Analysis
The game in detail
IM Anthony Petkidis (GER, 2427) vs FM Matthias Gantner (SUI, 2282) · 1-0
Board 6, ASK Réti vs SG Zürich · English Opening, Symmetrical Variation, Four Knights (A35) · 90 minutes for 40 moves, then 30 minutes, plus 30 seconds per move
By Bogner AI Coach AI Coach . This analysis was written by a Bogner Chess AI coach.
Board six, ASK Réti against SG Zürich, round seven. Zürich lead the table, and in this match the higher rated player sits on the Zürich side of all eight boards. On board six that is Anthony Petkidis, 2427, a hundred and forty-five points above Matthias Gantner, who has Black. Half a point against an International Master is the number the other seven boards get to work with against the leader.
For forty-two moves the position stayed level, and ten of those moves Gantner held with seconds on his clock. He lost the game to one move, and that move came once he had time again.
The queens are gone by move eight
English Opening, symmetrical, four knights, and move five brings the first real decision. Instead of trading with , Gantner pushes past: .
The choice sits in . is just as good and leaves the pawn on d7, and while that pawn stands there the d-file is shut and the queens stay on. Gantner takes with the d-pawn, opens the file and so forces the trade. A clearly stronger opponent is paid his advantage in attacks; without queens he has to win by technique, and that takes time.
walks the king to where the endgame wants it, and the position is finished: nothing to defend, nothing to regret. Against a stronger opponent you do not pick the position with the most chances, you pick the one with the fewest weaknesses.
IM Anthony Petkidis (GER, 2427)
FM Matthias Gantner (SUI, 2282)
Fifteen minutes for 13...Bg4
costs 15 minutes 38, the longest think of the game, and leaves 57:06 after the move. went there in one. After the bishop stands on f5 anyway, and h3 cost White nothing. Both routes are worth about the same, so this is not an error but a bad exchange rate: a quarter of an hour for a square that was one move away.
He did not hand the game over with it, because Petkidis was thinking long himself: after move twenty it was 39:12 against 35:11 in Gantner’s favour. and were expensive too, 8 minutes 21 and 6 minutes 57, and neither gave anything away.
then settles the game: , and off go a pair of rooks, the white bishop and the black knight. Objectively and were a shade better because they keep more pieces on. Practically the liquidation is right: with fewer pieces the stronger player can do less. You only have to know what you are liquidating into, and here it was a rook endgame, one rook and seven pawns each, in which neither side has anything.
IM Anthony Petkidis (GER, 2427)
FM Matthias Gantner (SUI, 2282)
Ten moves on under five minutes
Petkidis tries what the position has room for: , , , then and behind the black pawns. It gave nothing more, and credit to him for asking. Gantner needed 9 minutes 20 for and 11 minutes 03 for , after which he had 9:21 against his opponent’s 17:26.
From move thirty he was under five minutes, and four of his last six moves before the control came with under two minutes left after the move: with 1:43, with 1:52, with 1:55, with 1:07. Petkidis was under five himself from his own thirty-fifth and had 2:07 after the fortieth. It was still level, and neither had gone under a minute.
At there was : , White takes f7, Black is a pawn down with the rook on a1 behind the white pawns, and the position is level. cost a fifth of a pawn and stayed playable. In time trouble the hand reaches for the moves that cover everything; in a rook endgame the moves that free your own rook are the ones that count. The same choice comes back on move forty-two, with no second move that holds.
IM Anthony Petkidis (GER, 2427)
FM Matthias Gantner (SUI, 2282)
42...Rc7
Move forty-one brings the half hour, 18:55 for Black and 23:48 for White, and after the question stands there plainly. Exactly one move holds: , because from d4 the rook attacks c4 and e4 at once. It continues : a pawn down, behind the white pawns, level.
came after 6 minutes 45, with 12:40 left after the move. That is a tactical error. From c7 the rook covers c5 and f7 and attacks nothing, and that lets the white break in the centre work exactly as it is meant to: after Black is clearly worse, by a good two pawns. The move is humanly understandable, almost nobody finds here, because it hands over f7 without a fight. It stays wrong, and it decided the game.
Petkidis did not find . After 2 minutes 13 he played , and nearly all of it was gone again: after Black gives up a4, collects a2 and is a third of a pawn worse. Gantner played after 1 minute 10, with 12:00 left after the move. Almost every second player at this level picks that, the king defends the pawn, and he loses it anyway: , only this time the rook got nothing in return. Petkidis converted cleanly, , , , and after there was nothing to hold. In a rook endgame the active rook is worth more than the pawn it defends; if the pawn falls regardless, the only question is what you are given for it.
IM Anthony Petkidis (GER, 2427)
FM Matthias Gantner (SUI, 2282)
Verdict
Forty-two moves against an International Master a hundred and forty-five points higher, ten of them on seconds, and the position level the whole way: that is the performance of a player who belongs on board six. The half point was not lost to the clock, because the extra half hour had long since arrived. The learning sits three times in the same piece: in a rook endgame what counts is not what the rook defends but what it attacks, and , and were all the same move. Next to it, what this game got right from the first moves: against a stronger opponent you trade the queens early, because his advantage is paid to him in attacks. For the team it was one of the three losses in the 2.5 to 5.5 against the league leader, and for Gantner a half point he earned and then gave away.
Moves
1-0
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