Learn the London System Opening with 1 d4 d5: In five simple stages

hi now I've been talking about doing an educational video for a while now so I thought I'd better get off my arse and actually do do one rather than just playing blitz and having a whale of a time and so this video here I'm going to try and simplify the London system which is a very interesting way of playing with the white pieces and I'm going to try simplify it into five easy to remember steps and this is an opening which only recently have I had some fun with and become acquainted with myself and I think it's a very good opening for a lot of players it's very easy to learn you can play it as white against everything so it doesn't matter what black plays you can play this opening against everything and I would say it's a great opening for the lazy players out there because you don't have to learn too much and I'm in this video I'm mainly concentrating on the London system with the moves d4 d5 and I've recently filmed a DVD of chess space which will be coming out sometime and that is a about a seven hour DVD on the London system so of course if you like this short video go and buy their Dave a day and but I want to just give you a little overview and there's only so much I could do in a YouTube video of course for a more in-depth look you've got to buy the DVD and now what is the London system well this is an opening that actually became popular I believe in something like 1923 sometime around that in a tournement in London and it was played by a lot of great players at the time and it's a setup you can play with the move 1.d4 against everything so that's great because against other open you know as white here black has a number of options you can play as a number of different openings he can play but generally the London system you can play against everything so you save a lot of work and but even though I say that after the work quite extensive work I did on the opening I came to the conclusion then the London system will have a look at a bit later you have slightly different setups against free options at black plays so in this first video we're just going to concentrate on setups with d4 d5 and I'm going to try to explain what you should be doing here with whites after these two moose now what else can black play against 1b form well the other move black can play is Knight to f6 and now my suggestion move is always Bishop f4 and here black can go for either a six c5 and these are kind of like Indian setups so we'll look at them in another video and also g6 and this is Kings Indian setups and Grunfeld setups so these are the three things you have to bear in mind when playing the London system that black can go d5 we're concentrating on that in this video but you can also do these g6 systems I'll look at that in another video and also ideas with a 6 and with c5 and these are the free sort of main ideas at black complain you just got to be aware to play slightly different against each of these of course you need to adapt your play to the circumstances but as I said d4 d5 is what I'm concentrating on in this video so what are we going to do okay well rule number one very simple very simple rule is lets us move on to it when you play the London system the preferred way I think you should play it is with d4 so we played that move taking stance in the center of the board and after this move d4 as you can see by rule 1 we should bring our bishop out so we played d 4 that's the stance and now after d5 bishop to f4 and this is this is the next key move and this is really the first thing to remember now why did you bring your bishop out here we're going to see why in a second in the next rule but this is where you put your bishop in the London system on quite an active diagonal and more importantly when we come to rule 2 which we come to now and which is we want to move our pawns to you free and see free so you get this pawn structure like this let me just highlight where you want to place your pawns I call it a pyramid the pyramid in the middle of the board when you create this pyramid well your Bishop on f4 this one here is outside of the pawn structure so let me just bring that rule number two and really against most moves now you know nearly every move you do the same setup so you don't have to worry about blacks options too much so rule to create a pyramid and this is the pyramid in the center of the board so you go see free and III this is your second rule create a pyramid with your pawns so it doesn't really matter what black plays here generally what we're caught you know black called play c5 Knight f6 z six something like this it doesn't really matter let's say he goes with shall we say Knight to f6 so let's create the pyramid and I generally prefer moving my EEP office and I think it's a matter of choice I prefer going III this gives me options in some cases moving the knight here but you don't do that I just want to create my pyramid so let's say III and now a main move here again it doesn't matter it matters about a move order but you don't need to be too panicked let's say black goes ecigs and this is the main thing we're concentrating here at some point we finish our pyramid with C free and you can see now we finish Rule two we've created our pyramid which is a very good base in the center of the board and hopefully now you can see why our Bishop is on the outside of the pyramid if you think of the bishop as like an an archer or a Raygun obviously if he's outside of the pyramid on top of the pyramid he has good chance to hit the enemy because he can aim those arrows or aim the Raygun at the enemy but if the bishop was inside the pyramid so let's put him back in one of these two squares but he's not going to do much damage if he's caught in the crypt as he's got to be outside of the pyramid that's why we place our Bishop here wall to done now let's say black plays move here like c5 this is one of the best moves because black needs to try to attack the center now one thing I really don't do here I really rarely move the pawn on d4 this is the top of your pyramid you want to keep it as such as they say the elite or the pyramid don't start capturing with this pawn because you'll destroy that the top of that pyramid so