From a Game...

In the State Library on Monday, I looked at a lot of material and came away with some stuff to look at later. I copied some pages from Korchnoi's 400 Best Games of Chess and today had a look at the first game, a win for Korchnoi from the 1946 Leningrad Junior Championship. (By the way, this game isn't in Big Database 2013, though it might be in the more up to date versions.)

The game Korchnoi-Razov isn't perfect, isn't in a topical opening for today, or even for when it was played, but it does show some things that players should be thinking about. In this respect, it is a good teaching tool.

1. Don't worry about openings so much. At sub master level, no one knows much theory anyway, and thanks to our current World Champion, openings are being relegated in importance in favour of stamina, tactical solidity and endgame mastery.

2. You don't have to play the best move to win games. But when you analyse, you should be trying to discover what was best, and why you made mistaken choices.

3. Any ideas that strike you as interesting, or that you haven't seen before, you should take note of. In this game, I particularly like Korchnoi's bishop retreat on move 13, dominating the knight. I've seen the idea before in a number of openings but it must have been very tempting for a young player to drop the bishop back to b3 to stay on the a2-g8 diagonal.

4. The opening is a Hungarian type opening which is pretty solid, but not very ambitious. At club level it can be a good choice for players who don't mind playing a bit cramped for a while.

Anyway, here's the game, with notes from the book and a couple added from me:

If you haven't seen this opening before, and aren't particularly impressed with black's play, then the key game is probably Rodzinski-Alekhne Paris 1913. This is a game that you should study if you haven't done so before. It is only 15 moves long, but a lot happens in it. White pounds away at f7, and Alekhine ends up giving his rook up on a8. But then all his pieces come to attack a deserted white king, with a beautiful final tactic and mate.

In fact, looking at these games inspired me to look at some other games in similar lines by some quality players. Here's a position from a game where Korchnoi was playing the black side:

White over estimated his position and advanced. The position is balanced, so the bishop on g5 should probably retreat. 1.Bh6?! Qe8 2.f4? Weakening the king side 2..Qc6 threatening mate on g2 3.Qc2

2..Bd4+ simple chess, advancing slowly, this time using a pin as justification 3.Kh2 Be3 blocking the e-file, and putting white's bishop on h6 out of the game 4.Re2 Qd6 5.Rf1 Rde8 6.Qb3

In this position, Korchnoi, as black, played 6..Qd3 and went on to win. However, he missed an excellent tactical shot here.

Black to play and crush!!

Here's a position from the 1800's. Those from the Birmingham area of England will be familiar with the club Walsall Kipping. You might not know, however, that Kipping was a player, and a pretty good one for his time, though I think he was more celebrated as a problem composer. Anyway, this position is from the game Kipping-Pindar Manchester 1861. White has just played Ne5, centralising the knight. Unfortunately, white resigned a few moves later!

Black to play and win

This is a fairly crazy but balanced position from the game van Oosterom-Kazimdhzanov Dutch League 2008. White played 16.Bb5. Why was this a mistake?

Finally, take a look at this position.

What do you think black played?

I'll post the answers tomorrow with some extra stuff

Back to Chess

I have a week off and I don't intend to spend it dwelling on the lunacy that is the situation in my birth country, England (I did enough of that over the weekend!). Melbourne was bad enough today. After racist vs anti racist incidents in Carlton Gardens at the weekend, the city seemed particularly grim today. I was walking up Swanston Street today with a damp, grim, grey feel to the day. There were homeless sleeping in doorways while families passed ignorantly past them on this school holiday Monday.

I went to the State Library of Victoria to look at some chess materials in the Anderson Room. An ever growing resource, the Anderson room, is one of the largest collections of chess books in the world. There are many books and periodicals on display and a vast collection held off site that can bee asked for. I just went in to browse at a couple of things today. I looked at some recent New in Chess Yearbooks for a view of some opening ideas. I also read some interviews in the British Chess Magazine and New in Chess Magazines.

I was there for a good few hours and leisurely whiled the time reading about my favourite chess subjects, endings, history and player biographies. After his recent death, it was Korchnoi that I was interested in, and there were plenty of books on him or by him. I also had a brief look at the books on my pet opening, the Philidor (yes, I only have 1 pet opening!), but soon realised that my knowledge of the Antoshin Variation exceeds that outlined by Christian Bauer in his 2007 book "The Philidor Files", or any other book that was on the shelf. There was an interesting article in a New in Chess Yearbook, but that just confirmed ideas that I'd already come up with. Hmmm, maybe I should become an opening theorist?

Of all the books I looked at today, my best recommendation would be "Mastering Endgame Strategy" by Johan Hellsten. This book goes through a load of strategic concepts based around material considerations. Then the second part of the book has over 200 test positions. As I'm nearly hitting 50 year's of age, here's the 49th position from Hellsten's book.

White to play and win

The Evans Gambit

I've never played the Evans Gambit with the white pieces. I really don't know why, as white seems to get excellent piece play for a minimal investment. And the resulting positions allow white an initiative while black has the difficult task of defending for a long time, not something that many players below GM standard really enjoy doing. And I suppose that when I was growing up the Evans was not a frequently played opening, even at club level (the King's Gambit was always more popular).

Then came the 1990's, and Kasparov started playing 1.e4 and among other strange, old forgotten systems he bashed out the Evans. Of course, Kasparov was not the only top player to try it out, but there couldn't have been anyone more high profile. Anyway, the children of Kasparov's revolution are far more comfortable with the Evans than my generation. But then again, it still has to be a certain style of player who gives the Evans a go, especially at the Grandmaster level.

One such player is Australian board 1 at the 40th chess Olympiad, David Smerdon. I'm never particularly surprised by what Smerdon plays anymore, I just expect the unexpected. I remember walking into the State Library of Victoria a few years back to browse through some of the books, and there was David Smerdon, checking out some theory on the Scotch Gambit....or was it the Max Lange?

Yesterday, Smerdon played board 1 for Australia in the Olympiad against a very solid Norwegian team amd with the white pieces went all out for activity, putting his 2498 rated opponent onto the back foot. After prolonged pressure, black finally broke and David was rewarded with the full point. For what it's worth, I think that Smerdon's plan of 13.Rd1 and 14.c4 has not been played before, though the idea has been suggested, eg by Costa in Opening Encyclopedia 2011.



Another solid performance by the men's team, with a 2-2 draw with 2014 hosts Norway (without Magnus Carlsen), while our women came on the wrong end of a very strong Indian team who beat us 3.5-0.5. This means the men have a pretty tough assignment in round 3 against Mongolia, while the women take on Macedonia. Good luck to all our players!

ps. this includes the youth players, who have started their tournament with a 4-0 win and followed it up with another win 2.5-1.5, but I'll get to the Junior event in another post :)