positional - tag
Strategy and positional concepts are an important part of the chess game and improving our understanding of them can play a major role in the overall improvement of our level. Most of the time, the strategy is what makes the difference between a strong player and an amateur. If with other elements, such as tactics […]
Chess Improvement: Going serious at chess all by oneself is something truly admirable. It is unnecessary to say that chess is one of the most difficult things to master and every day it continues to become more difficult as the level of the players keeps rising. How to become better at chess? That is a […]
The strategy is a very important part of the chess game and, many times, slightly disregarded by club players, who usually like to attack and try to do it at any (positional) cost. If you are such a player and are thinking about giving strategy more thought, then the player we are going to present […]
Very often before a game, a player feels anxious about how to win his game against his respected opponent. Usually, this leads to spending too much time thinking about what opening he should use in order to achieve a considerable edge quickly and not suffer much to win. This kind of vicious cycle happens to […]
The English Grandmaster Michael Adams has been a reference player for the past 20 years in the sense that he has kept his position among the elite players. His playing style is very positional, always trying to squeeze the small advantages without taking many risks.
In today’s article, we will have a closer look at the use of open files in the middlegame. From the very early start of our chess learning, we are told that we must control any open file with our rooks, but as usual, it’s always easier said than done.
A good sacrifice is something that can completely change the evaluation of the position. It can save the game when you’re in trouble, or it can help you win when the positions are nearly equal. Most amateur chess players are afraid to sacrifice pieces because they don’t feel confident and don’t want to take any […]
It’s no surprise that the majority of chess players have trouble understanding and correctly interpreting the typical middlegame positions. Most chess players think that positional understanding is something that only the masters can effectively use to win games. This is quite an incorrect assumption. Any chess player can learn and effectively use the typical middlegame […]
Many openings, like the Alapin variation against the Sicilian, the Rubinstein (4.e3) versus the Nimzo Indian, the Panov Attack against the Caro Kan, have in common that, very often, white gets an isolated queen’s pawn in the middlegame and eventually, after exchanges, hanging pawns arise.
By pushing the pawns, weak squares are inevitably created in our position. It is very important to know how to correctly use and even create them in your opponent’s camp in order to win the game. Before moving further, we will first define what a weak square is – it is a square that can […]
