Do You Use This Powerful Game Changing Trick?

When I was just starting in chess, our chess club's team went to participate in one of the national competitions. Here I need to mention that unlike the U.S. Nationals, open to anyone who knows how to move pieces, the Soviet Nationals were highly competitive and you had to qualify to get there. Since I was practically a beginner at that point, I wasn't even close to qualifying.

After the team returned from the event, our coach, Sergey Timofeevich Pinchuk, was telling us—the kids who didn't qualify—stories about the tournament. One of the stories was about a kid who was just one year older than me, yet our coach said that this kid was going to become not just a grandmaster, but a super grandmaster. We asked if that kid won the tournament and were very puzzled when the coach said that the kid had only scored about 50%.

Answering our questions, the coach said that it didn't matter how many points the kid scored in that tournament: He possessed a skill that was very unique for the vast majority of kids. "What do you do when one of your pieces gets attacked?" our coach asked, and then immediately answered his own question, "Right, you run for cover, protecting the attacked piece or moving it to a safe square."

"Meanwhile this kid"—and here the coach made a brief pause to emphasize the importance of what he was about to say—"he always looked if he could counterattack his opponent pieces first and only if it was impossible, then he would take care of his attacked piece."

To tell you the truth, initially I didn't appreciate the depth of this simple concept, but nevertheless remembered the kid's name. Later we became friends, and just as my coach predicted, Boris Gelfand indeed became a super grandmaster!

The adage about offense being the best defense is well known and used in many competitive sports as well as military strategy. Moreover, over 200 years ago George Washington wrote  "...make them believe, that offensive operations, often times, is the surest, if not the only (in some cases) means of defense." If this concept is so well known, why is it not common in chess games?

Well, the short answer is human psychology. When your opponent attacks your piece (especially a piece as valuable as a queen), you train of thoughts goes like this: "Oh no, my queen is under attack! Am I going to lose it? Well, it looks like I can move it here or even block the attack using a bishop." In the process, it is so easy to forget about the motto, "Offense is the best defense!" It is not a big surprise that even the best players in the world forget about it in the heat of the battle. Here is a good example of that:

As you can see, even a candidate for the world title missed a cunning counterattack. When Black's position looked absolutely lost, the unexpected 23...Ba6! helped Karpov save the game and win the tournament!

In the following game, another former world champion missed the same crafty trick:

You shouldn't think that this idea happens only in the games played by super grandmasters. Here is a game played by one of my students:

It was a nice fighting draw, but here is a question for you, my dear readers: Couldn't White win the game instantly by playing 16. Ne6?

Now let's take a look at the following famous game of IM Rashid Nezhmetdinov. First of all, can you find a final move of the game. It has nothing to do with our today's topic, but it is extremely beautiful:

Now let's get back and look at the position after 18...Kh8. Why didn't White take the pawn on d6, also forking a queen and a rook?

As you can see, while this trick is a bit counterintuitive, it is very powerful. I hope you'll be able to use it in your games!