A Bad Move V

Black to play

Once more unto the breach, dear friends.

I'm not sure exactly why this position, or more precisely this mistake, has become so fascinating to me. I certainly didn't intend to dedicate quite so many posts to it when I started out. Anyhoo, following on from the original post I've already looked at how I miscalculated a tactical line but perhaps only because I'd applied a faulty template and misapplied a perfectly good one to guide my thinking.

Today I want to move away from the litany of my shortcomings, as numerous as they may be, and look at the specific position in which I blundered. It was chess itself, you see, that led me astray. Well how humans tend to play chess anyway.

To explain what I mean I'll need to take another look at Jacob Aagaard's book Excelling at Chess. Specifically it's chapter 4 which addresses what the Overly Voweled One calls 'Unforcing Play' that concerns us. Here Aagaard suggests that we are inherently attracted to forcing sequences of moves when considering a chess position.

"We have a tendency to force play (as opposed to searching for good moves), and the less we feel the need to do so, the freer we are to address the matter of finding the best move."

(emphasis from the original)

At first sight this is a somewhat odd concept. What would be our motive for choosing a move that was not one which we considered in some sense to be the best one?

For Aagaard,

The reason we employ forcing moves is obvious - forcing variations gives us a sense of control, while less forcing play, in contrast, can leave us with a sense of floating in air and lacking control, which is not a naturally welcome feeling when anxious about the outcome of the game.

Our rational conscious minds, then, sometimes take a back seat allowing an unconscious process to take over. Our emotional need to feel in control trumps every thing else, however much that might lead to an outcome that is counterproductive in terms of our goal of winning the game.

My friend and fellow blogger Morgan Daniels
demonstrating the human need for control

Applying Aagaard's concept to blunder ground zero, if we compare ... Qxd5 with ... Qc8 (see previous posts and comments) we can see the queen exchange is the much more forcing option.

After 1. ... Qxd5 I can be pretty sure White is going to respond 2. cxd5 and for that matter he's almost certainly going to follow my intended 2. ... Na5 with 3. Nd2 to stop my knight getting back into play. There's a huge chance, then, that the position I'm expecting to get at move three will actually appear on the board.

For 1. ... Qc8, however, things are very different. It's not at all obvious what White's next move is going to be let alone what might happen thereafter. I mentioned last time that I did not think about 1. ... Qc8 long enough to even consider what White's response might be. Aagaard's would perhaps see this as me steering myself away from an emotionally difficult option of not being sure what might happen in favour of a course of action that I could be pretty sure - or at least that I could believe - that I'd be able to chart with some accuracy.

Just my bad luck that 1. ... Qc8 happened to be a better move then? Well no, not really.

Implicit in Aagaard's idea is the point that, leaving aside possibilities of miscalculation, there's a sense in which forcing moves are more likely to be mistakes than unforcing moves. Maintaining the tension is sometimes the best approach in a given position but we will nevertheless be tempted to force matters because we always are but there is no equivalent in reverse, i.e. when a forcing continuation is best but we'd be psychologically tempted to keep things steady.

Thus for Aagaard when mistakes happen our tendency to force matters, driven by our human need to feel in control, is disproportionately likely to be a factor.

The idea that we should be wary of forcing continuations is far from uncontroversial. It's also obviously the case, as Aagaard himself fully recognises, that you can't play chess without sometimes finding yourself in a position when it's the best thing to do. Nevertheless, when explaining chess mistakes, our at least explaining my mistakes, it seems to me that there's much of value to explore here and I feel very strongly that if I could learn when to avoid directing play down concrete lines it could well lead to a big improvement in my play. After all, isn't this line from Aagaard familiar to all of us?

"I have long had the feeling that Real chess players are less inclined to force variations, perhaps because they do not have the same insecurity as the rest of us, where we always fear (don't lie to me, I know you do it too) that we are about to mess up our position."

Incoming

Exciting times here at the S&BC Blog – we’ve been sent stuff. Courtesy of Jacob Aagaard and Quality Chess we are two chess books better off than we once were, the newly released Attacking Manual 1 and Attacking Manual 2 having just dropped through our collective letter box. This is the closest thing to an income that I've had since last August.

I should admit that I start off predisposed to like my new goodies. I’m a big fan of Quality Chess' books and long standing S&BC blog readers may recall that I've previously a whole series of posts inspired by Mr. A’s older book Excelling at Chess [e.g. A Bad Move V, Why Study the Endgame? II, Why study the endgame?, Aagaard Revisited, Tick Tick Tick VI, Scorched Earth, Dirk Gently, Excelling at Chess - Again Again, Excelling at Chess - Again, Knowing What to Look For, What Might Have Been]. It only took the opening lines of ATM1’s introduction

My aim with this book and its companion volume is to teach you everything there is to know about attacking chess. Not a small aim and already by its very definition it is clear that failure in this project is guaranteed.

and I was enjoying his newest work too.

Aagaard wants his target audience (players in the elo 1700 to 2500 range which I suppose is pretty much anybody who'll be reading this) to learn the “general rules” of attacking play. If every decision we take at the board should be based on concrete analysis then which lines should we be calculating? ATM1 suggests, if I understand the argument correctly, that if we can grasp the principles of attacking chess we’ll have a much better chance of getting this question right. The rules are important, Aagaard claims,

not so much because they are relevant in all positions, but because they are relevant in all kinds of positions.

(emphasis in the original)

Well maybe, although I fancy I can hear the low rumbling of dissent beginning to emerge, not least from the EJH residence in Huesca, even as I type. Even Aagaard acknowledges his point of view is "unfashionable" to say the least.

Can ATM1 actually deliver? Enjoyable read or not, is Aagaard convincing when he claims these rules of attacking play exist? Does the book improve our understanding of the dynamic aspects of chess as he hopes? After reading it will our intuition guide our ability to select the right moves to analyse more effectively when we attack the enemy king?

