Move 14
 

f5 as expected. 14. g5 was discussed last move.

I was looking at moving the knight, or taking with a pawn, or counter-pushing, but none of those look especially appealing. I still like g5.

Yes, I still strongly favour 14.g5, with the following considerations in mind:
[LIST][*]Keep light squared bishops on the board, if we can, to aid our kingside attack. Therefore avoid opening the long diagonal h1-a8 and aim to recapture with the d pawn if Black plays ...fxe4.[*]Avoid opening the g-file so that Black does not get counterattacking possibilities against our king.[*]Aim to lever open Black's kingside by advancing the h-pawn once we have amassed our attacking forces behind it.[/LIST]Still, no need to be hasty. What other ideas might we have?

Is there any reason to delay doing g5?

[QUOTE=henryzz;323593]Is there any reason to delay doing g5?[/QUOTE]
Not if no-one can come up with any other insights. I can't, even after spending another 20-30 minutes staring at the position this morning. But I'm just a little wary of any self-reinforcing effect that might be present amongst the members in our team, like if each of us is thinking "Oh, of course 14.g5 will be right because we all think so!", which could blind us to something which an independent outsider might have no problem seeing. Not that I think that is happening in our team: in fact, I think we have been quite good at questioning each other's judgment up until now. But even so, moving too quickly on the basis of "of course this must be right" is dangerous in chess.
:smile:

Just one other thought:
Rich told us he is away skiing until 5 January. Although he started this thread he might not have had the chance to look at the position properly. Shall we at least wait until he has a chance to write down his thoughts about the position if he wants to?

Are we okay after 14.g5 fxe4 15.dxe4 d5? Black will have the square f5 for their knight which we will probably need to deal with by playing Ng3 and exchanging it. Is 16.e5 Nf5 17.Bd2 Qc7 18.Ng3 okay for us? Can we do better?

I can look again at the position on Sunday if we wait a little. It's tough to work on an iPhone instead of a board!

What about 14. Ng3. I'm liking it the more I think about it.

If they respond 14. ... fxg4 then 15. Bxg4 and we are attacking a pawn, threatening check, and they cannot immediately push our Bishop away with h5. Further, their knight is stuck where he is for a while at least.

If they respond 14. ... fxe4 then 15. dxe4 and our position seems stable. We still control the center, and now if there is an exchange of white bishops our queen moves to a powerful position.

If they respond by not taking, we can do 15. g5 if it suits us, now that the f5 square is attacked by our knight.

If 14.Ng3 I think their best reply is definitely 14...fxg4. Then 15.Bxg4 Qd7 and I fear our king's position is dicey. Black will have time for a quiet consolidation and build up with ...Rf7, ...Raf8, ...Bc8, and if we try h4 they can reply ...h5 if we don't get enough by sacrificing a piece for two pawns on h5 (which I doubt we do) or else just ignore our demonstration and allow us to play h5, then play ...gxh5 and possibly end up using the g-file themselves against our exposed king. We are not without chances, but nor are they by any means, and it's a pity if we can't go for the smothering 14.g5 just because they temporarily get the f5 square for their knight.

I agree. I also see some troubles for black if he does eventually push d5. So we may want to go ahead with g5 anyway, and see what happens.