i would have played Bh1 followed by Kg2-h3-g4-h5, gaining space on the kingside

This Re1 Nd3 plan is typical for this type of positions. I wanted to point out a good way of positional thinking and planning.

F4 is not bad, but not the best. There s no need to rush things when your opponent lacks ideas of improving his position. It s really better to improve your pieces to the maximum, to squeeze your opponent as much as you can and then, and only then begin active operations. By playing f2-f4 directly you give black chances and ideas to activate his pieces

This is not a very good plan. First, Bh1 and Kg2 is weird. it s rarely the case that moves so ugly can be strong. Besides, by advancing the g3 pawn, the f2-f4 plan is eliminated and so are the chances of white bteaking black's solid pawn structure

Judit probably meant Kg2-Kh3-Kg4-Kh5

You probably haven't followed this subforum enough to know how much Judit B (who is a cat, btw) adores developing the king to the fifth or at least the second

oh, i didn't realize it was a joke ) anyway, the advice is real

Yeah I played around with the computer a bit. Seems indeed a bit uncomfortable for black.

bogdanpos your work till now is great and definitely upgrades the whole chess forum!

I would like to ask sth about opening repertoire. Is Kosten's book on the english opening
good enough as a repertoire book? It has generally good comments but i dont know if it
is out dated or covers the english opening completely

I haven't read Kosten's book on the english opening because I do not play it with white and as black, I always try to transpose into KID type positions. But I can recommend one very good book (the best imho) on 1.c4 : Mihail's Marin book! He is a renowned chess writer with many many excellent books and articles and this one is not an exception. I think it may have won some awards also.

Best of Luck

In order to revitalize this thread, I will post an annotated game of mine, in a 5+0 tournament on chess.com versus an unknown, rather weak opponent. I am playing white and I think this game is quite instructive.

Posedaru,B - N.N 1-0 , 5+0 Chess.com Tournament

1.d4 d6 2.c4 c6 3.Nc3 Qc7 4.e4 e5 5.d5 Nf6 6.Bg5 Be7 7.Qd2 Nbd7 8.h3 a5 9.0-0-0 Nc5



How do we assess this position?

At first glance, the position is complicated, with chances for both sides. White has space advantage in center (notice that the center is not blocked - very important) and his pieces are occupying natural squares. He has yet to develop his king's side minor pieces. Black's pieces are also well coordinated, and his knight on c5 is occupying a very nice outpost. Also, his queen's side attack is ready to start.

But let's not forget that white can, at any time, dictate the dynamic of the center by opening it up with dxc6 and thus magnifying black's weak pawn on d6. But what should white play here? Unfortunately, white cannot capture and open the center, because 10.dxc6?? is losing to 16...Nfxe4 -+. So he must prepare that.

10.Bxf6! eliminating the threats on the e4 pawn and giving black a hard time making a decision about how should he recapture this. The natural 10... Bxf6 allows white to take on c6 and then on d6, winning a pawn. But 10... gxf6 looks nasty. He weakens his pawn structure and also closes his e7 bishop and sentences it to passivity. Anyhow, I think 10... Bxf6 was better, sacrificing a pawn for the sake of active play.

10... gxf6 11. g4?! A dubious move but for the right purpose: white wants to block black's move f5 which would allow him to undermine white's center and bring his pieces into play. But I didn't realize black's next move would be so dangerous. 11. Qc2 was far better, for the same reasons.

11... h5! forcing white to capture on h5 and releasing the tension on f5. White cannot defend his pawn with f2-f3 because black can still take h5xg6 and then Bxg4! - notice the rook on h1 is undefended.

12. gxh5 Rxh5 13.Nge2 Rh4 14. Ng3 White gains control of the f5 square again, but now black has an active rook. The position is about equal.

14... a4?! Black tries active operations on the queen's side but he should have finised his development first by playing Bd7. This is one important strategic rule to remember: Avoid active operations when you have pieces yet to develop.

