|
Chessville
logo by
ChessPrints
Advertise
with
Chessville!!
Advertise to
thousands
of
chess
fans
for
as little
as $25.
Single insert:
$35
x4 insert:
@ $25 each.
From the
Chessville
Chess Store
From the
Chessville
Chess Store
|
Chess Instruction
|
GM Nigel Davies |
Chess Mentoring Services
There is no quick fix to mastering chess so Nigel
takes a long-term approach to mentoring, individually tailoring his
guidance to each student's needs and available time. Several students
have studied with Nigel for more than a decade, experiencing
considerable growth in their game during this time. "Chess improvement can be a time consuming job and
prove especially difficult for those with
lives outside the game. For this reason my books, DVDs and
mentoring services are aimed at
enabling players to improve their results as much as possible in the
least amount of time." |
Getting the Positions
"I can
comprehend Alekhine's combinations well enough, but where he gets his
attacking chances from and how he infuses life into the very opening -
that is beyond me."
This is how
that great master of the attack, Rudolf Spielmann expressed his
admiration for the genius of Alexander Alekhine; how did he obtain the
positions from which he launched his famous combinations?
The art of building up good positions is a subject of great relevance
for club players. I know many strong club players that can
conduct an attack quite brilliantly once they get the position, but if
they play an International Master or Grandmaster they will usually be
kept at arms length and get picked off with the jab. But
occasionally a position will arise in which a clear attacking plan is
available, and then the chances of an upset are quite high.
The
following game is a superb illustration of how a strong club player
can, if he gets the opportunity, butcher a Grandmaster. In the
White corner we have Wrexham Chess Club's Richard (`Dangerman')
Dineley; in the Black corner is Keith (`Bone-Crusher') Arkell, who was
soon to be awarded the Grandmaster title. The game was played in
the 1994 Cheshire and North Wales Championship:
Dineley,R - Arkell,K
Caro-Kann Defence
1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.exd5 cxd5 4.c4 Nf6 5.Nc3 e6 6.Nf3
Bb4 7.cxd5 Nxd5 8.Bd2 Nc6 9.Bd3 0-0 10.0-0 Nxc3 11.bxc3 Be7 12.Qe2 g6
      
  
 
  
  
No doubt this variation was part of Arkell's Caro-Kann
repertoire, but my own feeling is that it was not a wise choice.
The point is that it gives White a rather clear plan of attack, which
is very dangerous against a player like Dineley.
Moving on to specifics, I don't particularly like
Black's last move which voluntarily weakens his kingside. At
this stage Black probably wanted to fianchetto his c8 bishop and the
immediate 12...b6 loses to 13.Qe4. But in view of the fact that
Black shortly abandons this plan, the immediate 12...Bd7 looks
tougher.
13.Bh6 Re8 14.Rfe1 Bd7 15.Qe3 Rc8 16.Ng5 Bf8 17.Qf4
Qe7 18.Bxf8 Qxf8 19.Ne4
With threats of both 20.Nd6 and 20.Nf6+ this already
looks winning for White.
19...Red8 20.Nf6+ Kg7 21.Re3 h6 22.Ng4 Qh8 23.Rh3
h5
24.Bxg6!
A very nice combination.
24...fxg6 25.Qf6+ Kg8 26.Qxg6+ Kf8 27.Rf3+
27.Nh6 Be8 28.Qxe6 also looks good with 28...Rc7
29.Rf3+ Kg7 30.Rg3+ Kh7 31.Rg8 being an amusing possible sequel.
27...Ke7 28.Qg5+ Kd6 29.Qf4+ Ke7 30.d5 Be8 31.dxc6
hxg4 32.Qg5+ Kd6 33.Rd3+ Kc7
34.Rxd8
Of course 34.Qe7+ forces immediate resignation but by
now it no longer matters too much.
34...Rxd8 35.Qe7+ Bd7 36.cxd7 Qxc3 37.Rd1 Qc6
38.Qg5 Qb6 39.Qe5+ 1-0
The way
Dineley won this game brought to mind an interesting comment of
Emanuel Lasker in his brilliant Manual Of Chess:
If Zukertort
has a plan in mind, he is a match for Steinitz, possibly even his
peer. Compare with the above games the one that follows.
