Chess Tip Of The Day 532

Chess patterns will often repeat themselves according to the opening that was employed, which is why playing through complete games with a particular opening will help someone play that opening well.

Nigel Davies, The Rules Of Winning Chess

Championship Chess

THE September issue of Chess magazine has reports on the British championships, held at Warwick University last month.

Chess ... championship edition

One game that particularly caught my attention, and certainly deserves deeper scrutiny, is the following round-three clash, which features a long-term positional piece sacrifice.

Notes in italics are by international master Andrew Ledger.

Syvatoslav Bazakutsa (IM 2579 ECF/2488 Fide) - Kenneth Hobson (FM 2349 ECF/2244 Fide)

Réti

1.c4 e6 2.g3 d5 3.Bg2 Nf6 4.Nf3 d4!?

We get a reversed Benoni, and White will get decent dynamic chances, given that he has the extra move and Black is committed to ...e6.

On the other hand, 4...d4!? is the top choice of Stockfish18 and Dragon1, narrowly ahead of 4...dxc4, while the engines agree the most popular continuation, 4...Be7, leaves White slightly better, or at least with the better part of equality, after 5.d4 or 5.0-0.

5.0-0 c5 6.e3 Nc6

This position occurs 1,929 times in ChessBase's 2026 Mega database, and is equal, according to the engines

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7.d3 h6!?

7...Bd6 is most common, although as this is usually met by 8.exd4 cxd4 9.Bg5, you can see the point of ...h6.

8.exd4 cxd4 9.Bf4 Nd7!?

Challenging White's dark-square bishop with 9...Bd6 looks much more natural, but the engines rate the two moves as more-or-less equivalent.

10.Re1 g5!?

An aggressive attempt to stir things up.

11.Be5

I'd be nervous about committing my bishop to e5, but Bazakutsa, quite rightly, has no such fears.

11...Rh7!?

After 11...N(either)xe5 12.Nxe5 Nxe5 13.Rxe5, Black has the bishop-pair, but White is ahead on development, and it is unclear where the black king will find a safe haven.

How should White proceed?

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12.Bxd4!!

This appears to be a novelty, initiating a long-term piece sacrifice, relying on Black's lack of coordination and development.

I am sure the text would not have seriously crossed the mind of most players, but it is engine-approved, and may well have been preparation. The known continuation is g4 but, as AL points out, it "looks pretty ropey after simply 12...h5."

12...g4

Black has to accept the piece sacrifice, as otherwise White is winning, according to the engines.

13.Bc3 gxf3 14.Bxf3 Bg7

How would you assess the coming middlegame?

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White has two pawns for a knight, which, materially, is clearly not enough, and has a slight lead in development. But the main factor is surely the plight of the black king, which will struggle to reach the queenside, and is unlikely to be very safe in the centre or on the kingside. The engines give White a slight edge.

15.d4 Kf8!

Bearing in mind White's threatened 16.d5, this is the only move to stay in the game, according to the engines.

16.Na3!? Kg8 17.Nb5 a6?!

Black has defended well up to this point, but this looks wrong, sending the knight to where it wants to go. 17...Ne7 looks better, and the engine [unspecified] assesses it as close to equal.

18.Nd6 Bf8?

The engines give 18...Qf8!?, but award White the upper hand.

19.d5!

Really strong.

19...Nce5

19...Bxd6!? looks catastrophic for Black after 20.cxd6, but the engines reckon it is not much inferior to the text, which shows how bad Black's position already is.

20.dxe6 Bxd6 21.Be4!

Excellent play, following up with all the best moves. White will soon start to recoup material.

He needs to - Black has two knights for three pawns!

21...Qf8 22.exd7 Nxd7 23.Bxh7+ Kxh7

The position has clarified somewhat, leaving White with rook and two pawns for bishop and knight

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Often two pieces are well worth a rook and two pawns, but not here - Black's position is a wreck, with a weak king and far behind in development.

24.Qd3+ Kg8 25.Rad1 Bb4!? 26.Bxb4 Qxb4 27.Qd4 Qf8!?

The engines reckon there is nothing better.

28.Qg4+ Kh8 29.Rxd7

The rest is pretty easy.

29...Bxd7 30.Qxd7 Qb4

It is KH's misfortune that, being 'only' two pawns down, he probably feels compelled to play on in the hope a swindle will somehow appear, and it may be his opponent is short of time

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31.Re7 Qxb2 32.Rxf7 Qb1+ 33.Kg2 Qe4+ 34.Kh3!? Qg6 35.Qxb7 Re8 36.Rf4 h5 37.Kg2 Kg8!? 38.Qd5+ Re6 39.h4 Kh7 40.Rf5 1-0

It is said that only when you become really good do you realise how really bad you are. Alas, I am fairly certain I am one of those players for whom 12.Bxd4!! would not have been a candidate move.

