IRLchess

Continuing the discussion of this ending from part I:

I thought this ending must be extremely rare in practice. But to my surprise Mason-Paulsen turns out to be only the first of many examples in Irish chess, i.e., where the game was played in Ireland or at least one of the players was Irish. Here is a list of all the examples I know of, excluding cases where this balance appeared only for an instant as part of an exchange: 15 more games from the ICU online games archive, 4 more from Tim Harding’s database of correspondence games UltraCorr3, and 1 from OlimpBase.

There were five Danish players in Castlebar 1969, and here two of them met in the last round. White’s pawns are nowhere near far enough advanced to cause difficulty, and Black manages a routine win:

54. a4 Ke4 55. b4 Kd5 56. Kb3 Rb1+ 57. Kc2 Rh1 58. Kb3 Rh3 59. a5 Kc6 0-1. [Replay.]

Rod Nixon played in Leinster in the early 1970’s, and played on the 1972 Glorney Cup team. He left for London around 1980 and is now playing in Oxford: he’s one of the players pictured on the cover of the latest Disinformator^TM (Oxford C.C. magazine). The European Junior when he played consisted of a preliminary stage followed by a final. He had lost to Richard Smith (Wales?) in the preliminary rounds, and here was pressing for revenge when they met again in the finals. The position is finely balanced: the pawns are still far back but the Black king is far away. It’s a draw with best play; win with the Black king at c2 instead. As it happens, both players go wrong but the errors cancel themselves out.

59. h4 Kc2 60. Kg3? (60. g4=) 60. … Ra8? (60. … Kd3/Kc3/Kb3 wins: the White king blocks the g-pawn and by keeping his rook on the 7th rank Black would force White to use several tempi to disentangle) 61. Kf4 Rh8 62. Kg5 Rg8+ 63. Kf6 Rh8 64. Kg5 Kd3 65. h5 Kd4 66. h6 Ke5 67. Kg6 Rg8+ 68. Kf7 Rxg2 69. h7 Rh2 70. Kg7 Rxh7+ 71. Kxh7 Kf4 ½-½. [Replay.]

From Smith-Nixon above, you would guess that a draw is the correct result here, and you’d be right. Unfortunately Short goes astray:

57. h4 Kc3 58. Kh3?

Now the Black king gets to e5; 58. h5/f4/Kf3/Kg3=.

58. … Kd4+ 59. Kg4 Ke5 60. f4+ Ke6 61. f5+ Ke5 62. f6 Ke6

White has managed to arrange the pawns protecting each other on the 4th, 5th and 6th ranks but is still lost according to the tablebases. The problem is that in aiding the advance of the pawns, White’s king has had to push too far forward. With the rook cutting off a retreat the king runs out of squares and is forced to allow the rook onto the h-file. Draw if the White king were at g2 here. The corresponding position with pawns at f4, g5, h6, White king at g4, Black king at g6 and rook at a3 is also lost for White, regardless of whose turn it is to move.

63. Kf4 Rh3 64. Kg4 Rh1 65. Kg3 Kf7 66. Kg4 Kg6 67. Kg3 Kh5 68. Kf3 Rh3+ 69. Kf4 Rxh4+ 70. Kf5 Rh1 71. Ke6 Kg6 72. Ke7 Re1+ 0-1. [Replay.]

Here the ending disappears almost as soon as it appears, since the h7 pawn is lost. But it would be a draw even with White to move, since Kg5 is met by … Rc5+ and the king has no shelter from the checks.

67. … Rh8 68. g4 Rxh7 69. g5 Kc3 70. g6 Rh1 71. Kf5 Kd4 72. f4 Kd5 73. Kf6 Ke4 74. f5 Rf1 75. g7 Rg1 76. Kf7 Kxf5 77. g8=Q Rxg8 ½-½. [Replay.]

Here the White king is again far afield, but now the Black pawns are dangerously advanced, especially as it’s Black to move, so here it’s White who is struggling to draw. With best play he just manages it. (Win if any of the Black pieces is advanced one square.)

60. … h4 61. Rh1! (only move) h3 62. Kb6! (only move) Kg6 63. Kc5 Kg5 64. Kd4 f5 65. Ke3 f4+ 66. Ke4 f3! (now Black needs to be careful; this is the only move to draw) 67. Ke3 Kh5! (another only move) 68. Rxh3+ ½-½. [Replay.]

To be continued …

The following is very slightly adapted from an article I submitted to the ICJ some time back. Unfortunately the ICJ seems to have fallen dormant, with the last issue having appeared a year ago this month. I’m still hoping we’ll see it return sometime soon, but as it’s unclear when, I think it’s a good time to post this here.

The game Mason-Paulsen, Vienna 1882, (see the ICU online archive of Irish games, http://www.icu.ie/games) reached the following picturesque and very unusual position, where White has just played 52. Rxa2:

What is the verdict with best play? Mason had no doubt it was a win, in his annotations to this game in his The Principles of Chess in Theory and Practice (London, 1902), pp. 272-76:

‘52. … g4 53. Ra8

If it were merely a question of stopping pawns with king, 53. Kg1 would be the move.

