King's Arena online bullet tournament

Attended and streamed the 2 hour long online tournement on chess.com. Taking into account my lag, the result was not so bad☺ And the games were quite interesting!


You can see the results and final standings here -
https://www.chess.com/tournament/live/arena/arena-kings-10-week-1-63015?players=3?ref_id=26489968
And here is the video -

Catalan opening in Carlsen vs Karjakin, St Louis 2018, answering student's question

Q: Black has just played 8......Nc6 giving himself temporarily a tripled c pawn in return for the exchange of White's Bishop on g2. This move looks very anti-positional.The previous Black move 7....dxc4 looks bad for Black as well as 8.....Nc6.

Could you please comment about these two strange Black moves.

A:That's a nice question! Yes, these moves by Black do look weird at first glance. But they also have positional background, even that executed in a very dynamic way. First we can have a look at the capture dxc4. This is the case when Black is already developed rather well, casled etc, and now he can consider this capture, because it opens the file D to his Queen, which already makes a direct pressure on centre and keeps d4 at sight. Then Black usually hopes to do something like c5 in these schemes, with even more pressure there. And Nc6 has a similar idea - a clear one - to put more pressure on centre, and also the file b opens after the exchange, and Rook can take it someday; and one more important point - Black gets a chance to sac the extra pawn he has now back but to obtain activity and dynamic in exchange. In this case this can be an exchange of one of the most active White pieces - either Bishop g2 or Knight e5. And if White accepts it, then his position instead of a typical solid Catalan-like positions can go in another direction. And for the tripled pawns he has a compensation like open b and d files with views of pressure on important pawns there, and White can get busy defending those and can lose in general mobility of pieces and simply have no time to hunt for the tripled pawns comfortably.

Answering a student's question

Q:
Could I ask you about this position (Danis v Skora Corr 1977)?

In this variation of Black's 21-st move, White has just played 25. g3! Why has the annotator has given this an exclamation mark? What is the idea behind this move( if 25.Kc7 then 26.h4 h6 and still W cannot get control of f4 for his Queen)?This plan is slow and will fail for White.

A:

Here it just looks like some missplelling or a typo. I guess that the move was Qg3!!  there,  with irrefutable kingatack, and not g3. Also White is a piece down here, and g3 is just useless there, it looks like he had sacrificed a piece previously somewhere in order to obtain this opportunity of King-attack with Qg3. A nice position and example, indeed☺

Answering student's question on French Defense

The French Defense Question:

If the opening goes :

1. e4 e6 2. d4 d5  3 Nc3 Nf6  4. e5 Nfd7  5 Qh5 c5  6.Nf3 ( with  the threat of the dangerous 7. Ng5 )

How does Black refute White's premature  5 Qh5?


The answer:

Against the 1. e4 e6 2. d4 d5 3. Nc3 Nf6 4. e5 Nfd7

5. Qh5 c5 6. Nf3 it can be simply g6, and now White fails to coordinate his Queen and Knight in time to attack f7. 

7. Qg4 cxd4 8. Nxd4 Nxe5

9. Qg3 Bg7 g6 is also a place for the Bishop to be fianchetted and make pressure on centre. 

10. Bf4 Nbc6 11. Nxc6 Nxc6 12. for example Bd6, to try to delay the castle;  a6

13. O-O-O Ne7 theratening Nf5 and at the same time insisting in castle. 14. Ba3 O-O 15. h4 h5 16. Ne4 Nf5

17. Qh2 Qb6 18. Bxf8 Bxb2+ 19. Kd2 dxe4 with winning position for Black.

Answering a student's opening question

Q:
Could I ask you about a Queens Gambit Declined opening query?

What is the best reply for White if Black plays the antipositional move 5..... dxc4?

If White replies with 6. Qa4+ followed by 7.Qxc4 , doesn't this cause the white Queen to be exposed to attack by the Black pieces later on losing tempi?

I would be glad of your comments please.

A:

Yes, here in this position the most optimal seems the refrained 6.e3. Dxc4 by Black in this case makes some sense, because in this situation it is not just giving the centre up, but since he has already a pawn on c5 too, which is making a pressure on d4, the move dxc4 is helping him to open a way to Queen from d8, for more pressure on d4. As to Qa4, - right, sometimes in such cases the Queen can become an object of attack by minor pieces. In Queen's Gambit on a move number 2 let's say 1.d4 d5 2.c4 dc, 3.Qa4 is also not the best because of that reason, and White prefers to take the pawn back with minor pieces instead, like after e3 or e4 with Bishop. It depends concretely, sometimes Qa4 is best and sometimes some other ways to take the pawn back are better. Here too - the Qa4 may be playable, but taking the pawn with Bishop instead of Queen would be preferable, especially that the position is getting open and there are dangers for the Queen in the centre of the board. 

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A question on Spanish game which I get quite frequently from my students

Avebakh vs Smyslov, Zurich 1953

Q:

White has just played 9. h3 to prevent  9......Bg4.

What if  Black played this move earlier( before castling) - 8......Bg4 instead of 8.....O-O? Then how does White go about to get rid of this troublesome pin? Is it by 9.h3 followed by 10.d3 followed by Nbd2 , Nf1 , Ng3?

A:

All the key idea to undertand it is that the pin  Bg4 in this case is dangerous only in case White makes the move d4 (then the Bg4 does there a concrete job - takes part in the pressure against the d4 pawn and White's centre at the same time). 

Thus it becomes clear too that White makes this move h3 because he wants to continue with d4, which he usually makes there on a following move.

And when the pawn in not moved yet to d4, or just to d3, then Bg4 makes much less sense, and on the contrary Black usually avoids making this pin, because the Bishop itself can become an object of attack there, and will be at a risk either to be exchanged for the Nf3 (which means a loss of Bishop pair for Black and weakening a complex of important light squares around his Kingside), or to retreat via h5 to g6, where it often turns out to be more like a burden when it comes to defense of Kingside rather than a help, and especially when the pawn e4 will be protected by another pawn d3 it may be very limited on that diagonal, unlike in case the pawn is already moved to d4 (then the e4 one can become a target for the Bishop on g6 and the whole diagonal is much more open). And also White can make his pawns rolling on Black's Kingside by means of g4-h4-h5 while driving the Bishop away this way. 

And right, the right plan against this pin is the normal development for this scheme by means of d3,  Nd2-f1-g3, h3 (or in some cases h3 can be made earlier too), and this is the case the Bishop already finds itself in an awkward position;  the square h5 is not that convenient for it  anymore because of the Knight standing on g3. That's it.