How would you judge this position, which arose after the 25th move by white in the game between Ponomariov and Bareev (FIDE Wch k.o. Moscow 2001). Question: who is better and can black take the pawn on e5?
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Before you answer the first question, I have another question. Was white’s last move: 19. Qd1 right or wrong? What was the alternative?
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This is a fragment from the game between Karl Burger and Pal Benkö (USA 1969). What is the best move for black?
Read More »Opening books are popular. Actually, I don’t really know why. Because personally, I have never finished an opening book. Most of the opening books in my bookcase lead a sad existence. At best, I will occasionally consult them as a reference.
Perhaps those books are so popular because we hope for a quick victory? Or to avoid having to resign after a couple of moves? No idea. But what I do know is that it is useful to know and avoid falling into opening traps. Or much better: trapping your opponent.
IM Sagar Shah has started a fun series about traps in the opening on the youtube channel of ChessBase India. The videos are released at a rapid pace. They are short and entertaining. The most important thing: you are introduced to some nasty tactics in the opening. Take, for instance, this video about the Accelerated Dragon in the Sicilian defence.
Sagar Shah regularly enlivens his lesson with a light anecdote. In the next video, he is playing a game of chess with his wife. Apparently, you shouldn’t mess with her. Watch how this turned out.
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The goal of chess is of course to checkmate your opponent. That can be done in different ways.
Chess often revolves around pattern recognition. Once you have studied those patterns and know them by heart, it is a lot easier to see how to checkmate an opponent during a game. That’s what this book is about.
Of course you have not read anything new with this introductory text. But reading (or hearing) and knowing is often something different than doing it in practice. That is precisely why this is such a usefull book. You can practice a lot and will never forget the patterns you have learned.
This a position after white’s 25th move. It is from one of my own games. At our level we make (too) many mistakes. But it doesn’t mean that there are no interesting moments.
It is clear that black is much better. The white king is not safe and his pawns are weak. Compare both rooks and queens and it becomes clear that black has a winning advantage. But the situation is still a bit tricky and black can go astray very easy. What is the best move for black?
At first glance it seems black is in time to defend his king. White still found a way to destroy black’s defenses. Do you see how he did it? Solution…
Chess can be a very complicated game. This is no news. And sometimes we over complicate things without knowing it. We get distracted and don’t see what’s the leading motif in a position.
See the diagram. It is black’s turn. The position is quite messy. There are a lot of possibilities. Do you see the correct solution?
I found this problem on Chess Tempo (number 738). It’s from a game between Franz Jittenmeier and Ludger Grewe (2234) played in 1998. Black found the correct solution and won.
White is winning. In the diagram position he could play for instance 1. b6 or 1. Ka4 and he is doing fine.
Instead he played 1. Qc3?? Why is this a blunder? Answer…
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