New Chess Videos for May 11 – 15
Monday, May 11
IM Bill Paschall – Botvinnik: Exploiting Space Advantages, Part 5 | Middlegame, Strategy
In one of their many battles, this one from the Soviet Championship 1936, Salo Flohr chooses to play the somewhat risky and hyper-modern Alekhine’s Defense against Botvinnik. The decision to play this opening against a master of spatial advantages was a truly poor decision from a practical point of view. Botvinnik is easily able to gain a lasting spatial advantage and finally establishes a powerful outpost for his knight on the 6th rank. In order to survive, Black must capture and allow White a very strong protected passed pawn. In many cases spatial advantage will lead to direct attack, but here we see the power of passed pawns as the decisive factor in the game.
Tuesday, May 12
Eugene Perelshteyn – Taking Over the Dark Squares in the Two Knights Defense | Opening, Strategy
When you play an opening, it’s very important to know the key strategic ideas. In this line of the Two Knights Defense, White gives up the bishop pair but doubles Black’s c-pawns. How does White neutralize the bishop pair? The answer is simple, blockade on the dark squares! Both knight, bishop and queen join the party and setup blockage on c5 & d5 outposts. Now what? The rest is very instructive: White, knowing that his opponent is in complete paralysis, slowly but surely keeps improving his position. Such art of maneuvering was first seen in many Kaprov games. Under pressure, Black eventually creates more weaknesses and loses a key pawn and the rest is easy.
Wednesday, May 13
FM Dennis Monokroussos – Attacking in the King’s Gambit Declined | Strategy
We don’t generally associate the great Akiba Rubinstein with attacking chess (his brilliancy vs. Rotlewi notwithstanding) or the King’s Gambit, but in this game we get a glimpse into what the Polish legend was capable of; he didn’t just win rook endings! Starting with the King’s Gambit, he soon offers a rook, and later, even more. It’s a beautiful attacking win by Rubinstein, and it features ideas that are very unusual – it’s unlikely that this game will remind you of any other one. Have a look!
Thursday, May 14
GM Nadya Kosintseva – Combining Tactical and Strategic Thinking | Strategy
In this lecture, I will introduce to you a brilliant game by the Polish grandmaster Michal Krasenkov who excelled in combining two important parts of chess: tactics and strategy. The moves that he played in the middle game were very consistent with his general positional line and provoked his opponent to play strategically risky continuations in an attempt to compensate a lack of space tactically. The grandmaster outplayed his opponent due to his more creative and detailed calculation in addition to a better understanding of the strategic patterns.
Friday, May 15
GM Robert Hungaski – Rough and Ready New Approaches in the French Winawer | Strategy
After covering an important French Defense sideline in my preceding video (3.Bd3), I decided it was only fair to cover a mainline. Here we will examine the Winawer Variation, although with a slight spin on it. This time it will be Black that aims for the surprise effect by employing a sideline (6…Nc6). As we’ll see, White’s road to an advantage is anything but clear!