It takes two to "Tango"

My opponent in the following game found a new way to lose a pawn as White against the Black Knights' Tango (1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 Nc6!?). He began with 3.d5!?, which IM Richard Palliser calls "The Lunge" in his book on the opening, tango! At first blush, the move looks strong. White hopes to chase Black's knights with his pawns and force them back in disarray, à la Borochow-Fine, Kujoth-Fashingbauer, Marshall-Rogosin, and various games in the Halloween Gambit (1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.Nxe5?! Nxe5 5.d4). Something like that did happen in Tate-Orlov, 1995. But if Black plays correctly, White gets little or no advantage with 3.d5. 3.Nf3 and 3.Nc3 are much more commonly seen, and more successful in practice.

White's 4.Qc2 was not in the spirit of The Lunge. White should continue his aggression with 4.e4 (when 4...Nxe4?? 5.Qd4 wins for White) or even Tate's 4.f4!?, offering the c-pawn as a gambit (4...Nxc4 5.e4). White's 7.a3? was an unfortunate theoretical novelty. Another passive, time-wasting move, it dropped a pawn to the simple tactic 7...Bxd2+ 8.Nxd2 exd5 9.cxd5 Nxd5! The lost pawn should have been the extent of the damage. Surely no one would be so naïve as to take the knight, which would give me the choice of two mates in two, or a mate in four? To my astonishment, my opponent fell into it hook, line, and sinker. I'm now 110-0-0 on GameKnot, with an Orwellian 1984 rating.

A beautiful miniature

I'm sure some of you have not seen this beautiful miniature, played in 2001 by GM Alex Yermolinsky against Indiana's Emory Tate, who became an IM in 2007. Tate likes to go his own way in the opening. Here he played a type of Schmid Benoni with 1.d4 c5 2.d5 e6 3.Nc3 (Yermo could have played 3.c4, with a regular Benoni) exd5?! 4.Nxd5. On White's sixth move, Fritz much prefers 6.Bf6! to Yermo's 6.Bh4, analyzing 6.Bf6! d6 (6...gxf6?? 7.Nxf6#) 7.Nxe7 Bxe7 (7...gxf6 8.Nxc8 leaves Black with a gruesome pawn structure and a bad bishop) 8.Bxg7 Rh7 9.Bc3, when Black is a pawn down, and against the "Yerminator" might as well resign. After 6.Bh4 Qa5+ 7.c3, Black would have been OK (Fritz says even slightly better) following 7...Nxd5! 8.Qxd5 Nc6 9.e4 d6. Instead, his 7...Nf5?? allowed a stunning coup. Take a look at the diagram below. Do you see it?

Ever since I saw this game, I have tried to pull off the same thing myself in blitz games. I succeeded in Rhine-NN, 5-minute game, playchess.com, November 19, 2007: 1.d4 c5 2.d5 e6 3.Nc3 exd5 4.Nxd5 d6 5.Nf3 Nf6 6.Bg5 Nbd7 7.e4 Qa5+ 8.c3 Nxe4?? 9.Qa4!! Qxa4 10.Nc7#.

Leonid Bondar ties for 4th in U.S. Senior

So more than one person in the family can play chess!

NM Mariano Acosta also had a very nice event: his only loss was to IM Emory Tate in Round 5. Tate got killed by the pairings: he lost to GM Kudrin and the tournament winner, GM Alexander Ivanov.

Check out the coverage at Chess Life Online.

Emory Tate, Honorary Chicagoan

Here's Emory's game from Round 2: