TL Chess Match - Page 24

I would like the Queen to watch over d6 in this position since it prevents white's attack against Black's weakest point. For that reason. The Rook support of the C pawn is superior.

are you serious? with the c5-d6-e5 pawn chain, and white having no real way to break it down, how can you not see how greatly limited white's dark square bishop is, when compared to black's opposing knight?

Seems to make sense at first glance (little more than that) clears the D file for your rooks and puts pressure on the weak c-pawn. It happens to be very difficult to defend.
Second glance: e4, Q-a6, Q-e2 works nicely. But it's not like planning to push the centre is right for black yet. I'd sit back and prepare slightly more while keeping 3 pieces locked up with the C pawn. (Bishop can't get a decent square either with the knight tied down.)
Third glance: e4 Qb7! Qe2 Qc6! a pawn I think.
Fourth glance: Oh damn!, based on the last page somebody probably posted analysis on Qc8 already =[ Appears they missed (or i missed something too) the Qb7 line perhaps.
Although: e4 Qb7 R-e1 Q-c6 R-b4?! might work.
Then R-e8, e5, Ra-d8 being the next moves perhaps?

You mean the a5 knight, on the side of the board? Sorry but that bishop seems ok to me.
No need to explain further though lets just see how this plays out.

After reading the analysis, I concur that this is a slightly stronger move than c5, I am still not feeling too hot about our a-file though. c5 will happen anyways, unless Vezkel intends to surprise us all.

This was my original idea with QD7, to eventually move to C6 and threaten the C4 pawn. However the pesky d pawn could cause problems to this variation. Since we played C8, its only natural to move the Queen to the attacking square on A6. From here we she can threaten the C4 pawn without any chance of retaliation. There's no rush to play C5 as we can always play it next turn. Things are going to get bloody soon, and I think we should come out of the exchange up material.

14. e4 exd4 15. cxd4 Nc6 16. d5 Nd4 with a small edge for black. White's centre is locked and Black has a nice knight, Black has permanent pressure against c4.

14. Bb2 Qc7 15. e4 Rac8 16. Rfc1 Nc6 with a noticable edge for Black IMO. Black has massive central control and can slowly up the pressure on White. Its very difficult for white to do anything active in the position

14. Qd3 c5 15. Rb5 Qc8 16. e4 cxd4 17. cxd4 Nc6 with a tiny edge to Black. However, white does get a mobile pawn centre and his dark squae bishop can come to life. For that reason, I dont like it.

14. e4 e5 15. Bb2 Qe6 16. d5 Qg4 with a tiny advantage for Black. The move 15...c5 may be an improvement for Black however, leading to 15...c5 16. d5 Qg4, but im not sure. Overall, a pretty useless line

14. Ba3 c5 15. e4 Re8 16. Rfe1 e5 and black looks really solid.

What is the point of 14. Bb2? Doesn't make sense for me.

Jfrazz the lines you give for our options aren't really convincing. In the c5 line, 14...Qc7 is essentially admitting Qc8 was a mistake and a waste of tempo. Also 14. e4 seems to be a better response than Bb2. Well then we can just do 14...e5 which is just a different move order of the 13...e5 14. e4 c5 line. I guess I just really like e5
But since the entire purpose of Qc8 was to make additional preparations for c5 even though it wasn't necessary, might as well make the follow-up move. E5 probably deserves more consideration though. In fact the line you give for e5 isn't good for black at all. White gets much more space and central control than we get from our knight in the closed position and the small weakness on c4 which we cant really attack. 14...c5 is a much better response than exd4.

The bishop is exerting some influence on the center after pawn exchanges.

Black exchanges ...cxd4, white recaptures cxd4 and then plays d5 ASAP - now he has a big centre, akin to the gruenfeld, with a monster bishop, but we have no opposition to it. He can even start to force attacking lines in this variation (his light square bishop will relocate obv.)