rosadot asked: I have a question concerning preparation for a specific opponent, and about move order. I am preparing for a tournament game (club closed championship final, one game a week). The player I am facing always tries to play the Stonew...
Some of you might be playing in the vote chess game against me at Chess.com. If so, then you probably know that the Opocensky variation of the Sicilian Najdorf goes the following way: 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cd 4.Nd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 a6 6.Be2. This is a q...
The Albin Counter Gambit is one of those openings that people love to hate. It starts with the moves 1.d4 d5 2. c4 e5!?, so Black sacrifices a pawn as early as move two! Indeed, it breaks one of the major rules of the classical school of chess t...
Bobby Fischer was having a very good performance at the Interzonal held in Palma de Mallorca in 1970. He had 14.5 points out of 19. His only loss was to the Great Dane, Bent Larsen. In round 21, he was to face the Brazilian prodigy Henrique Meckin...
Today, as promised I will look at the positions that the readers posted. Two positions were similar in that one side had a material advantage but had trouble finding a winning plan. It is very hard to win a winning position. It is hard from a psyc...
In recent times due to advances in opening theory, Black is struggling to equalize in most of the systems. There is no opening for Black in which he can guarantee a comfortable position from which he can play for a win. These days everybody has a...
Emanuel Schiffers, Russian chessmaster and chess writer, was born to German parents in St. Petersburg on May 4, 1850 and died there December 12, 1904. He was educated in his native city, studying the classical, physical, and mathematical faculties...
There is nothing that disgusts a man like getting beaten at chess by a woman. Charles Dudley Warner Playing in mixed events is enjoyable since it allows one to learn more about chess and psychology, and to improve more rapidly. So why, one might...
Mr. Dahl wrote: I’d like to ask about a certain Scandinavian Main Line variation I came up with. It is 1.e4 d5 2.exd5 Qxd5 3.Nc3 Qa5 4.d4 c6 5.Bd2 Qc7 (me and my friends playfully call this the Finnish Variation). Is it sound for Black? I’ve been...
Josef Emil Krejcik (22 January 1885- 4 January 1957) was an Austrian chess master, problemist, journalist and author. He was born in Vienna and participated in many local tournaments there. His best result came in 1921, when he shared first with ...
This is the eternal question of chess players who like sharp positions: "How do I reasonably achieve sharp play with Black vs 1.d4?" Sure you can play the King's Indian Defense or the Gruenfeld Defense, but then you will have to know an ocean of ...
Some openings have unsolved mysteries and questions that will probably never be answered. The Von Hennig-Schara Gambit is one of them. It starts after 1. d4 d5 2. c4 e6 3. Nc3 c5 4. cxd5 cxd4!? It is named after Heinrich Von Hennig, yet in the ga...
Erwin l'Ami was born April 5, 1985 and has become a leading Dutch grandmaster. In addition to having good tournament results, he has assisted Cheparinov and Topalov. In the following game, he plays the white pieces. His opponent is Nikolai Ninov, ...
We all have our favorite openings. Ones that we have studied thoroughly and have played dozens of times. Whenever one of our games begins with that opening, it evokes warm memories of brilliant wins from the past and naturally gives us a feeling...
A chess player should follow strong GM-tournaments like a business person follows the Wall Street Journal. First of all, one can see modern opening trends and adjust his opening repertoire accordingly. Secondly, and more important in my opinion,...
The Maroczy Bind is an opening, or to be more precise a pawn formation, named after the Hungarian Grandmaster Geza Maroczy. It is characterized by white pawns at c4 and e4, and the exchange of white's d-pawn for black's c-pawn. White binds down Bl...
Often in life or in chess we can understand things better through the illumination of the unvisible facts in the background. So please look at the folllowing endgame position: When I showed this position in my chess class and asked:" Whos...
Isidor Gunsberg (November 2, 1854, in Budapest – May 2, 1930, in London), English merchant, future challenger for the World Chess Championship and chess journalist began his career as the hidden operator of the chess automaton Mephisto! Nowadays t...
One of the reasons behind the “nemeses and customers” theory is that each chess player has his own style. It reminds me of the “Rock, Paper, Scissors” game where there is no one dominant item. The main three chess characters are:• Positiona...
ankitthemaster asked: I posted this same question on chess.com and most of them insulted and/or discouraged me. My query was simple: I am age 22, keen to play chess professionally, and I will say that I am an advanced beginner who has mostly play...
The Queen's Gambit has a reputation of being a very solid opening. It is one that you choose when you want to demonstrate your strategical superiority over your opponent. Once, during a big Swiss tournament (I think it was the World Open), I over...
Wesley So was born October 9, 1993. At the age of 14 years, 1 month, and 28 days he became an International Grandmaster (December 8, 2007). Only six players have done it at a younger age. In October 2008, he became the youngest player to ever be r...
Last article featured two positions from the Aeroflot Open, which was hosted in Moscow. Grandmaster Le Quang Liem won the event, scoring an impressive 7/9 with 5 wins and 4 draws, and 0 losses. Going into the last round Liem shared...
The Super Solid Chebanenko has always been a trouble for 1.d4 players as we saw in the previous articles( http://www.chess.com/article/view/the-chebanenko-system-by-gm-magesh-and-gm-arun and http://www.chess.com/article/view/the-chebanenko-slav-pa...
