knight on the rim

Studying middlegames and understanding the most important positional motifs is one of the keys to improvement for every club player. While many young players put a great accent on the opening preparation nowadays, the difference between an experienced chess player and an aficionado is most of the times felt during the middlegame and endgame.

It is usually more difficult to get away with a positional mistake when facing stronger opposition and, in order to avoid this, we advise you to take into account a few things during your game.

Today, I have decided to come up with a few examples on the topic that are very challenging for any chess player—even of the highest level. This is primarily because it’s totally counterintuitive, namely using your king in the middlegame while the battle is in full swing.

It’s difficult because the first thing we learn about chess is that the king should be kept safe. Then, as we mature and improve our game, we learn that, in the endgame, the role of the king increases: it can be an active piece, even one of the most active. So, how to use the king in the middlegame?

Today, I would like to discuss a topic, which in my opinion, is an important and interesting one, yet hasn’t been covered extensively in chess literature. How can sacrifices be used for a successful defense? Often, we cannot hope to survive an opponent’s attack by means of normal defensive moves that improve our pieces slowly or deal with their threats convincingly enough.

We all know the “normal” situation when the dominating knight is humiliating the poor bishop.

Here is a “pure” example with only the relevant pieces on the board.

However, in chess, as in life, things are rarely this simple. In the course of my career, I have discovered quite a few situations when the “bad” bishop wasn’t that bad after all.

Let’s get started!

If you are a Sicilian player, you are probably already familiar with this structure that is primarily employed by white against systems such as the Accelerated Dragon or the Hedgehog. It is characterized by the presence of white pawns on e4 and c4, set-up that aims to restrict black’s typical freeing rupture, d6(d7)-d5.

White’s usual plan is to control the center, keep black in a passive position and restrict his counterplay by keeping covered the possible pawn ruptures he is aiming for. However, this system is not without dangers for white, as black has a few interesting plans to choose from.

Pawn moves are of extreme importance in chess; from the opening stage to the endgame, pawn moves can change the character of the position and that’s often the case. In this article, we are going to talk about ruptures. The pawn ruptures usually allow us to clear squares for our pieces, to drive our opponent’s pieces back or simply to take over the initiative by creating tension and chaos.

These pawn moves are not at all easy to see, and sometimes even more difficult to play, but as every theme in chess, there are patterns that we can learn, remember and execute when the opportunity arises. Ruptures are similar to the commonly denominated “hooks”.

The Carlsbad structure, arising after the exchange of White’s c-pawn for Black’s e-pawn, most commonly from the Exchange Variation in the Queen’s Gambit Declined – 1 d4 d5 2 c4 e6 3 Nc3 Nf6 (or 3…Be7) 4 cd ed – is one of the most characteristic structures in modern chess.

The Queen’s Gambit Declined is one of the most popular openings in chess history and “an opening for World Championship matches” (Kasparov). The Exchange Variation, which introduces the Carlsbad structure, has proven to be very rich in strategic content for both sides.

It seems that nowadays it has become more and more difficult to win an “easy” game. Every opponent, no matter how low rated, has a fair amount of opening knowledge and short wins have become something almost nonexistent. There is plenty of information that can be easily accessed by anyone and, with the rise of the engines, all the opening lines can be checked and improved by anyone who wants to create a good repertoire.

The real fight is almost always seen in the middlegame and endgame. It is usually here where the more experienced player shows a better understanding of the position and gets to “trick” his opponent and obtain some advantage. In fact, one of the most common things I hear from my students once they reach middlegame is “I didn’t know what to do in this position”.

Every chess player knows how important the center is. It is one of the first things teachers tell their students – you must control the center at every moment and occupy it with either pieces or pawns. It is what we try to do right from the opening – develop the pieces toward the center and take as much space as possible. A powerful center can indeed represent a great advantage during a game; it gives us space and usually more active. A piece placed on a central square and supported by pawns can pose real problems to our opponent.

Probably one of the most difficult concepts for a chess player to understand when he is trying to improve is how to correctly make a plan. We have been told from early beginnings that every move we make should have an idea and a chaotic play leads -nowhere. There is even a famous saying, “having a bad plan is better than having no plan at all” – Garry Kasparov.

We are hence shown how to assess a position and how the process of selecting a proper plan should develop. However, as we advance and our level gets higher, we are confronted with more complex positions where the best moves may not be that obvious anymore.