CONGRATS, BADBISHOPS!

This Badbishops is not so bad after all! Winning his last game against Hasidin put him third in the standing thus getting a medal for himself and also helping the Kelantan team to get a placing in the recently concluded Paralympiad 2012. He actually called me to send him our game which discussed the Dutch played early this year in the Kelantan Closed for his preparation (this game is available in the Kelantan Closed 2012 bulletin which insha Allah will be sold at the Kelantan Open this month).

As I said before, home preparation is the deadliest weapon there is in chess. Azlin used this weapon effectively and it paid dividends. So, there should be no more excuses, especially the young players, for being lazy because the evidence is everywhere. There are many ways for those who really want to improve their chess skills and knowledge, including reading chess books or bulletins (preferably that contain your games in it) and also hiring a chess coach.

Once again, congratulations for Azlin and for you readers, enjoy the game!

MSSK IS HEATING UP!

Now that every district in Kelantan has finished their players selection, the players should now prepare for the MSSK which will be held in Tanah Merah in two weeks time (I will post the details later). We want players who are worthy of their places in the state's team, not those who are lucky, or those who comes through back doors or wild cards, just because he or she is a son/daughter of certain people. And to prepare, one has to have proper trainings, either with their coaches or by themselves through extensive reading of chess materials or playing against friends or computer chess programmes. There is no short cuts to success; hard work is A MUST! 

One thing that players in Kelantan still lack is preparing against other players. This can be achieved through studying their game styles and openings which can be found in tournament bulletins. I can safely say this because players in Kelantan DO NOT READ bulletins, thus they do not know what their would be opponents are playing. 

Preparing against your opponent will make your job easier. Grandmasters always make home preparation against their opponents. When I was playing in Kuala Lumpur some time ago, I always prepared against my opponents, especially in big tournaments such as the Royal Selangor Open. I have written about home preparation many times in my blog (you can read them here) but still Kelantan players attitude does not change. 

Hopefully Kelantan players will go far and stamp their mark this coming MSSM.

CHAIYOK RED KNIGHTS!

 

SECRET PREPARATION?

Actually, I wanted to put 'Does My Chess Life blog destroy Kelantan's chances in MSSM?' as the topic for this post, but after due consideration, I acted against it.

Admittedly, I, pretty much like all Kelantan chess enthusiasts, am feeling a little anxious right now as to how our MSSM team is doing in Penang. However, we are lucky because Gilacatur is there to update the results of the ongoing championship in the MSSM 2011 blog.

Nevertheless, the purpose of this particular post is not to update the result, rather to write whether My Chess Life (MCL) really is destroying the team's chances in MSSM.

As we all know, MCL posts about Kelantan's chess developments and news, and sometimes posts games played by Kelantan players completed with notes and analysis.

I was called to write on this topic because recently, there was a person who badly wanted the Kelantan Closed 2011 bulletin, which I think would be used as a preparation for his team if paired against the Kelantan team.

In my humble opinion, we, as a chess player, must always improve ourselves. We don't need to worry about somebody studying our games because we must always have something in our sleeves so that we will not become too predictable. There really is no question of 'revealing too many secrets' when we are really prepared for the games.

MASTER AT THEIR OWN GAMES

It was the last game of the tournament. At board one, the championship was at stake. It was either me or him. A draw was not sufficient as he was half a point in front at the start of the game. I was playing white. After six moves, I thought he made an opening mistake. I pounced and took his King's right to castle before feasting on pawns. However, I was so far behind in development when he started attacking and shattered my pawn formation. Several weak moves later, I started to panic when his centre pawns look menacing enough. The game finally ended when I blundered a rook. After the game, I finally realized that the variation he played was home prepared and I was foolish enough to enter into his territory. Who was he? (Kindly highlight the name of the Black player to know the answer)

White: Yours Truly
Black: Nizam Hamzah
Allegro BPM Kelantan (6)
30.03.2002

1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 d6 5.Nc3 Nf6 6.Bc4 g6 7.Nxc6 bxc6 8.e5 Ng4 9.e6 Ne5 10.exf7+ Nxf7 11.Bxf7+ Kxf7 12.Qf3+ Kg8 13.Qxc6 Be6 14.Be3 Rc8 15.Qe4 Bf5 16.Qd5+ e6 17.Qb3 Rb8 18.Qa4 Rxb2 19.Rc1 Qc8 20.Ne4 Bxe4 21.Qxe4 d5 22.Qe5 Bg7 23.Qd6 Bc3+ 24.Bd2 Rb6 25.Qf4 e5 26.Qf3 Bxd2+ 27.Kxd2 Qe6 28.Rhd1 Kg7 29.Ke1 Rd6 30.Qc3 Rf8 31.Rb1 Rf7 32.Rd3 Rc6 33.Qb3 Rb6 0-1

HOME PREPARATION

Game 3 of Anand vs Kramnik World Chess Championship match 2008 in Bonn, Germany shows how deadly prepared lines could be. I was among many chess enthusiasts who gets to see the game live because of the advancement of technology nowadays (I watched it at ChessCube). Anand gets the upperhand by moving very quickly which leaves a whopping 1 hour gap between the two (Anand used 20 minutes to reach move 20 to Kramnik's 1 hour and a half!). You can replay the game below:

As a player, I myself had the opportunity to prepare against a very good player once (he was 2196 FIDE rated!) during Royal Selangor 2004. He went down checkmated before reaching move 20! However, I did not move quickly so as not to reveal my home preparation. I just pretended to think even though I already knew what to move.

Yours Truly - FIDE Rated Player (2196)
Royal Selangor, 2004
Sicilian Defence

1.e4 Nf6 2.e5 Nd5 3.Nf3 c5 4.Nc3 e6 5.Nxd5 exd5 6.d4 Nc6 7.dxc5 Bxc5 8.Qxd5 Qb6 9.Bc4 Bxf2+ 10.Ke2 0-0 11.Rf1 Bc5 12.Ng5 Nd4+ 13.Kd1 Ne6 14.Ne4 d6 15.exd6 Bd7 16.Bd3 Bc6 17.Nf6+ gxf6 18.Qf5 Rfd8 1-0