15. Be2 Bd7



How do we assess this position? - Notice how important it is to asses the position in key moments! Actually, identifying this key moments is vital and on this depends your strategic play strength.

So the kings are not under real threats right now, white has space advantage in center and a better pawn structure, but black has an active knight on c5 and an active rook on h4. Also his position is quite solid and white has to find an active plan, otherwise black will castle queen side and then bring his d8 rook on h8 and pressure on the weak h3 pawn.

But there are is a KEY elements from the assesment of the position that we missed. Which one is that?
Well, if you look close enough, you can see that black's f5 square is really really weak and that our knight would occupy an ideal outpost there, attacking the e7 bishop and would chase away the active rook on h4.

How do we make that happen?

Here, another strategic principle intervenes: To maximize the potential of our opponent's weak squares we must eliminate the pieces defending it.
So, in this case, we must eliminate black's LSB.

16.Bg4! Now black cannot refuse the exchange of his bishop and white will gain control of the very important f5 square. Notice that this move is also possible due to fine tactics: Black cannot take the sacrificed pawn : 16... Bxg4? 17. hxg4 Rxg4 18.Rh8+ Bf8 19.Rxf8! Kxf8 20.Qh6+ Ke7 21. Nf5+ Kd7 22.Qxf6 with decisive attack. Remember that you don't need to foresee this whole variation when playing moves like this. It is enough to assess that for just a pawn, black gives away control of the H file and f5 square, so it cannot be good for him.

16... 0-0-0 17. Bxd7 Rxd7 18. Nf5? I misplayed it here due to the time control, missing the simple 18... Nxe4 which allows white to equalize. For this reason, I should have played 18.f3 first, consolidating the e4 pawn.

18... Rh7 ?! of course black should have played 18... Nxe4

19. h4 White already has a clear advantage, and this is solely thanks to the LSB exchange on move 16.

19... Bf8 20.Qc2 Qa5 21.h5 Qb4 22.Ne2 cxd5 23.Rxd5 Bh6? 24.Kb1 Bf8 black is lacking active ideas 25.f3 Qb6 26.Nc3 Qa5 27.Nb5 Notice how white completely dominates this position thanks to his light squares superiority.

27... Kb8 28.Nfxd6 Na6



29.Nxb7!! - in such positions, where black's pieces are extremely awkard, tactics are very common.

29... Rxb7

30.Qxa4!! black cannot capture because of 31.Rd8#.

30... Qb6

31.Qxa6!! again the same motive.

1-0

I will contribute a game that myself and fellow 2p2er salenka played: http://www.chess.com/livechess/game?id=1334613200.

I thought since it's between two 2p2ers it would be doubly instructive since we can both benefit from your analysis. I'd love to see Salenka's own thoughts even though we did discuss briefly after the game.

Here are my annotations:

5. c4 — Uh oh, I don't remember at all how to play against the Maroczy. I thought maybe it was something like Nf6 Nc3 Nxd4 Qxd4 Bg7 or something like that? I dno, I couldn't remember and when I can't remember a system at all I've found that playing it is a really bad idea. I know the system I want to play is close to "Grundize" or something like that (yeah, I never learned how to spell it properly either). FML

9...Qa5 — After doing normal type moves I decided to play Qa5, which I have no clue whether it's good here or not. I suspect not as I didn't realize Nb3 would be so limiting.

10...Qc7 — Dang, I realized afterwards Qd8 might actually be better. He always can hit my queen with Nb5 and if I ever play h6 to stop that b6 is super weak and Na4 Bb6 might force my queen to something super ugly like d7. Where am I gonna even develop my bishop?!

11. Qd2 — Whew, I was happy about this move since it allowed Ng4 which I think lets me free myself a little bit so I'm in not quite as much of a bind. I assumed 11. f3 would be more accurate here? White's in full-on bind mode anyway but this sort of gave me some stuff to do I felt.

