When playing the French Defense -Advance Variation- as Black, the player realizes that pieces on the kingside have only one way to develop: the e7-square. Through that narrow passage, both bishop and knight find...
Imagine one of your pawns is approaching to promotion. You want to queen it but you do not find the queen. Besides that, you are playing a blitz game and you are only seconds...
Dear readers, you already know the difference between absolute and relative pins. The Legal Trap is one example of a relative pin and its pattern is a recurrent motif in openings where one of...
Do you remember the “Legal trap” and “Boden’s mate”? In today’s game, both patterns appear together and the victim is none other than the great Russian master Mikhail Chigorin. It is not rare if...
It’s easy to complain when a chess player loses a winning game. Excuses like short on time, disturbing noise in the playing hall, fatigue, … are common. That situation is not exclusive of club...
One of the main goals in openings is piece development and beginners know about it early on. There are sharp openings where delaying development soon drives to inferior positions and the Sicilian Defence is...
Books about chess openings usually provide many variations and sometimes few comments. Good chess books are those which give variations together with explanations of why those moves are played. When the reader sees long...
The same trap motif can appear in different openings. Sometimes the pattern is difficult to discover and then even great masters fall into the trap. Do you remember the “Elephant Trap”? In today example...
When beginners start learning chess, their coaches repeat “develop your pieces”. That is a fundamental rule in chess openings. Another universal principle in chess is: “Every rule has exceptions”. Although they seem to conflict,...
A difficult part of the game of chess is the precise and objective evaluation of positions. This is especially critical in complicated positions with many options for both sides. Factors influencing the process of...
