Game Spotlight: The Immortal Outpost Game

At some point when you learn Chess, tactics are no longer enough and you need to learn something about positional play.  Invariably, the idea of outposts is one of the first of these new concepts you’ll run across.  I don’t want to rehash everything about outposts here, as most of that can be found pretty readily.  Instead, the point I want to make is that while many intermediate and club level players know what an outpost is, they tend to have issues with using one effectively.

The key missing ingredient tends to be patience.  I’ve seen many players occupy an outpost too soon, allowing a piece trade on the outpost square, recapturing with a pawn so the outpost disappears.  Or players occupy an outpost and immediately choose to trade the piece off.  Have patience.  An outpost is a long-term asset.  This week’s game will show you how to maintain an outpost, and how to use it to set up a winning attack.

If you appreciate games from former World Champions like this one, this is the month for you.  To celebrate the World Championship match between Magnus Carlsen and Fabiano Caruana, every Saturday in November we’ll be presenting a game from a past World Championship match.  This week, we’ll see how Steinitz beat Zukertort to become the first official World Champion.  And whenever a game happens on Saturday, we’ll be watching it live.  Come join us for the festivities.

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