keep that pawn there so what's rule number three what a course in chess you need to bring your pieces out so how do you bring your pieces out rule number three develop your remaining minor pieces so this is the third rule I want you guys to remember and what I mean by that is your minor pieces are your knights and bishops this is a terminology we're using chess to describe your your knights and bishops your major pieces are your Queen and your rook and even your King but your minor pieces are your knights and bishops at the start of the game you need to bring these out now generally a little tip I have or explain why a bit later as soon as black plays e6 I think it's totally safe now to bring my knight on G one out but as are explained later on I don't play Knights we're free until Black has played ecig so only when black plays g6 do we play Knight to f3 this will be explained later on so the way we set up is by bringing our Knights out so let's say Knight to we're free Knight for example to c6 and now let's bring the other night out shall we Knight to d2 and here well blacks got two options we look at them both one by one black really needs to castle so he needs to develop this Bishop here does he move it to eise Evan or to d6 now personally I think the bishop should move to d6 but a lot of players will move it to 7 so let's have a look at this first and then to complete rule number three we've got one more minor piece to develop and our fantastic square for this piece is d3 a brilliant square because this bishop tucked in behind that top of the pyramid is your best attacking piece and it's striking down towards this h7 square which is a key key square and now let's just say that black castles and here we come on to rule number four and rule number four is depending this depends on what black plays so this depends whether the bishop goes to e7 or to d6 now if the bishop goes to e7 we go with our first rule here Knight to e5 so against the bishop kind to this square we go Knight to e5 so let's have a look at this first then I notice videos a lot to take in I'm trying to make it as simple as I can as as well as comprehensive now against Bishop to e7 we go Knight to e5 so let's have a look at this one first and this is a key move in the London system and this is a move that really helps us generate a brilliant attack one thing I think you should always do really against Bishop e7 is delay castling do not castle because we want to use our pawns to create an attack and our rook is best on h1 as we shortly see it's quite funny because I know a lot of people are commentating when I spoke about London's system I said I warring opening why are you an aggressive player doing a DVD on a boring opening now I don't think that's true I think you can make nearly any opening what you want it to become you can make the London system interesting trust me you can in a DVD for chess paste the first five games I'll include all include peace sacrifices from white so you can make any opening interesting like you can make this like you can make the English attacking you can make the Berlin oh no maybe not the Berlin okay let's forget about the Berlin but you can make things interesting and now after this idea what is the attacking plan I'm going to recommend well let's just say black plays a move like Bishop to d7 a key move here and a move I really like is h4 and this move sets up a vicious trap the other way you can play this position and a very another formatic move is the move the Queen around to h3 to increase the pressure at h7 this is another good way of playing God for example Queen f3 and I don't know what black will play here let's just say rook c8 Queen h3 and this is another very good way to play cuz you're increasing the pressure on this pawn and all you need to do now is remove the defender to create checkmate because you can't go Queen takes h7 at the moment you'll lose your Queen to Knight takes Queen but if we get rid of the defender a typical technique in chess maybe by going Bishop g5 taking that one off maybe by trying Knight to g4 then we can get a checkmating attack going let's just say for example I don't know let's make a move a 6 for example Knight g4 and we can see now that the pressure is building against H zone so this Queen f3 is a good idea but my favorite idea I love Harry I want Harry to join in h4 and the idea of this very aggressive move is twofold number one our Knight comes to g5 and this is the key idea and I notice is getting some depth but the other idea is we just want to go g4 g5 and you get some really fascinating positions now one thing to bear in mind if black takes on e5 with a knight we always go pawn takes e5 and after something like Knight to e8 we now see one of the key ideas of having h4 the rook on h1 and that is the strikingly dangerous move here Bishop takes h7 check this is a technique called the Greek gift and this is why I love having a pawn in H 4 for example King takes bishop queen comes in swooping in with a check the King has to go back and now we need to bring our reinforcements in and a key key typical idea Knight to f3 and the knight wants to come to g5 creating Queen to h7 checkmate and I've analyzed this kind of idea a bit and it looks to be pretty much winning for white for example Knight g5 is such a strong idea let's say f6 maybe looks like it stops Knight g5 oh no no it doesn't income the boys Knight to g5 and look how strong Harry Harry the H porn Dirty Harry the H pawn plays a key part and after while Queen h7 is going to be checkmate and if Black gets rid of that one we've sacrificed the second piece yes we have but we're now threatening stuff like Queen h7 and g6 checkmate or indeed just g6 straight away and Queen H a and this is an unstoppable checkmate position here black is helpless in it um so let's just have a think about that again I know I've gone a long way and I've gone in summon debt debt fear but I wanted to show you the potential that you have after Bishop e7 so if Bishop e7 and these setups let's go back to rule 4 against Bishop e7 you put your knight in to e5 so the knight comes in to e5 and this is rule number 4 so against Bishop e7 and when we develop our minor pieces the knight comes to e5 and this gives you great attacking