13...Be6 — I really felt I had no good places for my bishop and while this may make it a bit of a target, I felt it was important to get something on the d5 square and also an eye on c4 in case I could create some threats against it.

15... Rfc8. I had considered preparing f5 instead and leaving this rook on f8 but I couldn't find a way to have ...f5 free me up all that much and instead felt I should prepare a queenside defense since it felt white was going to go for that break.

By the way, I was taking a lot of time on my clock and my opponent wasn't, so I was severely down on time pretty much the entire game. I also had to let my dog out a couple of times and help move some stuff which cost me a few minutes. But mainly, if I was actually somewhat prepared in possibly the most critical line of my black opening vs. e4 this shouldn't have been an issue, lol.

16... Ne5 — Aha a threat against c4, bind my ass!

17. c5 — Oops. I originally was planning Bxd5 Qxd5 then Qa4 but around now I realized that ...Qxg7 would be a big problem since I was counting on threatening Qxa2 hitting the knight on b3 for a tempo.

18...Rc6 — So instead I settled on this move which I think is a better defensive one, but I am not exactly threatening anything or to get out of most of my problems. I did spend some time checking Na5 and felt that wasn't very effective as after Ra6 he'd have to move it back or likely get it trapped on b7.

19. Na5 — Well, I don't think white had to go into this. I think he could have just built up more pressure on me and black is still fairly helpless.

22. c6 — First, after the game my opponent said he could have gotten better compensation by playing 22. cxd6 but I think I just win the d6 pawn after 22...Rxb7 23. Qc2 Rc6 then Rxd6. I think c6 is a more practical move and it did lead to a position where he had a defensive resource to save the game.

I spent quite a bit of whatever remaining time I had on this move and think I should have spent more. I kind of thought that at the time but felt I had fully audited Rxc6 and since it worked, why try to figure out the murkier Nxc6? But if I win a cleanish piece I don't really need much time on my clock in a 45/45 game so I probably should have just kept looking. I realized on the very next move that I did miss something so it's not like I needed the position to get greatly clarified to see it.

Btw, I have no idea if Nxc6 works. A "natural" line I do remember thinking of quickly was 22...Nxc6 23. Rxd6 Qxb7 24. Qxb7 Rxb7 25. Rdxc6 Rxd6 26. Rxc6 and black is losing I thought. And I didn't go back to look at it in any more detail but felt there should be better lines but 22...Rxc6 looked much clearer in terms of leading to a winning position. Except...

23. Nc5 — I realized after this move I missed 26. Kf2 and felt I probably should have taken Nxc6. Tbh I spent most of my time looking at Rxc6 b/c it seemed more straightforward and forcing but I wish I had seen Kf2 b/c I certainly could have spent a few minutes checking it out in order to play it instead.

26. Rc1 — So this was the main move I had in my analysis before playing Rxc6 and I'm happy my opponent got stuck on it too because after 26. Kf2 I think I'm forced to play 26... Bd4 27. Rxd4 Nxd4 28. Kxe3 and I assume the game should end in a draw. White's knight is pretty hemmed up but my d6 pawn is weak and king isn't mobilized yet. But I didn't look at this too hard b/c it didn't get played.

31. Nc6 — At this point I have to admit I was letting myself be distracted by my dog and didn't even see it threatened a7. But it still feels like a pretty easy win.

36. Kg3 — I thought white was forced to let me win the g-pawn. This way the king gets trapped and the rook is cut off from helping with a defense.

Ok, so that is what I remember from yesterday. Take-away points so far:

1) I need to solidify my opening repertoires better. It doesn't matter if I have a repertoire if I can't remember it. This likely means playing more then going over those games against my repertoire since that seems way more effective for me learning-wise than just looking at lines and hoping I remember them months/years later.

