Good grief, that is a terrible game!
You can be forgiving of modern openings being played strangely in the early 20th century. But you'd have hoped for better positional play in an open game.
British Championship, Shrewsbury 1906
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Paul Cooksey
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John Saunders
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Re: British Championship, Shrewsbury 1906
...is exactly what I thought when, in this position...
... I saw Black play the mind-numbingly awful 89...Kf8?? which I would have been ashamed of in a blitz game. On positional grounds as well as tactical: even without calculating the forced mate, moving the king towards the side of the board where the white bishop is actively placed seems quite unbelievable.
Similarly, in this position...
... I was appalled to see Black play 24...Qd7?? allowing 25 Qxg6+ winning a piece.
The perpetrator of both atrocities was the current world champion in the past couple of weeks.
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Britbase https://www.britbase.info
(I prefer email to PM - contact me via this link - https://www.saund.org.uk/email.html)
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Kevin Thurlow
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Re: British Championship, Shrewsbury 1906
"... I saw Black play the mind-numbingly awful 89...Kf8?? which I would have been ashamed of in a blitz game."
Well, yes. I never think of John playing Blitz games! Qe5 was the principled move and agree a draw.
Well, yes. I never think of John playing Blitz games! Qe5 was the principled move and agree a draw.