the second game PhilippeSaner vs MiroMiljkovic, after the opening moves 1. d5 e6 2. d4 d6 3. fxe6 fxe6 4. dxe6 Bxe6 5. d5
Instead of the classic 5… Bc8, PhilippeSaner decided to go for the rarer 5… B:d5!? and after 6. c:d5 d:c5 7. b:c5 B:c5 8. d4 Bf8
He holds a solid position, with some time to prepare for the pawn advancements.
Middlegame
In the 7th game PhilippeSaner vs MiroMiljkovic, black got into badly-looking position:
White promotion is inevitable, but Miro did not give up. After thinking 15 seconds from his 30 seconds of time left, he played 58… Rf8 59.e8=Q Q:f6!
The new queen has nowhere to go, and white is still far from winning. After many moves and turnovers, Miro finally won the game.
In the 9th game of the match PhilippeSaner vs MiroMiljkovic, Miro took advantage of a special opportunity to steal a pawn for free
15… B:c3! The d2 pawn can’t recapture because of Q:d1, and the b2 can’t take the bishop because of Q:a3 will follow.
kubalibre420, In his third game against VariantsOnly, showed a long thoughtful preparation of side intrusion.
20… Nh6 Aim for N:g4, so white had to respond 21. f3 Qh4 22.f2 Nf7 Threaten 22… Ng5 with 23… N:h3 23. f4 Nh6
Now the threat 24… N:g4 is unstoppable, and kubalibre420 convincingly won the game.
In the 4th game db1000c vs Chijss, the following position occurred:
Black threaten to capture the advanced pawns, so white had to use them immediately to get as much of black’s pieces as he can. 34. e7+ B:e7 35. g7 Rg8 36. d:e7+ K:e7 37. f:g8=Q Q:g8
38. f5! Making sure the g7 pawn won’t be captures, and securing the win for white.
Endgame
In the 4th game in the match PhilippeSaner vs MiroMiljkovic, the following position occurred:
After 41.e7, black had to sacrifice his queen. 41… Q:d7 42. c:d7 K:d7. Now a hard position of pawn vs. rook was achieved, with no clear way to victory for either side.
This is so far, looking forward to the next knockout rounds to see and write about more high-quality Horde Chess games. Stay tuned!
