Do You Know This Tactical Trick?

Many people who just started playing chess ask what games they should study in order to improve their skills. It is tempting to study games played by the highest-rated player in history, GM Magnus Carlsen, but this can be really counterproductive, as I already explained in this old article.

Besides Jose Raul Capablanca's games, which I recommended in that article, I would like to add another name to the list of classical players whose games are highly instructive for less experienced players. I am talking about GM Paul Keres, one of the best chess players in history who never became world champion.

Keres' games are very instructive because he played open, attacking chess, and that's exactly where you can learn all kinds of tactical ideas. Unfortunately, I am not sure if his fantastic book 100 Games was ever translated into English. To demonstrate what you can learn from Keres, let's talk about just one short fragment from his game (#88 in the book) vs. GM Svetozar Gligoric.

In his annotations, Keres wrote that this little combination is quite unexpected, and that's why you can easily miss it. He is spot on! First of all, it is indeed a small combination that takes just two moves. But pay attention to his words about it being quite unexpected and easy to miss. Indeed, it usually happens almost out of nowhere, and that's why many masters and grandmasters miss it. Here is just one example:

Now let me show you an opening trap that many titled players fell into:

GM Hans-Joachim Hecht was well over 70 years old when he played this game, so I wouldn't blame him for forgetting this trick, but if you check a database, you'll find more masters who fell into the same trap. Moreover, a couple of masters playing Black didn't even play 12...Bxd4! and completely missed the combination!

Finally, let me present you with a unique encounter, which happened just a couple of days ago, where this trick was featured multiple times in the very same game!

As you can see, just one short comment from Keres' book helped us to learn and appreciate the strength of this unexpected tactical idea.