53. … h4 54. Rg8+ Kh5 55. Kf2 f4 56. Rf8 Kg5 57. Kg2 f3+ 58. Kf2 Kg6 59. Rh8 Kg5 60. Rh7

A coup de repos, better than 60. Ke3, which would give some chance of a draw. The White king gets in among the pawns, and it is all over.

60. … h3 61. Kg3 Kf5 62. Re7 Kg5 63. Rf7 Kg6 64. Rf4 Kh5 65. Rxg4 f2 66. Rf4 h2 67. Kxh2 1-0.

This ending, rook v. three united passed pawns, is of course very rare in practice.’

Mason identified Paulsen’s losing move as occurring a few moves earlier.

But these days such endings are within the range of tablebases, so we can check the exact status with perfect accuracy. Using the online Nalimov tablebases (http://k4it.de/index.php?topic=egtb&lang=en) several missed chances are revealed:

52. … g4?

One of only two losing moves: 52. … f4? is also bad but everything else draws. So the diagrammed position is drawn.

53. Ra8 h4 54. Rg8+?

54. Rf8! wins, the only move that does so.

54. … Kh5?

54. … Kf7! (only move) draws. Black is now lost and White gives no more chances to escape.

55. Kf2 f4 56. Rf8 Kg5 57. Kg2 f3+

Zugwang forces Black to break up the pawn front. 57. … h3+ 58. Kh2 and Black has to play … f3 or lose a pawn immediately.

58. Kf2 Kg6 59. Rh8 Kg5 60. Rh7

Mason didn’t like it but 60. Ke3 is also fine, and in fact it wins one move earlier than Rh7.

60. … h3 61. Kg3 Kf5 62. Re7 Kg5 63. Rf7 Kg6 64. Rf4 Kh5 65. Rxg4 f2 66. Rf4 h2 67. Kxh2 1-0.

Speelman, noting that there is considerable theory on this ending, gives an extended discussion in Batsford Chess Endings (Speelman, Tisdall, Wade; Batsford 1993), pp. 219-224. Summarising, the first key position is shown below:

The key to the evaluation of the ending is the well-known fact that two connected pawns on the 6th rank can’t be stopped by a lone rook. In the position above, White can force the capture of the f-pawn by either king or rook. But a capture by the king can only be forced in a way that allows Black to reply … g3 winning (or perhaps forcing White to take a draw by perpetual), e.g. 1. Kxf5 g3 or 1. Ra3 Kf6 2. Rb3 Kg6 3. Rb6+ Kf7 4. Kxf5 g3 and draws, since White must take the perpetual. On the other hand a capture with the rook can only be forced with the White king on f4, when … h2 wins, e.g. 1. Rh8 Kg7! (only move) 2. Rh5 Kg6! (only move) 3. Rxf5? h2 or 3. Rg5+ Kh6 4. Rxf5? h2 and wins, or on e5, when … g3 wins. With the rook on a5-e5 and the White king on f4, Black shuffles his king between g6 and h6. So (regardless of who moves next) this position is drawn.

It’s not all plain sailing for Black, as there are some winning positions White can aim for.

Here the rook restrains an immediate … g3, but more importantly the Black king is cut off on the h-file. This prevents … h2 because of the skewer and also sets up mate threats, e.g., 1. … Kh4 2. Kf4 Kh5 3. Kxf5 and wins.

Note that this was exactly Paulsen’s final error: instead of 54. … Kh5?, allowing White to reach the model winning position, he should have played 54. … Kf7 followed by … h3(+), reaching the model drawn position.

After 1. … Kh6 above, it’s still a win for White but not a straightforward one. 2. Kf4? Kh7 draws, and it was thought there was nothing better until Kopaev (1958) found the winning approach: 2. Ke2!. After 2. … Kh7 3. Rg5 Kh6 4. Rxf5, the king is much better placed on e2 than f4, and White can stop the pawns. After 2. … Kh5 the main line runs 3. Kf2 f4 4. Rh8+ Kg5 5. Kg1! Kf5 6. Kh2 Ke4 7. Rh7 Kf3 8. Rg7 Ke2 9. Rxg4 f3 10. Re4+ Kf1 11. Kg3! f2 12. Rf4 and wins. So (regardless of whose turn it is to move) this is a win for White.

The International Chess Tournament Vienna 1882 was up to then the strongest tournament ever held: an 18-player double-round robin event including all, or almost all depending on opinion, of the world’s top ten. It ended in a tie for first between Steinitz and Winawer, after two playoff games failed to split the deadlock. James Mason, in one of the best results of his career, finished clear third on 23/34, ahead of Zukertort, Blackburne, Paulsen, Chigorin, Weiss, and Bird.

There’s an excellent account of the event in ChessBase Magazine 103 (2005), available online (http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=2117).

Mason’s origins are shrouded in mystery: his name was changed when he was a child and he never spoke publicly of his real name or place of birth. He was born in Ireland, it seems, though even that is not beyond dispute. Beyond that, although there are some very elaborate theories, nothing is known for certain.

His book, cited above, is now out of copyright and available on Google Books, so let’s take advantage by showing a picture from it:

And while we’re at it, here’s a picture of Louis Paulsen, from the article at ChessBase.com mentioned above:

To be continued …