2) If I sense there is a very critical forced line that will essentially end the game, I should probably just make myself look at it even more carefully at the periphery of my visualization. Maybe I did go to my "limit" but I really need to see moves like 26. Kf2 in a forcing line if I want to improve, I can't just count on my opponents missing stuff that seems completely within my control to see.

After checking briefly with an engine:

So, I am going to write a little bit about this game as well - from my perspective.

First of all, I think that most of our mistakes were due to the weird time situation in the game. Black spent really a lot of time during the opening and at around move 20 when all the complications began he had about 10mins remaining (while I had more than 30) if I remember correctly. At move 25 - when I missed the really obvious Kf2 and instead played Rc1 he definitely only had 5mins while I had something like 20-25. So instead of carefully looking at the position, I was playing very fast and just trying to put some time pressure on him. Well, with 45sec increments this just doesn't work if your opponent gets an easily winning position.

I was quite happy with my opening and the early middle game until move 20, when Nxb7 was just an obvious mistake. In hindsight, I believe b4 was a solid alternative. Again, I think the mistake was mostly psychologically. I thought I had both an advantage in the position as well as a big advantage on the clock, so I was probably overconfident and just thought that I was about to win and didn't spend any time calculating. It was just after ...20e6 that I realized that I was in some trouble.

As I said, the rest was a combination of bad calculation and playing too fast.

Ok, I looked over your game fellow 2p2ers and this are my thoughts:

5... Bg7 is very normal and natural, actually it is the main line against the Maroczy. I myself play this line with black but only against
similar strength or better opponents because I find it pretty dull and there's little room
for creativity. Also, I consider that black's chances for active play are reduced. Indeed, Nf6 Nc3 Nxd4 Qxd4 Bg7 is a good line for black.
I myslef played it against Zhigalko, Sergey and managed to equalize.

9...Qa5?! is a dubious move, not only because it allows Nb3 with tempo, but mainly because there's no ideea behind it. Black's plan in Maroczy is to
play a7-a5, a5-a4 and only then, maybe Qa5. That being said, Bd7 is the main line here with the idea of capturing on d4 and then Bc6, forcing white to
play f2-f3 which leads to more weakening of the dark squares.

10... Qc7 is not so bad, but you are right, Qd8 was better. Of course, you gotta admit: Qa5 was really bad!
Regarding LSB's development, bear in mind the Bc8-d7-c6 plan.
The plan in this position for black is the following : Nxd4, Bc6, knight from f6 to c5, a7-a5-a5, Qa5, Bg7, h7-h5 and Kh7. Notice that
h7-h5 followed by Kh7 prepares the fine plan of bringing the Queen to the best square: H8!! From there, the pressure on a1-h8 diagonal
will be enough counterplay for black.

11. Qd2 is not a bad move. f3 and Rc1 are also playable (Rc1 being the best, imho)

11... Ng4 is bad! I think you knew the ideea of Nf6-g4 but here it is not so good because
of the bad placement of the queen on c7. This allows for 12. Nd5! Qd8 13.Bg5 and white is better.

13. f3?! Again, Nd5 was better. For example : 13... Qd7 14.Rac1 Rac8 15.Nd4 and black's LSB is useless.

13... Be6 is a good move. Apart from the c6 square, the e6 square is also an alternative for LSB placement, for the very reasons you enumerated

15... Rfc8 again, a good, natural move. 15...f5 was bad. It is true that having the bishop pair obliges you to
try to open up the game, but here it doesn't work because of the simple 16.Nd4 Nxd4 17.Bxd4 Bxd4 18.Qxd4 and it is easy to see that white
is better. The move f5 does nothing but create more weaknesses in your position.

16... Ne5 is not bad but I think you were anaware that in this kind of positions, where the majority of pawns
are fixed on light squares, your LSB is not doing so great. So 16... Bxd5! was really good. If you understood during the game
that his knight is his best piece and that your LSB is your worst, you would've made the exchange in a heartbeat.
Remember to always be aware of the quality of your pieces and your opponent's pieces.

