Little Gem

IN a recent post I mentioned Fide master James Schuyler's book, Your Opponent Is Overrated - A Practical Guide To Inducing Errors (Everyman, 2016).

Flicking through the book again last night, I came across the following advice, which I found very interesting and well worth sharing.

(I have slightly amended the words to improve the English and clarify some points.)

Most people realise the bishop-pair is good. That is because bishops cannot get in each other's way, not even slightly.

If our first bishop is worth 3.25 pawns, our second is worth about 3.75 [another way of putting this is that each bishop is worth 3.25, but having both bishops is worth an extra 0.5].

Incidentally, the reason the difference is not even greater is that it is also inconvenient to have bishops on the board which must be continual safeguarded against being traded off for the opponent's minor pieces.

If the opponent happens to have no minors, the bishop-pair is with more than half a point.

This helps explain why the bishop-pair and a pawn are often said to give full compensation for the exchange.

In other words, sacrificing rook for bishop and pawn is not really a sacrifice at all, assuming you retain two bishops.