Lessons From Bad Bertrich IV

MY round-four game, in which I was White against Joachim Hiller (1879), featured an instructive moment in the opening, an Exchange Variation of the Spanish.

I have just played 10.Bc1-f4, and it is up to Black to decide what to do about the attacked c7 pawn

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As is well known, White in the Spanish Exchange gives up the bishop-pair in order to obtain the superior pawn-structure.

White gets a healthy 4-3 kingside majority, from which a passed pawn can be made with normal play, while Black gets a damaged 4-3 queenside majority, which will not produce a passed pawn with normal play, unless White gets careless.

In the diagram position, Black has three plausible ways of saving c7: (i) by castling, (ii) by defending the pawn with the dark-square bishop, (iii) by advancing the pawn.

I suspect most players would pretty quickly dismiss 10...c6 as not helping development, as well as weakening Black on the b8-h2 diagonal, including the square d6.

The overwhelmingly most popular choice in ChessBase's 2026 Mega database is 10...0-0-0, which not only defends the pawn, but gets the king to safety, and develops the rook - three good things for the price of one!

However, I was surprised 10...Bd6 appears only once in Mega26.

After 11.Bxd6 cxd6, Black no longer has the bishop-pair, but also no longer has doubled pawns. However, Black has also contracted a backward pawn on a half-open file.

The engines very much disapprove of 10...Bd6.

Part of the reason, no doubt, is the backward pawn, but there is also the fact that engines rate the bishop-pair as more than cancelling out the disadvantage of having doubled pawns - indeed, engines are not keen on White playing the Spanish Exchange from the get-go.

The move 4.Bxc6 sees Stockfish18 and Dragon1 drop their evaluation of the opening from slightly better for White to a game with equal chances.

Garry Kasparov might well agree, as I recall a John Watson review for The Week In Chess in which he quotes Kasparov as joking that "the bishop is always better than the knight!"

LESSON: the bishop-pair is a major factor in chess, and should not be given up without very good cause.

Chess Tip of The Day 531

Whether you are a new advocate or a seasoned exponent of the English, you will inevitably enhance your understanding by studying complete games, which demonstrate how ideas in the opening are continued into the middlegame and endgame.

Nigel Povah, How To Play The English Opening

Lessons From Bad Bertrich III

THERE is a fairly well-established hierarchy when it comes to the drawishness of endings.

At the top, and by a considerable distance, are endings with opposite-colour bishops.

Next come rook-and-pawn endings, their drawing tendencies illustrated by the aphorism, usually attributed to Tarrasch or Tartakower, that "all rook endgames are drawn."

Third in the drawishness stakes are queen endings, thanks to the danger of the weaker side escaping defeat with perpetual check.

After that the hierarchy becomes somewhat murky, but I would suggest the list continues with same-colour bishop endings, followed by knight endings, and finally pawn endings (note I am only listing endings where both sides have the same pieces, ie leaving out, for example, rook versus bishop and knight).

All of this is a preamble to the strange finish in my round-three game, where I was Black against Børge Svanholm (1871).

The following rook-and-pawn ending was reached after White's 27th move.

White has just captured on d8, leaving a commonly occurring rook-and-pawn ending in which material is level, but one player has a farside passed pawn

Such positions are normally quickly agreed drawn at high levels, and often at club level too.

However, if the game continues, the normal procedure is that the player with the passed pawn - in this case White - protects it from the front, and advances the pawn to the seventh rank, while the black rook keeps an eye on the pawn from behind.

There are two dangers for Black to avoid, once the pawn has reached White's seventh.

One is to carelessly put the black king in such a position on Black's third rank, or higher, that it can be checked by the white rook, allowing the a pawn to be advanced on the next move.

The other is to let the white king get over to the queenside to safely help promote the pawn, although this is a risky business if it means Black mops up White's kingside pawns.

But if White tries nothing, and Black does not get careless, the game is inevitably drawn.

Here is the position seven moves after the previous diagram

Material is still level, and the ending is still completely drawn. Indeed, the ending would be a tablebase draw even if the h pawn were removed from the board.

Six moves later, the h pawn was removed from the board after Black in this position played 40...Rxh5

The Syzygy endgame tablebase confirms that the position is still drawn, and would remain so after any move by the white rook along the back rank.

Instead, my opponent committed the cardinal sin of leaving a drawn rook-and-pawn ending for a lost pawn ending by playing 41.Rxh5+, resigning 10 moves later.

LESSON: unless you have no other option, never swop off into a pawn ending unless you are certain of the outcome.

Chess Tip Of The Day 530

In endings with bishops of opposite colour, material means NOTHING, position EVERYTHING.

Cecil Purdy, On The Endgame

Lessons From Bad Bertrich II

MY round-two game, in which I was White against Wolf Ebert (1725), was a French Defence that began 1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.Nc3.