17. c5! good, forced move. White really has no alternatives but to push the pawn. For example Qe2 is met again by Bxd5 and Qa4, just like you said.

18... Rc6? This is actually the first really bad move in this game. It looks like cxd6 is imminent and black will lose a pawn. But just think for a minute:
Is the threat of cxd6 real? Let's check: 19.cxd6 e6 20.Qd2 Nc4 21.Qe2 Nxd6 22.Rxc8 Rxc8 23.Qd2 Rd8 24.Bc5 and black is losing. So, somwhere along this line we must
prevent this from happening. How do we do this? Well... 18...b6!! - stopping the eventual 24.Bc5 like in our analysis. This is a really great move and I must admit that without an engine, I'm not sure I would've see it either.
This technique of constantly checking if the threats are real is an advanced but important strategy.

19.Na5! forcing black to move his rook to the awkard position on a6.

20. Nxb7? is losing. 20.b4 secures the advantage and increases the pressure on black's position

22.c6? it would've been a good move if only Nc5 worked. 22.cxd6 is also wrong because the pawn will be eventually recaptured by black. Anywho, white's chances are really slim after the previous two blunders.

22... Rxc6. Of course this is the move to play. 22...Nxc6 is bad because of 23.Rxd6. The line you analyzed is flawed: 22...Qxb7 23.Qxb7 Rxb7 24.Rcxc6!! followed by Rd8+ and Bh6 with decisive advantage

23.Nc5 best practical chances for white, but still losing to correct play by black

23... Rxb3?? Miscalculation from black's part. The best move is the calm 23...Qc8 and black wins on the spot. After the text move, the position is complicated, about equal

26.Rc1? is losing. White must try to regain some material. After 26.Kf2 white's chances of drawing increase dramatically.

After Rc1 it is clear that black will have absolutely no problem in converting the material advantage.

Regarding your take-away points, I must tell you that I do not think improving your opening repertoire
is the best choice you can make in order to improve. Sure, learning new lines and variations will help your game, but in
my opinion you should focus on tactics because you missed some pretty big moves in this game and I think this is what's holding you down
right now.

I'll give you a very important tip my coach gave me years ago: If you really want to benefit from your opponent's time trouble, you should make "series of moves" ! So when you decide on which move you are going to play, before playing it .. stop and look at your opponent's possible responses and find your next move! For example, in your game, after black's 18...Rc6 you want to play Na5. Don't play it yet. If you look closely, you notice that his only good response is Ra6. Now, with this position in mind, find your next move (preferably 20.b4!) and play it immediatly so your opponent has no time to think while you're on the move. You made some pretty big tactical blunders so I reccomend you study some tactic puzzles.

Best of luck to both of you!

Thanks a lot for your analysis - very interesting!

Thank you so much for the analysis! Very cool and helpful, .

Good to know. I didn't think Bg7 was necessarily the mistake, I just couldn't figure out/remember what black's plans should be which lead to Qa5, which makes no sense and is just a bad move at that point.

This is what I couldn't remember, that you want to achieve a4 first. For some reason I thought weakening the b5 square meant a5-a4 wasn't the right plan. But, yeah, I mean, I was spending a lot of time and still couldn't get a cohesive plan together .

Honestly, I didn't even consider that as part of the plan but it seems obvious now that you mention it. I really forgot all the features of the Maroczy and am not sure exactly what I spent so much time thinking about.

Yeah, this sounds familiar to me now that you list all of the ideas together.

Ahh, yes of course. I missed that.

Well, I did realize that but was delaying taking the knight until I felt it made sense. I just missed that ...c5 would work and ...Ne5 first was the wrong move order. It seems obvious now to just take and then play Ne5 but in the position I thought I could go after the c4 pawn rather than let white capture on d5 with it, removing it as a weakness.

While I'm not going to claim that ...Rc6 is the right move there, I don't think ...b6 is the right move due to preventing 24.Bc5 in your line. Can't white just play f4-e5 instead? Ohhhhh, black also has Nb7 due to ...b6. Nice, that's nice.


