I had not intention of giving up my presence in the centre with 2...dc6. Instead I chose to bolster my d5 pawn.

5...Nc6 is main line. I was however anxious to castle. I have closed in my Queen’s Bishop intending to point in the direction of the enemy King by placing it on c6, b7 or a6, rather than f5.

White has erroneously closed in his own Queen’s Bishop which allows me to freely play Bd6, as there is no pin on the f6 Knight and no opposing Bishop on f4.

White moves his light squared Bishop a second time and he has not completed his development. This resulted from a fixation on the b1-h7 diagonal which would ultimately lead to his down fall.

This Knight had no scope on the queenside, so I decided to transfer it to g6 under the pretence that I was protecting the h7 square. In fact, the transfer was more to help with a future attack on the white King.

Another scary move. However I was not perturbed. I continued my development which was incomplete.

16.h5 would have led to a fizzling of what could only be described as a pseudo-attack, after 16...f5 or 16...Bc6 with Bf3 and the eventual Rac8.

Now the value of the Knight at g6 becomes more apparent. If 20.Rc1 then 20...Rc1 21.Kg2 Nf4 winning a Rook and a Bishop!

White’s opening move seeks to control the d5 square without the need for e4, which would interfere with the development of my King’s Bishop to g2, which is my preferred square for it.

Black seeks a transposition to the Dutch Defense, aiming for control of e4. In this system, the key question is usually whether Black will secure a winning attack, or whether white can smash through the centre aided by black’s inherent pawn weaknesses.

White spurns the possible 2.Nh3, preferring the more fundamental chess theory which dictates that Knights should not be placed on the edge of the board.

This is a key move, white Bishop at g2 will dominate the h1-a8 diagonal, including the squares e4 and d5 and inhibits the fianchetto of black’s Queen Bishop at b7.

With the d6 pawn push, black threatened the space grabbing pawn thrust e5. White will have none of this, 6.d4 was imperative. Even though whites control of space seemed overwhelming to me here, Iwas to find out later that the game up to move 9 was all book.

Even though the book recommends 10.e4 here, I wanted to entice the h6 push which would weaken his King side and I anticipated the push of the e6 pawn, which would have resulted in the pinning of the f6 Knight to the black Queen with the white Bishop at g5.

I could not explain the rationale for this move at the time. It seemed to me to do nothing to enhance black’s position.

White continues his development, giving his most powerful piece greater scope and connecting his Rooks.

Black continues to play irrelevantly. This move was apparently played to give black the option of playing Bh8 if Bh6 were ever played.

White completes his development with this move and is now ready to formulate and execute a middlegame plan. The plan here is obvious, smash through the centre.

Now I see the purpose of 10...a6, it prevents the harassing move Nb5 here. This Queen move

prevents the c5 push.

I prepare to bolster my pawn storm in the centre with some support on the wing, which is quite normal for white in the Dutch (which I did not know before hand!)

Under stress from a fairly cramped position, Black blunders away a pawn here in a misguided attempt to free up himself. He calculated wrongly that the taking of the pawn by white might have led to the trapping of the white Queen on the Kingside. After a long period of analysis I gobbled the booty.

White gets back to business, expansion on the Queenside to bolster his advance in the centre. Note that black’s Queen Bishop and Rook still have not moved.

Black in his desperation to release his Queen’s Bishop and get some semblance of an attack going, blunders away another pawn and effectively the game.

Black probably expected 19...Ne4 here which preserves whites fianchettoed Bishop. White prefers to snatch another free pawn.

The Carnage continues. If 22...Bf1, white play would probably go 23.Qh6 Be2 24. Qg6 Kh8 25.Ng5 with mate on h7 or if 25...Qg8 26.Qh6 Qh7 27.Qh7 Checkmate.