How should I know? I haven’t read it yet. I suspect, however, that I'll be spending some time with it in the months to come.

Here's the first game Aagaard gives in the Introduction to ATM1. By pleasing coincidence it begins 1. b4 which was a favourite of the teenaged EJH as we discovered last Friday - the very day the books arrived.






You can download a PDF of ATM1's Introduction, including Aagaard's annotations to this game, here. While you do that I'd better get busy with the job application form I have in front of me. After all, man cannot live by chess books alone.

One for Tom

Get over yourself love: T.C.'s interests lie elsewhere

“I’m obsessed”, T.C. told me the other day, "by saccing the exchange now. It's the only thing I think about at the board...."

By a strange coincidence a few hours later I stumbled across a game in Jacob Aagaard’s Attacking Manuel 1 that would be very much my fellow blogger's cup of tea. Aagaard – Lindberg, Stockholm 2004 is in the chapter devoted to the principle that it's the number of pieces that matters when attacking and not the value of the material involved; it contains not one but two exchange sacs, the second of which ended the game.




It’s easy to see that if Black recaptures after 22. Rxh2 he’ll be mated after a few checks. The first time White gives up a rook for bishop is much more interesting however.

Here,




Black has played a risky line of the Caro-Kann but with … b7-b5 and a2-a3 thrown in. Evidently he'd hoped that this would help his attack if and when White castled long which in turn might put Aagaard off hacking away on the kingside. As it happens though it didn't turn out that way.

Right now though it’s White’s move. Breaking up Black’s pawns with g2-g4 looks an attractive plan but in this precise position the pawn advance can be answered with … Bd5 gaining a tempo on the rook.

Aagaard writes,

I cannot recall how long I thought about this position, but I know that I did not really calculate a lot of variations. What I was thinking was that his best piece was the bishop on e6. This is not hard to establish, as although its defensive responsibilities are not great, it is at least supporting his structure a bit as well as preparing to irritate my plans.

My own worst pieces are the bishop on c1 and the rook on a1. I knew very well that the only pieces relevant for judging the success of an attack are those present on the battlefield when the two armies collide. The remaining forces will only be useful in future clashes (often the endgame). With this notion I had no concerns about offering my opponent a bit of material.

So the game continued 13 Bh6 (“!” – Aagaard) Re8, 14 g4 Bd5, 15 O-O-O leading here:-

Black to play

White is happy to allow the rook to be attacked here because if it is taken he can replace it with his queen’s rook and in effect Black has only succeeded in swapping off one of his best defenders for White’s least effective piece. As it happens Black did indeed take on h1 and he didn’t last much longer.





By the way, the “I did not really calculate a lot of variations” bit is a little misleading because the thrust of the book is not that if we grasp some general ideas we will no longer have to bother working out any specific lines but rather that learning the ‘rules’ of attacking play enables us to

“… reduce the number of variations to calculate by tuning our focus to the most important moments and possibilities.”

(my emphasis)

I'm not sure that Tom would entirely agree with the sentiment but if nothing else he can at least enjoy the game and get the exchange sac obsession monkey off his back for one more day.

Sixty Memorable Annotations Index

#1: Sherwin slid the Rook here with his pinky, as if to emphasize the cunning of this mysterious move.
Bobby Fischer on Fischer - Sherwin, New Jersey Open 1957


#2: It was this position which Geller saw in my room that morning. And yet 25 moves have already been made!
Lev Polugaevsky on Polugaevsky-Tal, Soviet Championship 1969


#3: I often tell my students that good players are like monsters from horror movies. You can shoot them and stab them but they won't lie down and even after they are confirmed dead they keep coming after you. So never relax!
Simen Agdestein


#4: The position is now objectively drawn, but I was very determined to win. My long-term plan consisted of winning the a-pawn, winning the bishop for my pawn and, eventually, winning with rook and bishop against rook. Let us evaluate the position. I will not win the a-pawn, I will not win the bishop and, even if I did, the position would still be a theoretical draw. That would be the objective evaluation.

Real life experience, however, tells us something completely different ....
Jacob Aagaard on Aagaard-van der Berg, Wijk aan Zee 2001


#5: Oh no, not a rook ending. I hate these rook endings, just so you know.
Jesper Hall on Salov-Gligoric, Belgrade 1987


#6: White’s control of the position is so great that he could inscribe his initials on the board with his king if he wanted.
Michael Stean on Botvinnik-Szilagyi, Amsterdam 1966


#7: This is probably the best move in the position if you are of equal strength to your opponent but ... it is often in the stronger player's interest to exchange bishop for knight ....
Jacob Aagaard on Shliperman-Yermolinsky, Philadelphia 1997


#8: If you play the Dutch you have to accept the element of risk. Some years ago I heard a young player moaning to British GM Jonathan Mestel that he had played the risky Sicilian Dragon and been wiped off the board. Mestel, himself a Dragon aficionado replied calmly ‘think of all the draws you have avoided by playing the Dragon’
Neil McDonald on the Dutch Defence


#9: This is the privilege of the attacking player in these situations. Before trying his main winning try, Miles first goes around in circles, giving his opponent maximum opportunity to go wrong.
John Emms on Matulovic-Miles, Birmingham 1975


#10: Thomas Ernst was a big expert on the Dragon, but it was also in my repertoire, so I decided to play it anyway "to learn something". The main thing I learned was not to be naive.
Jacob Aagaard on Ernst - Aagaard, Copenhagen 1991


#11: Were White to play, he would immediately draw after 1 Kg3 and 2 h3.
Jesus de la Villa


#12: At first sight a strong move, but the knight only looks good on d5.
Ivan Cheparinov on Polgar - Topalov, San Luis 2005


