Monday, December 30
Bill Paschall – The Challenge of Beating Your Own System | Opening, Strategy, Endgame
There are several challenges to facing your own favorite opening system. Firstly, we are used to looking at these positions from the other perspective. Perhaps more importantly, at the highest levels, it is critical not to give away good ideas as ammunition against your own defensive systems. In this encounter, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, who is the heir apparent to the Najdorf “throne”, must face his own weapon. Kasparov has retired from chess and Boris Gelfand has moved away from the Najdorf leaving Vachier in charge of defending the most premium of Sicilian Defenses. Presumably, Maxime doesn’t want to give any ideas away in his favorite opening, so he invents a rather unique way of playing with White. The game features White’s focus on the pivotal d5 weak point, as well as a quite instructive endgame.
Tuesday, December 31
FM Dennis Monokroussos – New Ideas in the Moscow Sicilian from Magnus Carlsen | Tactics
The anti-Sicilian line 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.Bb5+ used to be a minor line, not considered anywhere nearly as dangerous as the related Rossolimo (3.Bb5 against 2…Nc6). But new ideas have been cropping up, and in today’s game vs. Ian Nepomniachtchi we see Magnus Carlsen demonstrating one such new idea. With well-timed opening play Carlsen rapidly whips up a strong queenside initiative, and by move 14 already enjoys a clear advantage, which he went on to convert into a full point with his characteristic excellence. It looks like a dangerous line, so players who could be on either side of the variation should know about the new plan. Besides that, the game is worth seeing for Carlsen’s terrific technique. Sicilian players, beware!
Wednesday, January 1
GM Eugene Perelshteyn – Crushing Attack in 2…a6 Closed Sicilian! | Opening
If you love to play the Grand Prix attack, how do you handle the pesky 2…a6 in the Sicilian? Take a look at this amazing miniature where a young Chinese GM crushes a top Russian junior, Artemiev, with an odd-looking opening plan: Nh3!? Why would you develop a knight to the side of the board? Watch the video to discover the hidden ideas and crush 2…a6 once and for all!
Thursday, January 2
GM Leonid Kritz – MVL Attempts to Prove That 2+2=5 | Strategy
It’s a rare occasion today when White decides to go into the Spanish instead of the Italian. Black chooses a line where White has some theoretical chances to get an advantage after the opening. However, instead of choosing the principled line 10.a5, White goes into the old, known but unpromising variation and Black shows one more time that there is nothing to catch there!
Friday, January 3
GM Nadya Kosintseva – An Irregular Regular Dragon | Strategy
In this lecture we will consider a pretty unusual line of the Sicilian Dragon move order. The regular Dragon occurs after the following moves: 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 g6. Then, the most principled continuation for White is linked to queen side castling: 6.Be3 Bg7 7.f3 0-0 8.Qd2 Nc6 9.Bc4 Bd7 10.0-0-0. As in many other Sicilians, White brings the king to the side opposite of it’s Black counterpart in order to start a pawn storm sooner. For Black, it can be typical to counter play on the queen side. The most popular way to start such counter play is 10…Rc8. However we will consider another rook move – 10…Rb8 with the intention to push the “b”-pawn. The following variations seem to be extremely sharp and lead to a very complicated for both sides position, with an unpredictable outcome.