I have worked quite a bit on tactics since starting chess again but I feel it comes and goes, if that makes sense. Some sessions I feel sharp and plow through tactics quickly and other times I feel like it's hard to see the solution and it takes me much more time.

I haven't done as much the last couple of months but will make it a priority.

What I was doing is creating sets on chesstempo of problems with a standard rating of 1300-1500 or so that have solutions of 3 moves or fewer and then solving them with spaced repetition (to mimic the woodpecker method described in Axel Smith's Pump Up Your Rating). Do you have any advice on improvements to that? Should I do lower rated problems to do them faster, higher rated ones and keep doing them until I can do see them relatively quickly?

I think what you (and all the others who want to improve their feel for tactics) should do is the following:

First, and very important, use a real chess board ! I cannot stress this enough: it is really important to look at a real 3d board rather than just looking at an "empty" board on your screen.

The chess puzzles you should aim for should be somehow intermediate: not too easy so you can find the solution before finishing setting up the position, but not too hard that you look at the solution and wonder : "wtf?!"

Then, after you finally set up your position, do not start calculating moves!. This is a common mistake, even among advanced players. Instead you should take a deep look at the position, analyse it and try to identify the motive of the combination (like "black king is on a mating net" or "the queen on e7 is protecting too many pieces/squares"), then the theme of the combination (like deflection, double attack etc.) and only then the sequence of moves that will accomplish your idea.

By training using this methods you will develop a routine of identifying the spots where you should start looking for a combination. Bear in mind that noone will be there when you play a game and you have a beautiful sacrifice to mate in 3, just shouting : "DEFLECTION! Mate in 3!!!". This only happens in tactics books.

I hope you understand what I mean by this and that you will listen to my advice. This will dramatically improve your play!

Best of Luck!

When you say "medium," how long would you say finding the solution should take? 1-4 minutes? Less than 1 minute? Less than 30 seconds but not instantly?

Would setting up chesstempo problems work or would you recommend a book? (If so, any particular books?).

I am already going through Yusupov's series and many problems are tactical in nature so I will try that structured method with those as I do them to practice.

By medium I mean it should take you between 30 seconds and 3 minutes. I am not familiar with chesstempo, but I can reccomend the Encyclopedia of Chess Combinations, by Chess Informant or Pinter, Jozsef - The Great Book of Chess Combinations . I think the latter is better but has one main disadvantage: the solutions are written below the diagram

It's a very large database of combinations from real games that you can access online and do training with quite easily.

It seems this should be for "strong players" only? I read 1900+. Which I may or may not be but I'd guess solving problems would often take longer than 3 minutes with such difficulty. Or is that assumption misguided?

I "liberated" a copy of this and I see what you mean. I guess the way to do it might be to find some way to cover up the solutions, but it's hard to figure out how without printing the problems out. Maybe I should just do that, print out 100-200 and work on those, using other pieces of paper to cover up the right-hand column and below the diagram.

Then work through them in pump up your rating style, awarding myself points for getting them and removing points for missing, trying to do them faster and more accurately over and over again.

Just liberated the 4th edition of the encyclopedia. I see how this one is easier to use as solutions are in the back.

It doesn't seem like it's specified which side should move in the problems? Is this a benefit of the problems since you have to look at the tactics for both sides, or am I missing something and old school problems had some trickier way of notating which color was to move.

Honestly, I don't think I've encountered positions where the side to move wasn't given...

It is not specified because the solution is just under the diagram. But this is actually helpful : You should be able to realize whose turn it is by just looking and feeling the position.

I will add 2 the fire

http://www.chess.com/echess/game?id=117083036

Kinda played this like a blitz game, and ran into my usual problems when i gamble on an opening I dont know. I just dont know opening theory.

Anyway, knew i was dead around move 15, flame away...