#13: The Classical Dutch is a pretty rare bird these days. According to Jan Pinski's 2002 book on the opening (Classical Dutch, Everyman £14.99), I am just about the only top player who would consider playing it. If so, it is in need of new advocates because I abandoned it years ago. Having said that, it is only a little dubious, rather than plain unsound. Furthermore, few White players are familiar with its subtleties.
Nigel Short on Ward - Williams, British Championships 2004


#14: This move, suggested by Hort, was specially prepared by Korchnoi before this match. The plan is to cramp Black's queenside pawns.
Ray Keene on Korchnoi - Spassky (7), Belgrade 1977


#15: Here I had a long think.
Jon Speelman on Speelman - Sokolov. A, Brussels


#16: An important branch of endings of this type is the endgame with the BP and RP pair, which as been met repeatedly in tournament practice. When Marshall drew such an ending at San Sebastian in 1911 against Rubinstein, theoreticians set about a detailed analysis of it. Spielmann, Rabinovich, Belavenets, Maizelis, Zek, Keres and finally Botvinnik together with Ragozin and Flohr discovered many interesting ideas. All the same, far from everything is clear in the assessment of this ending.
Levenfish and Smyslov on rook plus f&h pawns against rook


#17: The tablebase tells us the fastest win starts with 82 Rg7, from a human point of view of course 82 Re7 is much more sensible, preventing the Black king from joining the action.
Jonathan Hawkins on Alekhine - Capablanca, Buenos Aires World Championship 1927


#18: Although it is fairly frequent, even masters go astray: in 1931 Capablanca won two games with it despite the fact that a "book" draw has been reached.
Reuben Fine on the short-side defence


#19: After this move the endgame is drawn according to FinalGen program.
Alex Baburin on Carlsen - Kramnik, Tal Memorial (Blitz) 2013


#20: After Hsu's 24 Kh2, I understand why Alekhine sometimes 'improved' his games by substituting the brilliant finish he had foreseen for the mundane conclusion which actually occurred.
John Nunn on Hsu - Nunn, Manila Olympiad 1992

#21: We're going to join the game forty moves later ....
Jeremy James on Larsen - Donner, Master Game 1980

#22: Either Euwe had not time left to think, or else he considered he could draw as he pleased; in any case, he was not paying sufficient attention to his opponent's plan.
David Bronstein on Gligoric - Euwe, Zurich Candidates' 1953

#23: The interesting part is that White is not lost yet. By Rg8+ he still has an opportunity to save the game but in a more difficult way ... If you do not know the easy way, do not expect anything better the hard way.
[After another six moves] White resigned. He should not regret the loss of a half-point, since he did not deserve it anyway.
Nikolay Minev on Muldavanski - Pipkov, Bulgaria 1963

#24: ... before studying rook endings the reader should acquaint himself with the principles of pawn endings ....
Levenfish & Smyslov

#25: Tempting fate, inasmuch as White is presented with a typical exchange sacrifice opportunity.
Ray Keene on Keene - Toth, Rome 1979

#26: (!!) At many levels, this is undoubtedly a great sacrifice. However, a more human line would be 22 Qe1 Bc2, 23 Bxc6 Qxc6, 24 Qxe5 [White is clearly better]
Viktor Moskalenko on Feller - Williams, Novi Sad, 2009

#27: The triumph of good development and precise play. With an extra pawn and the better position, the rest is a matter of technique.
Miguel Najdorf on Reshevsky - Kotov, Zurich 1953

#28: ... that’s probably a move you’d like to try in blitz
Fabiano Caruana on Carlsen - Anand, Sochi World Championship Match 2014 (11)

#29: A normal exchange sacrifice ....
Botterill and Keene on Spassky - Fischer, Reykjavik World Championship Match 1972 (17)

#30: But why ... err what, err why are you winning?
Yasser Seirawan on Ivanchuk - Jobava, Wijk 2015

#31: The game was adjourned here (remember adjournments, anyone?) and I sealed 57 Kd1.
... now I seemed to hold: 57 ... Kd3 58 Ke1 e2 59 g5 fxg5 60 g4 Ke3 leads to a real stalemate, while 60 ... Ke4 61 Kxe2 Kf4 62 Kf2 Kxg4 63 Kg2 gains White the opposition and draws.
I knew this couldn’t be correct. Korchnoi had played too quickly and confidently and the position didn’t look like it should be a draw. Before leaving the table, Korchnoi looked at me and said, 'I know something about triangles.' I was lost in more ways than one, because I still didn’t see the win. Fortunately Dmitry Gurevich, who was 'classically trained' in the endgame (i.e. he grew up in the Soviet Union) showed me the potential finale ...
I ran after Korchnoi and resigned, apologising profusely for my ignorance. Quite perplexed, Korchnoi told me, 'It is the ABCs of chess!'
Joel Benjamin on Benjamin - Korchnoi, Jerusalem 1986

#32: Only a player with complete confidence in his understanding of pawn endings should consider this move
Joel Benjamin on Al-Rakib Abdulla - Short, Dhaka 1999

#33: While some of the players of the twenties might just have played Black’s first four moves I don’t think anyone but a modern - not even Nimzowitsch - would have played ... P-KR4 so early. Black is fixing his grip on KB4 for his knight and the blocked position means that the loss of time does not matter.
C. H. O’D. Alexander on Honfi - Gurgenidze, Kislovodsk 1968



Also see:

"My sort" of chess: And so I awoke with a thirst for battle, but not a reckless battle, but one prepared beforehand, like a decisive encounter in a war. Hence the stages in my opening preparation, carried out on the morning of the game.

First I had to decide the question: should I play what I normally play, or should I try to surprise my opponent with my choice of opening? My second made his recommendations to me on both possibilities, and we began considering opening with the king's pawn. In its favour, apart from its surprise value, was the fact that after 1. e4 Portisch feels much less confident...

"But if it should be a Lopez, what then?" I asked dubiously.

