A Tale of Three Castles
Always remember to castle (only) on time!The Illegal Castle
The game started pretty well, black misplayed the opening and I got a strong attack which then became material advantage:
However, I forgot about the king trip that was previously made, and castled!
The Forgotten Castle
After a very dubious opening play by black which was met with impatience by white, I obtained a decent position. All I needed to do was castle... Unfortunately I forgot that I could!
The Castle that should not have been
For once I had a lot of time to think here and did take my sweet time, and I was quite proud of myself for coming up with the clever idea of castling so that my king ends up close to the white h pawn and stops it easily. It was especially nice to have the opportunity to play this move which felt like settling the score with late castles (I obviously had these two games in mind. It is very satisfying to connect chess move with things like irony, poetic justice, aesthetics, but it can also be risky and result in errors in judgement).
Unfortunately as frequently happens in such occasions I got it wrong, and the pin on the g file could have cost me half a point!