chance it's brilliant now what if Bishop to d6 is played which I consider a better move now against this move we I don't think Knight to e5 is as good you can play this way but a problem is now black has better control over this important square he can aim to exchange off a number of pieces so I think the best way to play against Bishop d6 is simply to retreat your Bishop to g4 this is a key idea because if black ever takes on g3 you open up the H file with a very strong line against that h7 port blacks best move after this nice retreat it's like a Mexican standoff you can see them at dawn they've got their pistols out you got pistol on g3 and pistol shooter on d6 and they're waiting for one of them to strike first because when they do you're going to give away a bit of the position and in this position I think it's key to remember after let's say this is a key move by the way Bishop g3 worth remembering the Mexican standoff let's say black cause now we have Bishop D free and this is going back to rule free let's just bring that one up remember rule free develop your menthe minor pieces remaining minor pieces and here well there's a couple of options here but one of the main moves is b6 and I probably should have mentioned really against b6 my recommendation for you would now be efore I'm not going to go into too much details I'm trying to keep this video as simple as I can but this is a very good way to meet b6 this is a key way to meet the b6 move evil because if there's multiple exchanges on e4 then b6 has weakened this diagonal let's just have a look very quickly for example pawn takes e4 Knight takes let's say everything gets exchanged off and you can now see this is this is a bit of a problem for black so just the basic rule to remember and this is like quite high class stuff but if b6 you aim for evil this is the key thing okay now really I'm not going to over it you know go into too much but I do want to talk about the final rule and the final rule is be flexible with your move order and I'm going to explain now with some demos demonstrations of what different setups why this is important so the move order and the rules I've told you are basic rules but you've got to remember it's the game of chess and things change now for example one thing that a lot of players don't realize and the Lord plays still do and one of the biggest mistakes you can make in the London system is after the moose bishops where for now you might be wondering why don't I play Knight to f3 first and this is what a lot of people playing the London system play I'm going to tell you why and this is coming back to rule 5 be careful with your move order so let's say you play Knights we're free here and now one problem with this line is Knight to f6 to do the London system we have to move our Bishop here so we could also we could also let's just go back go Bishop f4 first and then after Knight to f6 go Knights we're free but this is kind of breaking rule 2 can you remember rule to create the pyramid because we have created the pyramids yet and the problem with this move order is black can now go c5 and if we create the pyramid now let's say with III Knight to c6 c3 the problem here is that black has a very good move which equalizes on the spot and remember with the white pieces you're aiming for a slight advantage you don't want to allow your opponent to get equality and that move is Queen to b6 and this is one move that so many London London defend London system players forget to to you know forget about and this is a really nasty move now as a rule against this I'm throwing more rules at you you want to meet this move with Queen to be free now you might be thinking our boring Queen exchange well if black ever takes on be free this is very pleasant yes the Queen's are exchanged but you have a nice Vantage you've got an open a file a nice compact pawn structure but the problem with this line is that black can place c4 and of course you don't want to exchange Queens because then we allow black to open up this line for his rook so the way we always meet c4 and this is another key thing I learnt is to go Queen c2 and given a chance we want to go be free and exchange off this seaport and we get a very nice system so black plays a bad movie let's say e six we now go be free and black really is forced to take on be free and this is the pawn structure we're aiming for white must be better here such a compact pawn structure later on you'll be playing c4 and this is this is a very nice system but the problem here is that black has a very good move Bishop to f5 and this move is a real problem because if we take that Bishop black has Queen takes b2 and we're losing because we're losing on poor little guy on a1 so what do we do against this idea well that's big that's the good question let's now be a bit more crafty and we come back to something I said earlier we only move our knight on G 1 when black plays a6 so let's say that black ties do the same thing let's create our pyramid first of all and now in rather than going night two we're free well okay so KX is play d6 so let's just try a different move or so let's say he goes Knight to f6 first we go III he goes c5 we go C free and now he goes Knight to c6 okay so let's look at this so he hasn't played the movie six yet so you've got to be careful moving this Knight if you go Knight to f3 black goes Queen b6 equal a simple way to avoid this is by moving the other night moving the knight on b1 and there's a key difference here and the key difference is if black tries the same thing with Queen b6 we now go Queen B free and if black now goes c4 the problem that we had previously we go Queen c2 and the whole point here is that black cannot play this very annoying move Bishop to f5 because we can simply take on f5 and if black takes on b2 our rook is not trapped it can move to b1 so we avoid that idea so that is a move order thing which is key to remember in the London system and the basic rule is just keeping it simple when black plays C six so soon as he plays e6 you can go Knight to f3 because then you don't have to worry about the bishop coming out but don't play that until he plays e6 this is the thing and if we go back to that last position let's just say we get this again