Planning

Hello chessdudes and dudettes,

Sometimes OTB I get an ok, reasonable or even good position, but I find it hard to continue play, to come with a good plan so to speak.

Last week I got the below position (I am white). Any advise on how to continue?

Since Black doesn't appear to have any good moves, White could play h2-h4 intending h5, so after h5 gxh5; Qxh5 then maneouvre the rook from f2 to h3 and attack the h7 pawn.  Black would have to move his d7 pawn to free up the rook on a7 to defend the h7 pawn, but after the White exchanges the pawn, e.g. exd6; it will threaten the Queen.  If Black's Queen captures the pawn it'll no longer be defending the 7th rank and the h7 pawn can be attacked immediately.

@DarKnight71

Yeah, I played h2-h4 to be honest. However after playing it, I realised its a blunder. Black can play Qf8 and follow up with Re7.  Luckily for me, my opponent also missed it.

Thx for the reply

@FunWIthChess20, you're right!

I basically forgot the rook on h6 was unprotected.  Have you tried computer analysis to see what it suggests?

Well I didn't until just now..

As often with computeranalysis I have a hard time trying to understand it. In fact there are many moves within a 0.2 evaluation. They are:

1.Kh1 0.68  I Thought about this, with the idea of rerouting the rook to g1 and pushingthe g pawn. But it seemed slow to me and didn't seem to work

2.Qg3 0.67 Actually thought about this  for rearranging the pieces, like Rf3, Qf2, Rfh3 etc. Also slow and didn't seem to work for me

3.Kf1 0.60 I haven't got a clue why this is a good move.

4.Rd2 0.59 Didnt consider this one. because I dont want to play the d-pawn, also don't understand why the computer advices it since in it lines it also doesn't push d.

5.Rh4 0.58 also missing the why here. The main line the computer gives me here only confuses me more (1.Rh4 Qd8 2.Rf1 Qb6 3.Qf2 h5 4.Nf3 Nc3 5.Nd2 Qc6 6.Rc1 Qd5 7.Re1) I understand the rerouting of the knight but black moves and white rook moves are a mystery to me.

6.h3  0.57  Why? for a future g4? no it doesn't want to play g4 after that. It is counterintuïtive for me I would label it as a bad move.

7.Re2 0.55 why? black isn't going to play d7 anyway

8.Rh3 0.48 ok,..

9.Nh3 0.45 bleh, don't see it. 

I know that if the computer says it is a good move, then it is correct, however I'd like to understand it.

Heh, this is why I don't like positions like this, you need to be able to spot future tactical possibilities to justify the placement of your pieces.  You really don't have time to bring them back to the center, you have to make something of the kingside.

Thankfully I don't see any useful play generation for black.  His only pawn break is d6 which gives him a backward pawn on e6 so unless it's involves e5 as a follow up somehow it just looks bad.

So if I were OTB I'd try to find some configuration on the kingside that had a tactical threat to it.  If you could pile on h7 and force d6 to bring the a7 rook into the defense, then that's fantastic (you'd then target the e pawn).  So tripple on the h file for example with an eye out that d6 doesn't hurt you by opening when all your pieces are crammed on the edge.

Qg3 Rf3 Qf2 Rh3 Qh4 for example.

And that's about the best I can do lol.  Pretty crude.  I don't like repositioning the knight.  Maybe OTB staring at it I'd find something eventually... but again that's why I don't like these types of positions ;)

Thx wafflemaster.

Any other thoughts?

thank you Conzipe!

Looks like you were too optimistic for kingside attacking chances.  I see that black is weak on the dark squares, but your piece position isn't exploiting that much.  I'd try figuring out a way to put a knight on f6 as it controls more valuable squares, though one shouldn't expect black to simply let you do that. 

Now, I don't know how the game went, but it looks like judging from the pawn structure that an earlier d4 push would have been great to blast open the center and exploit the weak d6 square.