My Earliest Online Chess Game

 Way, way back in the dim and distant past, this blog was launched and called, "Dave's Chess Games", and was going to exclusively feature my Chess games - instructive, successful, disastrous, educational and bizarre.  I soon realised, however, that Chess blogs are two-a-penny and written by Chess players with far more skill in the game than me.  The blog was retitled Chess, Opinions, Maths and Puzzles; then it was changed to Web Analytics, Maths and Puzzles.  Looking at recent content, it could probably be called, "What is he going to write about next?" with a focus on mathematical, analytical and numerical content, and some science fiction thrown in for good measure.  Who knows?

What I do know, though, is that I've been playing Chess for a while, and playing online for about 10 years, starting on the Google Chess app, back when we had Google homepages. 

This may not be the oldest game I've played, but it's certainly a start: 7 September 2020.

The time control for this game is one move every three days, so blunders are to be criticised!

I was playing direct Chess back then, and this is what happened:  I was Black.

1.e4 e5
2.Bc4 Nf6 

All fairly standard.  I'm not going to let White play Qh5 and start making my life difficult.

3. d3 Be7

 4. Nf3 d6
5. O-O Bg4
6. h3 Bh5 

If and when White plays g4, I will almost certainly sacrifice one of my minor pieces to open up the files in front of his king.  I will then also advance my g and h pawns.  We'll see.

7. Nc3 Nc6
8. Be3 Qd7
9. Qd2 g5
10. Nxg5 Rg8
11. g4 

So, White has advanced his g pawn.  I've placed my queen on the c8-h3 diagonal, so it seems like the ideal time to sacrifice (especially since I have also place my rook on the g file).  I suspect this was as serious blunder by White - what else would I do?

11. ...   Nxg4
12. hxg4 Qxg4+
13. Kh2 Qh4+
14. Nh3 Bg4
15. Ne2 Qxh3+

There goes White's h pawn.

16. Kg1 Bf3+
17. Ng3 Qg2# 0-1

Whenever you join a new online Chess club or site, and start off as an unranked player, it seems like everybody wants to try and mate you as quickly as possible.  You're fresh meat and you're probably not very good (unlike the long-standing mediocre players you're about to face).  So a good plan against 1. e4 e5 2. Bc4 is probably a good idea.  You can play the Sicilian (1 ... c5) or like me, play Nf6.  That should slow them down a bit.