The Knight: Part III
Submitted by
Grakovsky on Sat, 04/04/2009 at 6:41pm.
The knight - a strange figure, isn't like anyone else. Many beginner chess books simply waste hundreds of words trying to explain how this piece moves. We will use an old Russian war song: "There where the infantry won't pass, where the armored train won't speed through, and a heavy tank won't crawl through, - that is where a steel bird will fly by."
A knight of course isn't as fast as a steel bird. But when talking about the moving tempo of a knight, it will surpass any other chess war piece, except for the infantry. At least though, no one can compare to the knight especially when he has been annoyed; then he is a full move ahead of everyone. There are little obstacles for the knight when facing against an army of pawns because it can simply hop over the aggressors.
There are times in chess when your opponent will use all of their pieces to build a wall around their king. This is called over-protection. It ultimately leads to the opposite of what the defensive side was attempting to accomplish. Knights are excellent weapons against this aggressive-defense style of play because as we know knights work best in cramped positions - they hop over pieces and swiftly deliver inevitable tactical blows. Here are some examples on this topic:
Granter - Kem (1894): 1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Nxd4 e5 5. Nf5 (not the best move because of 5... d5!, but...) 5... Nge7?? 6. Nd6#.
Do you really think mistakes like these are made only by beginners? Absolutely not! In this next example Paul Keres plays white against a Polish master in an international tournament in 1950.
Keres - Arlamowski (1950): 1. e4 c6 2. Nc3 d5 3. Nf3 dxe4 4. Nxe4 Nd7 5. Qe2 Ngf6?? 6. Nd6#.
You'd think grandmasters would never miss a simple beginner's trap, nevermind a grandmaster like Samuel Reshevsky. In a game against Margolit the unexpected happened - Samuel Reshevsky lost to a smothered mate on the ninth move!
Reshevsky - Margolit (1958): 1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 e6 3. Nc3 Bb4 4. e3 c5 5. Ne2 Nc6 6. a3 Qa5 7. Bd2 e5 8. axb4 Nxb4 9. Rxa5?? Nd3#.
The danger of this kind of checkmate always increases when a knight is involved in the attack against a king in a limited space because of his own pieces.
Rumiantsev - Lomonosov (1978): 1. d6! What develops after this is more sad than funny. After 1... Na6 follows 2. dxc Nc7 3. Nd6# mate. If 1... Qc8, then again there is 2. dxc with the same threat of checkmate on d6. Black resigned because he would have to lose heavy material.
Shlage - N.N. (1934): The Black king is nicely wrapped up in a package - the only thing left to do is to demolish his defenses and the critical point f6: 1. Qxd7. The knight is removed from the f6-square on which White's knight can deliver a checkmate. Black resigned.
From the position of Muller - Weinacht (1937) the c2-square from where the b4-Knight could make the finishing blow, is protected by two pieces - queen on b3 and knight on a3. Therefore Black comes up with something else: 1... Ne4! 2. Bh4 (2. Nxe4 Nc2# mate) 2... Nc5! 3. Qg3 (one piece is distracted by the threat, the other is captured) 3... Qxa3! White resigned.
Donner - Balcerowski (1962): How should one take advantage of Black's tight king position? Like this: 1. h6!, and Black resigned because 1... g6 2. Nxe7+ Qxe7 3. Bg5 leads to a loss of material, or after 1... Ne8 - to a smothered checkmate: 2. hxg Nxg7 3. Nh6# mate.
Zotov - Glebov (1975): 1. Qc7! An amusing situation. White threatens 2. Qb8+ Rxb8 3. Nc7# mate, and this finale can at least be "traded in" for 1... Bxa6 2. Qxa7# mate or 1... Rxa6 2. Qxb7#. That's why Black resigned.
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