"Play the Italian Game!"

"But I never played it even as a child!"

"So much the better! Portisch plays only the variation with ...Bc5."

And I was shown a multitude of variations of primordial antiquity, which had been worked out taking Portisch’s games into account...

I hesitated, and was all ready to agree, when I suddenly sensed: this is no way to play! This is not the way to plan a decisive battle. After all, if I were to fail to gain an advantage from the opening, I would not forgive myself for having betrayed "my sort" of chess.
Lev Polugayevsky on Polugayevsky-Portisch, Petropolis Interzonal 1973

What might have been?

Last Sunday I asked,

Who, in 2001, wrote:-

"Anand, by the way, did not have a strong tournament, and it is quite well known that he is not a very patient person. In his youth he played very quickly, living only on his enormous talent. He never became the great player he could have been, and I predict he will not be"

My question appears to have generated a fair amount of reaction, see for example Dennis Monokroussos' blog The Chess Mind, but as far as I know only 'Stig' - presumably not Top Gear's anonymous racing driver- has identified the author. Well Tom got the answer too but since he went on to talk himself out of it there's no cigar for T.C.

It's time to reveal our mystery scribe as Jacob Aagaard who was writing in Excelling at Chess (Everyman Chess, 2001). Aagaard is now British Champion (and a one-time commenter on our humble blog) but back then he was a relative no-mark at 2360 elo.

To be honest, I hadn't intended the post as anything other than a cheap shot of the "let's make fun of a guy for whom the passage of time has not been kind" variety. Inspired by Richard's comment to the original post I re-read Aagaard's words and I began to wonder ... might he be right? Even now? Even if Anand does go on to beat Kramnik has he become the player he could have been?

Is Anand the strongest player in the world today? I suppose we'll see when he plays Kramnik, but perhaps a more pertinent question is how he rates in historical terms - a Tarrasch or a Keres perhaps rather than a Lasker or a Botvinnik? At best a Tal? Even if you think he deserves to be higher up the ladder would you say he's fulfilled his potential?

Is this all a little unfair to Anand? Maybe so but making fun of Aagaard was definitely somewhat harsh. If nothing else Excelling at Chess at least has something to say which is more a lot of chess books can claim. I'll be coming back to Aagaard's book over the next couple of weeks - and while normally I usually get distracted and wander away to other things, this time I definitely mean it.

The Interesting Sacrificed Exchange III

Black to play

Movsesian - Kasparov, Sarajevo 2000

Another Tuesday bonus post. Why not? Especially since last Wednesday's post has inspired me to get this series rolling at long last.

For today's TISE we journey back in time to join Movsesian and Kasparov for move 13 of their game at the Sarajevo Grandmaster tournament of 2000. Gazza is about to make a very good move and while I'm sure you can guess what it's going to be, the title of today's post being a bit of a clue, you might want to have a think about why he played it before reading on.

Of all the goodness-knows-how-many games of chess that I played before starting to write about exchange sacrifices last June, I can only think of two in which I gave up a rook for a minor piece myself. Actually, even those don't really count: the first was an accident - I played ... Rxf3 (knight) thinking I'd end up winning material, but I'd miscalculated and had to pretend that I'd done it merely to break up his kingside pawns - and the second wasn't truly a sacrifice.

White to play

JMGB v Bloke, London League circa 2000

Here I 'gave up' the exchange with 21 Rxh5, but really it just leads by force to a position that is concretely better for White. In six moves time I will be queen for rook ahead and any attempt by Black to avoid that fate will only lead to something even worse.

I was pleased to play it at the time, but rook takes knight is, at best, a temporary or ‘numbers’ sacrifice and not at all difficult to grasp.  Even I can understand that 9 is bigger than 5 and that mate ends the game. Much more interesting is what went on over on the other side of the board. White’s doubled c-pawns and the absence of Black’s queen's rook rather suggest that rook takes knight on c3 has been played at some point and the game had indeed opened in a manner familiar to all Dragonistas.

1 e4 c5, 2 Nf3 d6, 3 d4 cxd4, 4 Nxd4 Nf6, 5 Nc3 g6, 6 Be3 Bg7, 7 f3 O-O, 8 Qd2 Nc6, 9 Bc4 Bd7, 10 O-O-O Rc8, 11 Bb3 Ne5, 12 h4 Nc4, 13 Bxc4 Rxc4, 14 h5 Nxh5, 15 g4 Nf6, 16 Bh6 Nxe4, 17 Qe3 and now Rxc3

The more experienced chessers amongst our esteemed readership won't need me to tell them that … Rxc3 is a common idea in the Sicilian Defence in general and the Dragon in particular - and that it is not played with number compensation in mind. Knowing that and understanding it are two very different things, however. I suspect that, like me, my opponent was aware that he was supposed to sac the exchange, but didn’t truly know why. That might explain why he spent 40 minutes on his 17th move and then took another quarter of an hour on his following turn.

Anyhoo, it was stumbling across the scoresheet for this old game (stored in traditional pre-Chessbase 'shoved-in-a-shoebox-under-the-bed' fashion) that reminded me of Movsesian-Kasparov, a game I had come across in Jacob Aagaard's Excelling at Chess.

So, from the diagram at the head of today's blog,

13 … Rxc3, 14 bxc3 Qc7, 15 Ne2 Be7, 16 g5 and now 16 … O-O (! – Aagaard)

turning the battle into one of competing opposite-wing attacks. Movsesian, according to Aagaard, had played this line against Loek van Wely in many internet blitz games, but the Dutch GM hadn't risked castling in a single one of them. How to explain the difference of opinion as to whether it's safe for Black to walk into a White's kingside pawn storm? Let us quote The Voweled One quoting Kasparov:

"From my perspective it’s a matter of chess culture. If you take on c3 and the knight goes to a4, then Black is fine. Black need not look for an immediate approach. You castle, you put your knight on e5 and the queen on c7 or a5, and you have many options. Sometimes you strive for d5 or even for f5. The exchange means very little, since we both have such attacks going, the quantity of pieces is often more important than their quality."

