Monday, August 10
IM Bill Paschall – World Chess Championship 1894: Lasker Takes the Crown – Part 5 | Strategy, Endgame
Seriously trailing in the match as it moved to Montreal, Steinitz strikes back by winning games thirteen and fourteen. Lasker shows vulverability as Steinitz switches to a queen pawn opening with White. In this encounter, Lasker is worse after weakening his position with f5 in the opening and Steinitz shows great positional understanding as well as tactical finesse with the combination and subsequent exchange sacrifice started by 20.Nxc6. An all around great game by Steinitz which illustrates the power of connected pawns in the endgame.
Tuesday, August 11
GM Eugene Perelshteyn – Morozevich on the War Path: Sac’ing Pawns and Playing for Mate! | Opening
In this game, GM Perelshteyn revisits one of the brightest modern attacking players, Russian GM Alexander Morozevich. In a lesser-known game, the Russian tactician plays a quiet opening against positionally gifted Armenian GM Vladimir Akopian. At first it looks like White is slowing getting outplayed, as Black opens the h-file and gets the dark squares. However, out of nowhere, Moro unleashes his pawns, first on the Q-side, then in the center, and finally on the K-side. In just a few moves, Black’s king finds himself totally defenseless against White’s attack. Where did Black go wrong?
Wednesday, August 12
FM Dennis Monokroussos – Legends of Chess 2020: A New Anti-Ragozin Idea | Opening
Due to the coronavirus the chess world has moved online and is almost exclusively playing games with a shorter time control, and that has given the players more freedom to experiment in the opening. This game is a perfect example: Magnus Carlsen comes up with a very interesting new idea against Anish Giri’s Ragozin, and while Giri probably would have been able to work everything out under a classical time control, that was simply not going to happen in this rapid event. Carlsen’s idea is interesting in any case, and one we might want to adopt the next time we face the Ragozin. It’s not bad, and he went on to win a very impressive game.
Thursday, August 13
GM Nadya Kosintseva – Play the Caro-Kann Defense – Part 6: Facing the Advance Variation, Part 2 | Strategy
In this video, I finish covering the closed system of the Caro-Kann Defense when White closes up the center on the third move, playing e5. We will cover less aggressive continuations when White just develops the king side pieces, castles and then starts playing with the pawns on the queen side. For Black, again, it can be very important to find counterplay – otherwise pieces can be very crowded. It is still popular to prepare and play c5 to challenge the center. However, I will introduce an alternative to it that implies an aggressive pawn advance on the king side specifically g5 followed by f6. Black can afford to start pushing the pawns before he castles since the position is closed and it’s nearly impossible for White to open it up quickly. In doing so, Black keeps in mind the possibility to castle in either direction and so can choose one depending on White’s actions.
Friday, August 14
GM Robert Hungaski – A French Winawer Sideline: 5.Bd2 – and Alekhine’s Gun | Strategy
In this video I take another look at the 3.Nc3 French. This time I examine 5.Bd2 – one of White’s most interesting sidelines. White’s idea is quite logical: to prevent Black from doubling the pawns on c3. Moreover, White can meet 5…cxd4 6.Nb5! when White is likely to achieve a nice clamp along the dark-squares (as in the Alekhine-Nimzowitsch game, which gave us an iconic moment in chess history, and the term Alekhine’s Gun”). However, I believe that with accurate play Black can create some serious problems for White. Enough that White will have to break away with his most logical move, since otherwise he will fall fatally behind with his development. I was able to win a couple of nice blitz games that illustrate this point (see pgn).