Game Spotlight: NCC Closed Tournament 1

The 2018 edition of the NCC Closed Championship was held over the past 4 weeks, with one game per week at a time control of 60 minutes.  Spreading the games out in this way meant a small, but strong and dedicated field.  Over the next few weeks, I’ll be highlighting some of the more interesting games.  For the first selection, a relatively slow middlegame shifts into a tricky endgame:

While endgames take skill, there are some keys to success.  In this game, players needed to pay attention to where Kings can enter the opponent’s position, and which pawns to target.  It’s also important to keep focus on the entire board.  Both players had some opportunities to leave the situation as it was on the kingside and push some queenside pawns to prepare for a more favourable setup before the action shifted to that side of the board.  Of course, all this becomes more difficult in time trouble!

Our calendar for July is now up.  There were a number of interesting games played in the Closed tournament, so come by and see what the players had to say about their own games.