Aagaard himself made precisely this last point when discussing his win against Lindberg in Attacking Manual 1 – the game that inspired this series in the first place. If I understand the argument correctly, the idea is that after … Rxc3, bxc3 Black will sooner or later follow up by swinging his king’s rook over either to c8 or somewhere similar. As a result Black is net +1 for pieces on the queenside, has got rid of White’s best defender and the doubled pawns might well make it difficult for White to transfer reserves across to even up the numbers. In consequence Black must have a decent attack and can castle short safe in the knowledge that the enemy king will always be in as much if not more danger than his own.

Simples? Well, not really. After all, castling short didn't occur to Movsesian and van Wely so I guess it can't be that obvious.

When I first played through Movsesian - Kasparov I found the exchange sac much harder to understand than the one from Aagaard-Lindberg. I'm not sure that's any less true today, but, still, I do feel that by looking at the game my understanding of these sacrifices inched a little bit further forward. Just a tad more comprehension, then, and certainly not a grasp of the 'chess culture' thing that Gazza talks about, but it was enough to help me to go on to play an exchange sacrifice - a real exchange sac - in one of my own games. That story, though, I think I'll save for TISE IV.

Previously:-
TISE
TISE II

Opening surprise

The Streatham and Brixton season may be halfway through, but mine is about to begin, with a game on Sunday. Which means I have to think all the thoughts about my opening repertoire that I should have been thinking over the last six chess-free months. But I've never been able to work properly without the pressure of a deadline and this applies as much to opening preparation as to anything else. You never have to get it done - it can always be put off for another game or another month or another season - so I never really get it done. Not properly. I read, or flick through books, I make decisions that I promptly change the following day and then change back just as swiftly once I remember all the reasons for the original decision.

What to play against 1.d4, if White doesn't allow the Nimzo? For years, now, I've been pondering whether to play the Queen's Indian Defence. The Benoni? Too risky. The Bogo? Not quite good enough. The QGD? Too hard to generate counterplay. The Semi-Slav? Bg5 is a pain. Yet at one time or another, I've "decided" I would play all of these. I have books on all of them. I have four books on the Queen's Indian Defence.

The best of these is probably the most recent, Peter Wells' volume in the optimistically-entitled series Chess Explained. Still, if the series title is misleading, the writing is not: Wells, who has written some justly-praised guides in the past, has produced another good one. Good enough, I hope, for me to use it as the launch-pad for a new opening experiment. At least until until I decide it's too theoretical, too passive, unsuitable for email chess, unsuitable for use against weaker players, unsuitable for use against stronger players, unsuitable because of various move-order issues arising from 1.c4 or 1.d4 - or because I play a couple of games with it, get beat and give it up as a result.

(I have, as I recall, played it before - but only once in an OTB game. I won. I gave it up nevertheless. Now that's what I call unreasonably high expectations.)

The other books I have on the Queen's Indian were written by Bogdan Lalic - always an author I like, as our styles are similarly dull - by Yrjölä and Tella and by Jacob Aagaard.

Aagaard has written some good books, but his Everyman Queen's Indian Defence is some way short of classic (although not down to the level of some books produced by that publishing house: the absence of effective proof-reading is unfortunately all too manifest in all too many of them). Still, it's workable enough, or so I thought after buying it - and I read it pretty thoroughly, by my standards, anyway, in the lead-up to a tournament I played in Oban, in the west of Scotland, in November 2004. (It was the second time I'd played that tournament: the first time, I played on top board in the final round, lost and won nothing, although my game subsequently featured in the Telegraph chess column.)

Travelling to Oban entailed a flight to Prestwick, a train journey into Glasgow and then another, slow but spectacular, up into the mountains to the north and then a final descent towards the coastal town. I read Aagaard's book for most of the journey and in my hotel room afterwards (and would probably have read it between the station and the hotel, had not my mobile rung, leading to a long conversation with a tearful friend about the sudden death of her cat). I was satisfied with my work and resolved that, if I drew the Black pieces in my opening game and my opponent gave me the opportunity, I would give it a try.

So off I went to the tournament hall, in the hotel where I was staying, to look up the draw. My name was on the right hand side: I did, indeed have the Black pieces. Top board, too. I looked to see who I was drawn against. My opponent was International Master Jacob Aagaard.

Knowing What to Look For

Last week, unfairly or not depending on your point of view, I was making fun of Jacob Aagaard's book Excelling at Chess.

In the second chapter, dedicated to Kasparov's idea of 'real chess players', Aagaard outlines his belief that for the most part chess games are won and lost according to which player has the better understanding of fundamental positional principles.

It's an interesting idea not least because, as Aagaard himself acknowledges, tactical errors can be found in any game - even the most famous it seems. Aagaard's point, though, is that no amount of tactical ability will save you if you don't know what it is you should be analysing in the first place.

"I remember David Norwood claiming that Grandmasters calculate less than amateurs, Basically, they do not need to because they know what to calculate, or so his argument goes, at least ...

in Jonathan Rowson's interesting recent work, The Seven Deadly Chess Sins, the author talks about his six game match against Michael Adams ... After the games it always turned out that Adams had seen only a fraction of the lines addressed by Rowson but, somehow, these were the relevant lines! Adams won the match 5-1."

I read these words around the time that Justin posted a Reti composition back at the beginning of May.

It's such a beautiful study that it really deserves another look.

White to play and draw

Chasing the pawn down the board is obviously not going to work so White needs to gain a tempo from somewhere. Fortunately as soon as I saw Justin's post I recalled an idea that could achieve precisely that.

