Promotion

Last night I played for Spondon 'D' in our last game of the season against West Notts 'C'. This was a crucial game to decide which of us would win a promotion place to Division 3. Luckily for us, two of our opponents didn't turn up, so we knew we were getting promotion after half an hour. Whether this will actually happen though is a bit confusing in that Spondon 'C' may well be swapping places with ourselves, so we might actually stay where we are.

[Event "Derby League Division 4"]
[Date "2008.04.25"]
[White "Michael Zhang, West Notts 'C'"]
[Black "Dean Madden, Spondon 'D'"]
[Result "0-1"]
[ECO "B01"]

1. e4 d5 2. exd5 Qxd5 3. Nc3 Qa5 4. d3 c6 5. Bd2 Qc7 6. g3 Nf6 7. Bg2 Bf5 8. Nge2 e6 9. O-O Be7 10. Re1 O-O 11. Nd4 Bg6 12. Be3 Nbd7 13. Qe2 Rfe8 14. Bf4 Qb6 15. Nxe6 fxe6 16. Qxe6+ Bf7 17. Qh3 Qxb2 18. Ne4 Rad8 19. Ng5 h6 20. Nxf7 Kxf7 21. Rab1 Qxc2 22. Rxb7 Bc5 23. Be3 Bxe3 24. fxe3 Qxd3 25. Bxc6 Rxe3 26. Rf1 Ke8 27. Bxd7+ Rxd7 28. Rb3 Qd4 29. Rxe3+ Qxe3+ 30. Kh1 Qe2 31. Qg2 Qxg2+ 32. Kxg2 Rd2+ 33. Rf2 Ne4 34. Rxd2 Nxd2 35. Kf2 Ke7 36. Ke3 Nf1+ 0-1

Anyway, I had a good win against Michael Zhang, graded 90. I played a pretty standard Scandinavian opening. On move 14 he'd just played Bf4.

I don't know why I missed e5, I didn't consider it at all, was too preoccupied with Qb6. After I played that he made his fatal mistake of playing Nxe6, I'm not sure exactly what he was aiming for, but it looks like he miscalculated the sacrifice.

There were some hairy moments after this but I eventually managed to force the extra knight advantage to a win. I concentrated on playing simple safe chess, as I'd learnt from experience that I could still throw it away with all the power that was still left on the board.

I was a bit nervous of what I'd need to do in a knight & pawns v pawns endgame, but needn't have worried.