A position familiar to every tournament player, even if it has not appeared in one of their games

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The position occurs 239,392 times in ChessBase's 2026 Mega database, with the most popular continuations being 3...dxe4 (27,031 games), 3...Nf6 (94,362) and 3...Bb4 (106,481).

Geoffrey Stern (1931, Luxembourg) told me later that, although he had played the French for many years, my opponent's continuation was one that GS had never even considered playing.

The move my opponent played was 3...Ne7!?, which frankly looks rather silly at first, but appears 251 times in Mega26.

One of my first thoughts was to reply 4.Be3, to make it difficult for Black to get in ...c5. But then one of the points of my opponent's move becomes apparent, as he can play 4...dxe4 5.Nxe4 Nf5, with ...Nxe3 to come, when Black at least has the bishop-pair for his trouble.

I finally settled on 4.Bd3, which is reasonable enough, but the commonest continuation in Mega26, and the top choice of Stockfish18 and Dragon1, is 4.Nf3.

(Note that a move such as 3...Ne7!?, no matter how awful it may look, cannot be refuted out of hand - there is no tactical blow to punish Black.)

After 4.Nf3, the engines for quite some time completely disagree as to how Black should continue, but eventually agree that best is 4...Nbc6!?

This may look odd, but a knight on c6 is well-placed to harass a white bishop on d3 (by continuing ...Nb4) and may support a later ...e5.

After 4...Nbc6!?, the continuation 5.Bd3 scores a disappointing 47% in Mega26, but 5.e5, ensuring Black cannot play ...e5 in the foreseeable future, rings up a much more satisfactory 61%.

Black can attack the head of the pawn chain with 5...f6 - Nimzowitsch might have disapproved - when the relatively high-level game, Yunguo Wan (2471) - Ngoc Truong Son Nguyen (2579), PGMA Cup (Manilia, Philippines) 2008, continued 6.exf6 gxf6 7.Nh4!? Ng6?! (the engines reckon 7...Bg7 improves) 8.Qh5 Ne7 9.Nxg6 Nxg6 10.Bd3 f5 11.Bg5 Be7 12.h4 Qd6 13.0-0-0 Bd714.Bxe7 Kxe7! (14...Qxe7 15.Nxd5!) 15.g3 Rag8, when the engines agree White has at least the upper hand, but the game was drawn after 41 moves.

A later game, but also at quite a high level, Axel Delorme (2495) - Aleks Sahakyan (2243), Chess.com Blitz 2023, varied with 7.Bd3. There followed 7...a6!? 8.Bf4 Ng6 9.Bg3 Bd6 10.Qe2 Nb4!? 11.0-0-0 Nxd3 12.Rxd3 Nf4!? 13.Bxf4 Bxf4+14.Kb1, with a slight edge for White, according to the engines (but 0-1, 49 moves).

LESSON: following established theory is often be safe and reliable, if a little predictable, but striking out on one's own, even with a move that may cause 'superior' players to smile or wince, can be invigorating, and may bring surprising success if the move is played with specific worked-out ideas in mind.

Chess Tip Of The Day 529

It's better not to change entire lines or systems, but to tinker a bit so as to make one less predictable, while retaining the knowledge of the ideas behind the lines.

Junior Tay, Chess magazine

Lessons From Bad Bertrich

I CAN recall reading an article by Cecil Purdy, the first chess world correspondence champion, in which he stated that, though it is hard to believe, novices can struggle with mate-in-one problems.

It is easy to laugh at such difficulties, but I suppose the equivalent among experienced players would be to miss a mate-in-two.

Unfortunately, that happened to me in the 50+ at Bad Bertrich in game one, in which I was Black against Jürgen Dieter (1769).

The critical position arose after White's 40th move

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Knowing something is on, it is not difficult to find 40...Rb3+! 41.axb3 Rxb3#.

The situation of the white king, and specifically its inability to retreat, is a little unusual, but hardly unprecedented.

I have preached in previous blogs about how I try to follow a mantra, Captures-Checks-Hangers-Threats, at every move.

This entails firstly looking at every possible capture, not matter how apparently absurd, followed by looking at every possible check, again no matter how foolish-looking.

I am then supposed to look at hangers, ie pieces and pawns that are not protected, and so are 'hanging' or 'loose'. If a player has two or more, a forking combination may be in the air.

And finally I look at threats, eg a minor piece that can 'hit' the opponent's queen, or a pawn advancing against a piece short of squares, or a move lining up a checkmate.

The mantra takes longer to explain that it usually takes to carry out - most possible captures, for example, can be dismissed at once as of poor value, and lots of possible checks are either pointless or downright harmful to the checking side.

But if, in the diagrammed position, I had seriously considered, just for a moment, ...Rb3+, I would surely have seen that it was by no means as ridiculous as it might appear at first sight.

LESSON: there is no point in having a mantra if you do not use it.

Chess Tip Of The Day 528

A growing trend in modern chess is to know as many different openings as possible, making it harder for opponents to prepare.

Simon Williams, Chess magazine