This diagram is taken from Master Chess: A course in 21 lessons (Pergamon Press, 1985). It must have made a strong impression on me because I still remember seeing it for the first time in Chelmsford library a year or two after the book was first published.

The point is that if you want to move the king from a4 to g4 the apparently direct red route is no quicker than the blue or the green. It's going to take six moves whichever way you go. Add to that a recollection of another Reti study that involves a diagonal king march and the fact that the extra tempo has to be gained from the bishop - there's nothing else on the board that White can attack - then it's not too difficult to find:-

1. Ke7 g5 - otherwise the pawn will be caught

2. Kd6 g4 - seeing that the pawn now blocks the bishop's other route to e8 convinced me I had to be on the right track and also clarified for me what White's next move has to be

3. e7 - otherwise ... g3 and the bishop can go to h5.

3. ... Bb5 - otherwise White queens


4. Kc5 B somewhere

5. Kd4

and the king enters the square and it's a draw.

The whole thing took me about 30 seconds in total. That's not as fast as Fritz but unlike the iron monster I didn't need to calculate any other lines at all.

So it seems to be true. If you know what to look for the number of lines you need to calculate reduces considerably.

Of course, it's the knowing what to aim for that's the tricky bit. I so rarely do, but for one morning at least I was able to entertain the delusion that I'm not completely incompetent at this game.

Excelling at Chess - again

You know it's strange but I find I've been finding it next to impossible to give a crap either way about the great grading debate so today I've decided to write about something else and I'm returning to Jacob Aagaard's book Excelling at Chess.

I started off taking the piss out of it (never let it be said I won't try to hit a soft target for a cheap laugh when there's one available) but more recently had a look at the central thesis of the early part of Aagaard's book - the idea that it is a superior understanding of the positional fundamentals of the game that is most likely to secure us victories.

Rivas Pastor-Akopian, Leon 1995
White to move

Today's position is taken from a game cited by Aagaard in support of his claim.

How would you assess this position? Would you say

1. White is winning
   
2. White is clearly better
   
3. White is slightly better
   
4. Equal
   
5. Black is slightly better
   
6. Black is clearly better
   
7. Black is winning
   

or, do you want to play the chess book author's universal 'get out of jail free' card, and cop out with 'unclear'?

I'll come back to what Aagaard has to say about this position at a later date. In the meantime, please indulge my curiousity by answering the following too ...

How did you come to your conclusion? Did you calculate specific lines or are there certain features in this position that suggested the answer to you?

Excelling at Chess - again again

Rivas Pastor-Akopian, Leon 1995
White to move

Last Wednesday we took a look at this position taken from Jacob Aagaard's book Excelling at Chess.

As I mentioned in the comments, Aagaard says,

"If you cannot fully appreciate that Black is a lot better ... you might want to have a discussion wiht yourself and/or a friend in order to acquite a better understanding of the differences between the respective set-ups."


Aagaard cites various factors in support of his assessment:-

"Black already has the advantage. The two bishops will give him a lasting edge in the endgame...."

"... the rooks should have been on c1 and e1 instead of d1 and f1, but this is not such a serious problem ...."

"Secondly, and this is far worse, the bishop looks stupid on b1, being better on d3 ...."

"... why, oh why, did White exchange pawns on d5 and open the c-file?"

"... it is hard to see where White's [knight] is going."

So there you go.

Here's the entire game to play through. White was 2500+ at the time but Black manages to win without apparently doing anything special. Aagaard feels that Akopian simply understood the game better and just put his pieces on sensible squares while Rivas Pastor was busy making a series of strategic mistakes that led to his eventual demise.

Sixty Memorable Annotations

#10: Ernst - Aagaard, Copenhagen 1991

5 ... g6

Thomas Ernst was a big expert on the Dragon, but it was also in my repertoire, so I decided to play it anyway "to learn something". The main thing I learned was not to be naive.

Jacob Aagaard, Grandmaster Versus Amateur, (Quality Chess 2011)

Regular readers might have noticed that I'm rather partial to Jacob Aagaard quotes. It's no accident that two of the first nine SMAs (#4; #7) are his (another, #5, comes from one of Mr Vowels' books) and no surprise that last year's Grandmaster versus Amateur contains plenty more gems from the Aagaard keyboard.

The annotation I've chosen for SMA #10 refers to a chess opening, the Dragon variation, but it is the idea of chessic naivety that interests me most. Naivety, in this case, not relating to the beginning of the game but the very opposite end.

Endgame knowledge: retention and the subsequent use thereof. That is our theme for today.

Black to play

You may recognise this position as Mackle-Eggleston from the fifth round in North Shields. White has just played 55 Kf4 which, as it happens, turns a winning position into a draw, but what we're really interested in is what Black's about to do. Eggleston's choice, 55 ... Bc2, you see, is probably a mistake. Not because it hands the win back to White - according to Nalimov, it's still a draw after the bish goes to the second rank - but because Eggy is drifting away from the standard defensive plan.

As Tom Rendle explained, the bishop really belongs on the c8-h3 diagonal where it restricts White's king and the pawns all in one go. The king is tied to the g4 pawn and it's not possible to advance either pawn because f4-f5 allows Black to sacrifice his bishop and g4-g5 will lead to a blockade. Upshot: White can't make any progress and the game is drawn.

As it happens, I'm not able to watch the chess live at work and yet I can access the EC Forum. Normally this arrangement leaves me rather uncertain as to what precisely is going on, but when I saw Tom had written,

Mackle-Eggleston is a draw, it helps if Black knows the easiest way is to put the Bishop on c8 or d7 (which he hasn't done yet)

I was pretty sure that they must be playing out an ending that I'd seen in de la Villa.

