Competitor Analysis
Not easy to play against Mr Razali.
First, his style of solid play (i hate solid play!) in which if overreach, can simply exploded in front of your face.
Second, his misleading rating. Razali's strength is way, way above his current rating.
Third, he just drew with NM Yeoh Chin Seng...
“Just play 1.h3” advice one of my colleague when he know i will be playing against Razali Ng6 and continued giving his reasons. While i was about to buy into his suggestion of playing waiting first move (though what i really intent to play is 1.a3, and hopefully end up playing any of my black’s opening a tempo up...) suddenly he advise me of NOT playing 1.e4 “...because he will played Alekhine and he know the opening well.”
Alekhine?!
At that instance i know i have to play 1.e4! Reason is because as white, against Alekhine, I normally played a rare and dubious Chase Gambit Variation in which for a pawn sacrifice, white has tremendous initiative.
Below is the game.
The Game
W:Nor Ilhamuddin
B:Razali Hamzah
Note from Nf6
Maybe this is still too early to say but what i think the favourite now to win this tournament is Dr Kaushal. He is currently studying medicine at UK and according to him, he occasionally played chess there. He did not play spectacular chess opening (he played a quiet positional chess, double fianchettos, hedgehog structure and stuff like that) but from middlegame onwards he slowly and surely collecting advantages...squeezing his opponent like a hungry anaconda...wonder is he secretly study chess there at UK ...?!
Good to see how Yeoh Chin Seng and Yeoh Li Tian really battled it out on their game last Saturday. No early draw (or even ‘early lost’ for that matter) that one sometimes could expect whenever there is immediate family member chess encounter. Very serious, very professional.
If memory serve me right, the last time i saw a serious game between sibling is some 17 or 18 years ago at PWTC (National Closed) when Khairunnisha played against Nurul Huda. The game was adjourned and at one corner Khairunnisha is busy analysing and at other corner, her sister is busy analysing....
Many thanks to Mr Najib Wahab who is very patience in handling the re-schedule and re-re-schedule of the tournament...and also for the efficiency in sending out tournament ‘bulletin’ FOC to contestant.
Good sharing Ilham. What I am trying to do is to add another layer to the analysis. Apart from the purely technical evaluation, I try to input psychological profiles. Eg. What type of games do my opponent like and dislike. What levels of stress can he endure etc. And which lines can give me the type of games that will give those conditions. If you have time go back to the Olympiads and see all the games that England played against us. I think there is something there. All my best.
ReplyDeleteps: I am not referring to Mas's game. Look at the rest. :)
ReplyDelete