Last night Horsham 1 and Horsham 2 played in the Sussex League. Horsham 1 came out with a comfortable 3-1 victory; my game was an eventful draw as Black against Robert McDonald.
The game began with my opponent adopting an unusual line against the Classical Sicilian. This soon transposed into an equally unusual line against the Sicilian Dragon. At first, I managed to arrange my forces well, but then I first missed an opportunity to exploit a mistake by my opponent, which would have led to me gaining a strong attack, then I played a couple of weak moves, allowing my opponent to establish a big advantage. The game then went along for a while with my opponent maintaining his advantage, but missing a chance to force things in his favour; eventually, he went wrong, allowing me to gain serious counter-play. In the end, we agreed a draw with both of us very short of time and deciding to repeat the position rather than risk continuing. Subsequent analysis suggested that Black was in fact winning, but this was difficult to see or prove with both players in such time trouble. A draw was in the end a fair result, given the ups and downs of the game.
I give the game below with some notes.