I remembered that one of the 100 Endgames You Must Know involved a bishop attacking a couple of pawns from the front. I was entirely confident about that because I'd read the book from cover to cover last year. What I couldn't recall, naturally, was the actual position involved. I couldn't remember how far up the board the pawns were supposed to be and I didn't even know if it was an opposite-colour or same-colour bishop ending. They say that plans flow from the key features of a chess position, but there was I knowing full well what I wanted to do and trying to imagine which arrangement of pieces would allow the idea to make sense!

Back on the EC Forum the problem of remembering endgame theory cropped up. It often does - see also the first comment to a post I wrote last year about Queen vs Rook - although it seems to me that the "Will we/you/I remember?" question usually comes with the implicit assumption that you only look at something once. "Now we've seen it, in this game or in that Endings manual, will we remember it next time?"

When I was spending time with de la Villa I knew that I wouldn't remember much of what I was reading unless at some point in the future - points probably - I revised and reviewed what I was learning. I thought that this knowledge would in itself make sure that I actually did the follow-up work. I thought that I'd have a spare hour or two here and there and that I'd fill it by going over the old ground.

A rather naive view of life, that, isn't it? Usually, chessically speaking or otherwise, items on 'To Do' lists that don't have a deadline don't ever get done. There's always going to be something else that feels a bit more pressing.

"OK," I would tell myself, "I know I need to brush up on this stuff but it's not as if I need to do it right now. I'll do it tomorrow." And the next time I would say it all over again.

Mackle-Eggleston might well have taught me something about the kind of position where it is appropriate to attack two connected pawns from the front, but the main thing I learned from their game was not to be naive about the process of acquiring endgame skills.

It's the rest day in North Shields. Since there's no cricket, I think it's time I got down to some endgame work.

Sixty Memorable Annotations Index

Tick Tick Tick ... VI

The other half

It's pointless talking about time management if you're going to ignore the up to 3 1/2 hrs of the game when it's not your move.

... as Richard rightly said in the comments box to this post.

In Excelling at Chess*, Jacob Aagaard considers the time during a chess game when it's the opponent's turn to move to be analogous to the breaks between the individual games of a tennis match. According to Aagaard the realisation that five sets might actually involve playing tennis for perhaps half an hour at most led to attention being focused on those parts of the contest during which 'nothing' was happening. It was found, not coincidentally he feels, that "the best players all had a similar pattern of behaviour" at those times.

In the light of his findings Aagaard goes on to describes his visit to the Wijk aan Zee tournament of 2001.

"Kasparov, Anand, Morozevich, Ivanchuk and Kramnik all did the same thing. They walked up and down on the stage, staring down at the floor. They occasionally glanced at other games, but never with true interest. The only one of these who was not totally focused was Anand who, occasionally, would talk with Piket or another player. Anand, by the way, did not have a strong tournament ... [**]

Shirov behaved differently, sitting at the board for most of the time. After six or seven games he was leading by a point."

I had this passage in mind during my visits to the Staunton Memorial last month. I took a close interest in what the players did when it was not their turn to move and found their habits remained remarkably consistent throughout the event. Nigel Short, for example, would typically retreat to the arbiters' table where he would often share a word or two with Steve Giddens while Jan Timman would usually spend his time wandering the playing hall taking a close look at each of the other game. The Dutchman had a very lackadaisical attitude towards the clock and on more than one occasion I noticed him returning to his board then wandering off again without noticing that his opponent had actually moved.

Only one player - Michael Adams - was Shirovesque in his approach. Adams rarely left the board and indeed would even remain seated when it was not his move and his opponent was absent. He seemed to make a habit of going for a stroll around the playing hall for a few minutes once he'd reached the time control but other than that once he'd sat down for the start of play that was pretty much where he'd stay for the next few hours. It hardly need be said that it was Adams who ended up winning the tournament***.

Of course outward behaviour doesn't tell us for sure what these guys were actually thinking about. Timman clearly wasn't focused on his game but Short could have been contemplating his position just as much as Adams seemed to be. For that matter it's perfectly possible that England's number one didn't have his mind on chess at all but instead was spending the time pondering just how much fun it would be to find himself trapped in a confined space with Ann Margaret with nothing but a large tin of baked beans and a vat of melted chocolate for entertainment****. Still, if you had to put money on it, you'd have to say that it was most likely it was Michael Adams who was making fullest use of the available time wouldn't you?

Acting on the outside what you want to be on the inside is invariably a helpful technique. Not a cure all for sure but a good start. It's certainly not enough on its own though. We also have to find an answer to the question of what it would be helpful for us to be doing while our opponents' clocks tick away. Unfortunately in the otherwise very helpful and comprehensive chapter on Clock Control in Chess for Tigers Simon Webb doesn't have too much to say about this. His advice pretty much amounts to,

"The Tiger is determined to do his best, and so gets up only as often as necessary to refresh his brain. He spends his opponent's time thinking generally about the position and what manoeuvres are available to both sides so that he can start thinking in terms of exact moves as soon as his opponent makes a move."

What Michael Adams thinks about while waiting for his opponent to move. Maybe.

Sadly he doesn't give any examples of how exploring a position in general might look in practice. I suppose this is about positional understanding and identifying the key features of a position - fianchettoed bishop, queen side pawn majority, insecure king etc etc - but that's much easier to talk about than to do I feel.

So at the end of today's meanderings I'm left with the knowledge that my opponents' clock time is an important resources for me but without any clear idea of how I can best make use of it. Not for the first time I throw my troubles out to the esteemed and most valued readership of the S&BCC Blog and ask two questions:-

(a) what do you do while your opponent is thinking?
(b) what do you think is actually 'good' or 'helpful' behaviour at these times?

All answers gratefully received.










* A book I've discussed many times on the blog (from most recent backwards ... 1, 2, 3)

** Regular S&BCC blog visitors with elephantine memories may find these words familiar. If so it's because this passage is the lead in to the quote about Anand not reaching his full potential as discussed here and the prior to that in the original post here.