Every move of Zukertort's pointed towards a vigorous co-operation of
the pieces united to attack the King - at first against its initial
position, then against the Castled King. The forceful
concentration of pieces against the King is the old Italian plan;
Zukertort found it ready-made, and in the tactics of mere execution he
was a great master. Steiniz, however, discovered sound and
successful plans over the board.
And here is
the game that Lasker was referring to:
Zukertort-Steinitz
Match (game 5), 1896
1.d4 d5 2.c4 c6 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.e3 Bf5 5.cxd5 cxd5
6.Qb3 Bc8
By now this is an unfortunate necessity. It
would have been better to play 5...Nxd5 and probably 4...Bf5 is not
the best.
7.Nf3 Nc6 8.Ne5 e6 9.Bb5 Qc7 10.Bd2 Bd6 11.f4 0-0
12.Rc1 Bxe5
Played in order to weaken the pressure on the c-file,
but it leads to problems on the other side of the board. With a
clear plan of attack, Zukertort plays superbly.
13.fxe5 Ne8 14.0-0 f6 15.Bd3 Rf7 16.Qc2
Forcing a further weakening of Black's kingside as
16...g6 is met by 17.Bxg6 and 16...h6 by 17.Bg6.
16...f5 17.Ne2 Bd7 18.Rf2 Rc8 19.Bc3 Qb6 20.Qd2 Ne7
21.Rcf1 Bb5 22.Bb1 Qa6 23.g4 g6 24.h3 Rc7 25.Re1 Ng7 26.Nf4 Nc8
27.gxf5 gxf5
After 27...Nxf5 there is 28.e4 fxe4 29.Bxe4 followed
by 30.d5. Now the knockout comes on the g-file.
28.Rg2 Kh8 29.Kh2 Qc6 30.Reg1 Ne7 31.Qf2 Qe8?
A blunder, but Black's position was untenable in any
case.
32.Rxg7 1-0
The problem
faced by Spielmann and Zukertort was how to get the positions from
which they could use their strengths and this is also a problem faced
by many club players too. How does one go about solving this
problem?
In recent
years an approach has become prevalent which I will call the `catapult
method'. The proliferation of opening theory has led to many
players simply memorizing opening variations and thus catapulting
themselves past the planning stage of the opening.
This is how
Lasker described the evolution of this method:
To visualize
the beginning of this evolution we may surmise that at an ancient
date, when players of original talent, whom today we would call
'natural' players, pre-dominated over all other, some unknown genius,
with a penchant for collecting information, made notes of the
beginnings of good games, compiled them, classified them, and
exhibited his work to a few friends. As a natural consequence,
some of the industrious and intelligent learners would, in the first
dozen moves, overcome superior players of that day, by employing the
tactical maneuvers gleaned from the manuscript of their
compiler-friend. One can imagine the surprise of spectators and
the wrath of the defeated masters as they observed newcomers, without
natural talent, waging a strong fight purely with the aid of a book of
compiled information.
For Aaron
Nimzovitsch, one of the most profound chess thinkers, the catapult
method was complete anathema. When a player called Becker came
fifth in the great Carlsbad tournament of 1929, Nimzovitsch grudgingly
admitted that "Becker was quite clever to use a variation everyone
had long since forgotten" and that "Becker carried out his
attack quite well". But in his description of Becker's style
he gave vent to his true feelings:
It is
difficult to find anything whatever to say about Becker. He has
no recognizable chess physiognomy - indeed, God only knows how he gets
through his games. With White, he opens 1.e2-e4, employing an
old line of the Giuoco that everyone else has half-forgotten, while
with Black, his defense evinces neither style nor accuracy. He
is hardly likely to achieve such heights a second time.
I only
disagree with Nimzovitsch in the last sentence as the Becker approach
has been shown to work very well if one's aim is only to get better
results. So for players with plenty of time on their hands, good
memories and a stomach for crass repetition, learning a set of sharp
opening variations can make them into quite dangerous opponents.
