Chess tricks and traps have always caught the imagination and appreciation of chess fans as long as chess has been played. A nice trap shows tactical ideas, combinations, and fascinating concepts that capture our attention and stand the test of ti...
Everyone knows the story about the Trojan Horse that helped the Greek army win the Trojan War. Since chess is a model of a war on 64 squares, can't we use this 3,000-year-old trick on the chessboard? Just think of it: Your opponent hides his ki...
Some 20 years ago I had a conversation with a grandmaster who grew up in a bad neighborhood. He was recollecting his youth years when street fighting was pretty common. I don't remember much from his stories, but one of his phrases has stu...
At the very end of my article about MVL's trapped rooks, I mentioned that Tal was famous for his queen play. There was even a joke that a regular queen is worth nine pawns and Tal's queen is worth 12 pawns! The Chess.com member "fiercebadge...
Some chess tactical ideas are very common. For example, I cannot imagine any experienced chess player who never had back-rank problems in his games. Interference is pretty much at the opposite end of chess spectrum. Here is how Wikipedia describ...
Pattern recognition is one of the most important chess skills. Some time ago I even suggested an idea that Magnus Carlsen is so great in chess due to his incredible pattern-recognition ability. Through the years I've written a series of articl...
There was an anniversary a few days ago that was completely missed by the chess world. I am not talking about any chess player's birthday since they generally are covered by many chess publications (believe it or not, I even saw a note about Kar...
Shakhriyar Mamedyarov's result in the last Candidates' tournament has cemented his position as one of the world's very best players. In a year-old article, we already discussed what makes his chess so sparkling and powerful. Today I would like t...
I bet many of you have heard the famous chess saying: "If Tal has an open file, there will be mate," but do you know how this expression was born? Mikhail Tal's second, Alexander Koblencs, who coined this phrase, tells the story in his book...
One of the most shocking games in the history of the U.S. chess championship was played in 2015. Can you imagine one of the world's strongest players losing his game in just six moves playing White? This is exactly what happened! I was really pu...
In an old article, I expressed the opinion that some games played by really strong grandmasters shouldn't be studied by inexperienced players. Therefore I suggested to assign chess games ratings similar to movies. The article claimed that acc...
Yes, you've caught me! Whenever I see a checkmate, I cannot help but re-phrase the well-known joke of Steve Martin. You see, Wikipedia has a page about different mating patterns, and it turns out that the checkmates I knew since childhood all have...
In his famous book My Great Predecessors, Garry Kasparov titled a chapter about Mikhail Tal "Bluff as a Weapon of Victory." Indeed, there is no other world champion who sacrificed as many pieces and took as much risk as Tal. Yet as GM Averb...
Today we are going to talk about a very simple trap that any experienced chess player is supposed to know by heart. Yet,at least two legendary world champions fell into this trap in the most unfortunate moment: when they played their world champio...
Magnus Carlsen is a genius. I doubt that many people would argue about this well-established fact. It is a totally different question why we call him a genius. Is it because he is the world champion? I don't think so. Max Euwe was the world cha...
In one of my recent articles, I asked readers to share their goals for 2018. Despite my explicit warning that the goal of gaining rating points can be counterproductive, this is exactly what majority of our members wish. Well, your wish is ...
For most club players, blunders are a very big problem. They can ruin a game or even a whole tournament! Besides, they prevent a chess player from getting better results and a higher rating. That's why some time ago I wrote a six-part arti...
In last week's article we learned some of the favorite chess patterns of super-GM Ding Liren. As you probably remember, he loves to play for domination when his opponent's pieces can barely move. His most common recipe to get this kind of a p...
The Chess.com member grepschrop wrote: “Some players told me that it’s not important to know the names of mating patterns. My experience with kids is contrary. What is your opinion?” SILMAN: Though one might think this is easy ...
In one of my recent articles we analyzed the games of Rudolf Pitschak. As one of the readers correctly pointed out, he wasn't the best player in the world. Actually quite far from that! And yet we could learn something from his games. Now imagin...
When I was a teenage Sicilian Dragon aficionado, I salivated over the thought that one day I might land in a certain theoretical sub-variation of the Yugoslav Attack where Black sacrifices not one but both exchanges to bust up White’s queens...
When a pawn reaches the last rank it creates one of the biggest miracles of the game of chess. In such a situation the weakest chess piece can instantly become the strongest one! While in the majority of such cases, chess players indeed promote a ...
I noticed that when I teach the rules of chess to kids, almost nothing excites them more than a pawn promotion. I can see sparkles in the kids' eyes and have to answer the unavoidable question: "So, I can have two queens at the same time?" Of co...
Most of the classical attacking games have a similar scenario: the winner brings his pieces close to the opponent's king and then sacrifices something to deliver a winning combination. But what can you do if your pieces are far away from your oppo...