*** I might also add that unlike Peter Wells and Ivan Sokolov, Adams invariably arrived at the tournament hall five minutes before the start of play.

**** Or is that just me?

Sixty Memorable Annotations

#4: Aagaard- van der Berg, Wijk aan Zee 2001

61. ... Bd8

The position is now objectively drawn, but I was very determined to win. My long-term plan consisted of winning the a-pawn, winning the bishop for my pawn and, eventually, winning with rook and bishop against rook. Let us evaluate the position. I will not win the a-pawn, I will not win the bishop and, even if I did, the position would still be a theoretical draw. That would be the objective evaluation.

Real life experience, however, tells us something completely different ....

Jacob Aagaard, Excelling at Chess (Everyman Chess 2001)

Evidently Viktor Korchnoi, notorious for playing on in almost any position regardless of how drawn it might be and irrespective of the strength of his opponent, knew exactly what Aagaard was getting at. Consider, for example, the position at the adjournment of the 9th game of the the Belgrade Candidates' Final of 1977/78. In his book on the match, Ray Keene wrote ...

The best that White can get is the theoretically drawn ending of rook and bishop against rook. Nevertheless, this would offer some practical chances, but it soon becomes apparent that even a symbolic triumph of this nature is beyond the capacity of White’s position.

Korchnoi vs Spassky: Chess Crisis, Allen & Unwin 1977

... but nevertheless it was a full thirty moves before Vik agreed to split the point.

This wasn't a one-off instance of Korchnoi stubbornness either. Of the position after 91(!) moves of the fifth game in Baguio, Raymondo observed ...

Here the game was adjourned for a second time. Korchnoi has made no progress in the last twenty moves but now had a chance to consult reference books and analyse the position thoroughly … Alas they merely confirmed the position was a draw.

Karpov – Korchnoi 1978: The Inside Story of the match, Batsford 1978

... yet once again it was another thirty-odd moves before the game ended.

Naturally, game 25 of the 1978 World Championship was no different. Here's RDK, once more (source as above):

The position is now a book draw but, unperturbed by snoring from the audience, Korchnoi plays on for another fourteen moves before bowing to the inevitable.

I'd include an example from my own games at this point, but I don't have one so I can't. There's a moral for me there, I think.



Sixty Memorable Annotations
1: Fischer-Sherwin, New Jersey Open 1957
2: Polugayevsky-Tal, Soviet Championship 1969
3: Simen Agdestein

Sixty Memorable Annotations

#7: Shliperman - Yermolinsky, Philadelphia 1997

4 Nbd2

This is probably the best move in the position if you are of equal strength to your opponent but ... it is often in the stronger player's interest to exchange bishop for knight ....

Jacob Aagaard, Excelling at Chess (Everyman Chess 2001)

Today is Wednesday. I mention that as a service for anybody who happens to be playing in a chess tournament and who therefore, if my experience is anything to go by at least, might not have known.

This time last week EJH, Angus French and I were in Penarth and up to our necks in the South Wales International. Just like Benasque a year ago, I lost the ability to recall the day of the week pretty much from the pushing of the first pawn. Occasionally I found myself thinking something like, "Well, we arrived on Friday and the next day I played him and him and the day afterwards it was that guy so today must be ....", but mostly I didn't even bother with that. There didn't seem much point really.

Time disorientation notwithstanding, it was a highly enjoyable week, not to mention a rich source of material for chess bloggers. No doubt EJH will be along shortly with his traditional ... against the grandmasters post. Usually this is an event for which I can do nothing more than spectate from the sidelines and feel envious, but at Penarth, thanks to a pairing system I do not pretend to understand and a first round victory against a guy rated roughly equivalent to 140 ECF, I finally got to play my first ever game against one of the game's bigger cheeses.

Round 2, 5:30pm Saturday 8th of July
JMGB (1908) v Marijan Petrov (GM, 2522)

A pairing, I rather suspect, that will live a shade longer in my memory than it will in his.

A fine place for a pre-game cup of tea

"Someone who isn't a strong chessplayer will lack the feel for when bishop takes knight is the correct decision", Phil wrote on Monday. It's hard not to agree, especially if, as Aagaard believes, the definition of 'correct' varies according to who is playing.

The Vowelled One's idea - he attributes the original thought to Smyslov - is simply that,

when the pieces in the two armies have different properties the outcome is less likely to be a draw.

so for him, it doesn't have to be BxN. The other way around would be just as good.

NxB is much easier to understand, though, isn't it? That way you unbalance the game and get the bishop pair. Bishop takes knight, however? That's a completely different kettle of minor pieces.

Marijan Petrov:

Not thought to have been bricking it prior to the commencement of round 2

Of course, regardless of who is playing, the inherent superiority of bishop over knight is one of those 'rules' the existence or otherwise of which sparked a falling-out between Aagaard and Watson a few years back. These days, could we even talk of a mini-fashion for playing BxN early doors in chess games? I'm not so sure, although I do know that,

• in this month's New in Chess Peter Heine Nielsen points out that his boss handed Gelfand the bishop pair in more than half the games of their World Championship match, often, if not always, for "structural compensation";
• when Black was by far the stronger player and had the chance to bust up White's pawns, it took him no more than a second to decide on ... Bxc3+ here:-

Either way, we have reached the boundaries of your humble scribe's technical competence and it's probably best that we move on. If the fact that I ended my twenty-five year wait to play one-on-one with a grandmaster is a good thing, I'm afraid our Penarth Diaries must continue on Friday with games that are both bad and ugly. I should warn readers of a squeamish disposition that they may wish to stay away at least until the weekend.

As for the result of my game with Petrov, well, formally you'll have to wait for Justin's post for that. Let's be honest, though. If the game had ended with any result other than the thousand-to-one-odds-on one, do you really think I'd not have mentioned it before now???

Sixty Memorable Annotations Index