Do I
therefore recommend it? Definitely not! I am one of those
stubborn die-hards who still believe that the point of playing chess
is not to get a higher number next to your name. For me the real
value of chess is in the way it can contribute to our intellectual and
spiritual development, and in this way arguably contribute something
to the world.
Chess can
have such benefits only when one tests one's intellect, judgment and
character on the board, not when one regurgitates 25 moves of Sicilian
theory. It seems to me therefore that the most valuable lessons
in chess are the ones which develop our overall understanding and
enable us to improvise plans over the board. Studying the games
of great players, for example, gives us an insight into their
character and how they approached different problems. My
favorite books are auto-biographical game collections and amongst
these I should mention the works of Fischer, Larsen, Botvinnik,
Alekhine and Keres as being outstanding works of strategy, delicate
judgment and creativity.
Regarding
playing the opening, a good approach for club players is, in my view,
for them to adopt openings which have fairly clear plans but without
masses of theory.
Richard
Dineley's play was a good example and another good bet against the
Caro-Kann is Bobby Fischer's favourite exchange variation: 1.e4 c6
2.d4 d5 3.exd5 cxd5 4.Bd3. The point is to understand what
you want to do in the middlegame, to have a clear plan.
I say this
in the knowledge that one of the most effective ways to defeat a less
experienced opponent is to deprive him of a clear line of action, to
make the planning part of the game as difficult as possible.
With this in mind I personally have had a long term preference for
flank openings in which the contact between the opposing armies is
delayed and amongst British players, Jon Speelman and David Norwood,
for example, have shared my attachment for the Modern Defence.
Black risks
taking on a cramped position with backward development in order to
test both players' positional abilities. The flexibility of
Black's pawn structure makes it difficult to detect a clear target and
thus makes it difficult to pin down with clear theoretical lines.
To use a cliché, it 'throws the opponent on his own resources'.
The theory is that one's superior understanding of chess will tell in
the difficult positions that follow.
The
following offhand game I played against a good club player in South
Wales is a good example of this theory working well. I outplayed
my opponent in the opening because I had a better feeling for how the
pieces should be arranged in the subsequent middlegame.
NN - Davies,N
Cardiff, 1995
1.d4 d6
After the game my opponent expressed disappointment
that I played this way as after either 1...d5 or 1...Nf6 he wanted to
try the Blackmar-Diemer Gambit. Well I have to say that contrary
to the opinion of IM Gary Lane, I think that the Blackmar-Diemer's
rarity is because it isn't terribly good. But certainly this
would be a reasonable practical try for White because his plan of
attack is fairly clear.
2.e4 g6 3.f4 Bg7 4.Nf3 c5 5.c3 Qa5!?
I have played this provocative move once before and to
my knowledge it is my own idea, at least in this particular setting.
The idea is to play 6...cxd4 without allowing the White c-pawn to
recapture and thus cause general disruption to White's set-up.
This type of game is exactly what I like to get when I
want to win with Black against a weaker opponent. I'm not so
sure I would take it against a player such as Bronstein! It
needs a high level of skill for White to properly orientate himself in
such a complex and unfamiliar setting.
6.Nbd2 cxd4 7.Nb3 Qb6 8.Nbxd4
After the disappearance of one of White's center
pawns, the danger of Black being rubbed out with e4-e5 is considerably
diminished. I think the recapture with the pawn is more
critical, but Black can pressurize the d4 square with moves like
....Nc6, ....Bg4 and even ....a7-a5 intending ....a5-a4.
8...Nc6 9.Bb5 Nf6
10.Qd3?
After this White's position is very bad because his
pieces are so poorly placed for the middle-game. The critical
move was 10.e5, and this was in fact the only way to justify the
rather odd 9.Bb5.
10...0-0 11.Be3 Qc7 12.h3?! Bd7 13.g4?
Not knowing what to do White lunges at Black's king.
In fact this is a typical error, seeking a clear plan even when none
exists.
13...Nxd4 14.Nxd4 e5!
|