now if black plays move like e6000 be free you play be free because after an exchange on be free you have a very nice compact good porn structure and this is this is a key thing to to remember now you know I could give you a number of examples of great attacking lines here and let's just see some other I mean again let's just see some of this in action shall we some of the things I discuss so and we go through it one more time just for you know for the the rules very quickly so rule one is to run fruit start with d4 and Bishop f4 so Bishop f4 now comes and let's say black plays Knight to f6 stand and move what's rule to rule to create a pyramid so here we go III and after let's say c5 it doesn't matter so much we go c3 so he creates a pyramid now remember if the knight comes out it hasn't gone e6 so let's go to the next rule we need to develop your remaining knights and bishops so here he hasn't gone any six so it's better to go Knight d2 first and at some point if you ever moves the bishop out too early well there's a problem then you can go Queen b3 so e six is certainly the move you encounter and the majority times the love and of course there's only a quick youtube video I can't cover everything you know go to my chess base DVD for a more in-depth look at this if you want to learn the opening properly I'm just trying to give you some nice and easy to learn as white okay so now we need to develop our pieces he's gone e6 so we can now move on light out and now if Bishop e7 we go eventually for a knight apply man ie five let's move the bishop out first castles Knight e5 and here there's two attacking plans one bring the Queen around to H free and my other favorites attacking plan here is to go h4 which sets up some deadly ideas and really nice ideas here now and if Bishop d6 here what you do now we remember it's a Mexican standoff so you need to do something about your bishop you should retreat your Bishop to g4 II hoping he will capture so you open up your rook better thing to castle and now you complete your development Bishop d3 and here if b6 the key thing is as soon as b6 you go e4 now if black doesn't go b6 is a very funny trick here which I've seen if Queen e7 well we can actually go back to the other plan and this is rule for now so you have to be flexible as we see in rule 5 but you have to either remember to play your knight into the center or to play your porn into the center and it depends on the situation so this is rule 4 so here is either Knight into the center or Eve or what do you think is correct it what he hasn't gone b6 now so I think here Knight into e5 is is the best move and this goes to rule five you have to be flexible and giving you basic rules here but you have to flip those rules depending on the situation and there's a lovely trick here and the trick a trick I just wanted to show you one more thing which a lot of grandmasters falling for let's say that black fights for control of the e5 square because this Knight is a real pain and we can even go pawn to f4 next move to gain more control over this square here it's a bit like a reversed Stonewall touch now a lot of grandmasters have played Knight to d7 here and now I'm going to show you another example of the Greek gift which we saw previously there's a great idea here amazing idea Knight takes D seven now black will generally take with a bishop to defend this to get his Bishop out and it looks like black should be absolutely fine here but black is probably on the verge of losing because we can go Bishop takes d6 Queen takes d6 and now we take on c5 and the whole point of all these exchanges is that we've made the Queen move to this square and here there's a devastating idea Bishop takes h7 check boom and again after King takes we now come with a combination of Queen and Knight Queen to h5 check the King has to retreat and we see now the real reason why the queen is on c5 Knight to e4 a devastating trick this one and if black takes the knight we win the Queen and we win the game and when black moves the Queen on Knight comes into this square on g5 threatening Queen to h7 checkmate and this position is winning for white again I'm not going to go into too much detail but I just want to show you again who says the London system is boring look at this line it's another example of the London system kicking some butt and okay look I'm going to leave it there and I hope that gives you a little bit of a only a very basic eye opener to an opening and of course when you're playing chess it you know it's a really tough game and you know if you're a beginner this is aimed at beginners upwards a little bit and to give you a little taster for the London system and I hope I hope it gives you you know an idea that you might want to go out and play it now and really we're just concentrated on this video remember there's free setups that black can play which I discussed but in this video we've just concentrated on the way to play the London system against d4 d5 and I've hope I've simplified things as much as I'm able to and give you a little taster I remember if you want anything more detailed about these openings buy my DVDs go to ginger gem calm I've got a selection of tutorial dvds and in those DVDs I go into great depth about everything you need to know so a lot of detail and also the overviews also you can check out my DVDs I've done for chess space this one on the london system will be a chess based DVD go to their website buy those DVDs anything to support me would be great but anyway I hope you enjoyed that video if you did please like please subscribe please share please play the London system and I'll be back again with the other parts of this at some point in the in future thanks for watching

Channel: GingerGM

Views: 498,269

Keywords: chess, gingergm, gingergm chess, simon williams chess, chess.com, london system, london system chess opening, opening in five stages, chess opening, learn a chess opening, chess lesson, chess video, play chess, chess trap, best chess trap, chess explained, chess tricks to win fast, hutch chess, learn chess, best chess lesson, great chess lesson, how to play chess, chess openings, grandmaster chess lesson

Id: LDU83nDqCUc

Length: 27min 52sec (1672 seconds)

Published: Fri Dec 02 2016