The Shirov Attack in the Advance Caro-Kann | Chess Openings Explained

[Music] well hello and welcome to chess openings explains I'm Caleb Denby and today I'll be taking you through a line in the advanced caroon so this is going to be the Shir of attack so uh this game was played between hakaru Nakamura and E barv way back in 2007 so back when hakaru was young and full of fire so the game of course opens up E4 C6 D4 D5 so we have the kocan and then white opts for the advanc variation so now these days uh a lot of people are trying out uh this move directly on move three which uh for a while that wasn't uh the most played move by far the most played move was Bishop F5 because after C5 uh black has to make sure that he can uh justify spending two moves playing C6 and then right after C5 instead of playing it in just one move and that can sometimes be difficult for him so the most played move is Bishop F5 and after Knight C3 we're entering the Shira variation so this move seems a little strange right because when you have this Pawn structure sometimes you want to play C3 to support your pawns and a lot of times in the Caro you end up playing C4 to break down this D5 pawn and this Advanced line but uh White has a very good purpose for playing Knight to C3 which we'll find out soon so after E6 uh White's next move might surprise you if you're not too familiar with this opening so what white wants to do now that black has committed to E6 is take advantage of of Black's Bishop so in a different line of the kocon which you reach from playing Knight to C3 on this move uh just Defending Your Pawn so D takes E4 Knight takes E4 Bishop F5 Knight G3 so already you're attacking this bishop and then here white plays H4 trying to trap the bishop and take advantage of Black's uh early placement of it so black usually has to play like H6 and after something like Knight F3 Knight D7 H5 Bishop H7 that's the other line that's the classical variation of the carot but here obviously it's a little different because now if you play H4 uh black might just respond H5 instead and I mean the the pawn structure is different and you don't have a knight on G3 so everything is changed so in this case white actually starts with a move G4 driving the bishop back to G6 so now if white uh boldly continues with H4 what might black do to stop White's attack right in its tracks right off the bat H yeah H5 so why is this move so good you gain SP right it's giving it's giving your Bishop a square you're getting space on the king's side and more importantly it's going to force white to make a decision so if white decides okay I don't want to trade my G Pawn for your H Pawn I'm just going to push forward he gives up a very important square and you guys know what square that is hm uh well this square is not so important right and you haven't really given it up because F3 at some point can defend G4 even though like that move looks very terrible but Black's not trying to make use of the G4 square but especially in French structures and Caro structures the square is always very very important F5 yeah F5 so before G5 on G4 you're attacking F5 and White's future plan was to play F4 F5 shutting out out this bishop and attacking Black's weaknesses but after G5 uh something like Knight to E7 controlling the E5 square and white is never going to be able to break through so how can white prepare this move H4 so what can white do to make Black's H5 less effective but okay let's take a look at this position uh let me get rid of these arrows for you oh I've just added more okay so what piece would white like to have supporting this this structure and where would you like to have it the Knight yeah so this Knight and where's the best Square for it6 F6 well that's a little ambitious but uh a more attainable goal might be F4 right so if this Knight could get to F4 here it would attack this bishop in this Pawn simultaneously so black wouldn't really be able to take because after Knight takes G6 you'd have triple isolated G pawns which is never really anyone's favorite structure so because of this white plays Knight G2 here so today we're going to be going over Black's most popular response which is C5 in the past black has tried moves like F6 and Knight E7 here but uh by far the most well respected move is C5 so that's what we're going to stick with so now after H4 black still responds H5 and then uh what was white idea with Knight G2 right so we're going to continue with Knight F4 so now like I said H takes G6 would not be very good right because after takes takes and takes Black's just losing just immediately so black does have to solve the problem of this bishop so what can he do to prevent Knight takes G6 from winning the game it's not the most natural move H yeah that's right so we're just going to come back to H7 but what's the drawback with this move yeah that's one and so that leaves the H pawn attack twice and defended zero times so white can actually just take it so black has gamed his H Pawn to give his Bishop some safety and in the future Black's hoping to take advantage of these weaknesses that he's made as well as some holes in his camp and especially Strike Back in the center which white is neglected by pushing over on the king's side so that's actually an old uh adage in chess when your opponent attacks on the flank you want to respond in the center so that's what Black's going to try to do he's going to try to use his Central pawns to play so after Knight takes H5 uh Knight to C6 is what barv decided to play and now how can white continue so Black's making quite a big threat here right so we might have to respond to it E3 so yeah Bishop E3 is one idea but uh after C takes D4 you really don't want to take back and end up with something like this because uh well maybe black wouldn't commit to taking back a second time but uh this e Pawn's just going to be weak and your Bishop really doesn't want to be on D4 it'd much rather be on G5 or and one funny line even H6 the bishop travels to and on D4 it's really not supporting your attack at all I think actually Bishop E3 might be playable though I think that might be a a move in this position but most common is what Nakamura chose which is D Tak C5 so giving keeping options for this bishop open along this C1 H6 diagonal so black recaptures and here white actually plays Bishop to B5 so uh black obviously can no longer take this Pawn because he's pinned to the king and uh you might be wondering what happens if white takes a free Pawn so how might black respond to this because taking a pawn with check does seem kind of tempting so yeah King f8 and then the point is yeah after something like Knight H5 this Pawn is simply going to fall so Knight Tak G7 might seem as though it comes with Tempo but after King f8 you're going to have to move your knight back so you lose the tempo again so instead white goes with Bishop B5 defending his pawn and here black plays the U first move that's not so popular so more often uh you'll see black play Queen to C7 here simply defending the Knight and attacking the pawn again but uh after D4 this leaves white with some options so rather than just moving the Knight away uh Nakamura found a move that was uh much better actually right Queen F3 is the idea and Nakamura first chose to uh take on C6 I believe followed by Queen F3 so what is the idea on D take C3 uh right so after DT C3 what did you want to play yeah sorry I was I have Queen takes F7 I'm not so sure that's defended twice right but yeah queen queen C6 is the idea so here you're going to have to give up your Bishop with with check even because you can't block because it hangs The Rook so you'll have to play like King f8 and then just Queen C5 and you're just totally lost so you can't take this Knight so black decided that his best course of action was to just defend his Pawn with Queen to D7 and here Nakamura did not play the best move Nakamura chose to play Knight to E4 which I mean this move is fine it maintains an advantage for white but uh what could be a better move here it's not natural at all and I'll be very impressed if you guys manage to find it which move is Knight B5 good knight B5 hm I didn't consider Knight B5 but I don't think that's really making any significant threats right just maybe Rook B8 obviously I can't take it but Rook B8 could uh just solve my problems and you'll have to move your knight again the idea is to sacrifice this Knight so what can we do uh that uh makes a bigger threat than uh dtes C3 well actually it doesn't even all right this is a little too difficult but I I think I'll just give you the move so it's Bishop G5 here which you might be thinking well what does that do at all what if I just take the take the Knight which is actually Black's best move so here the idea is Rook to D1 well actually we'll we'll take on G7 first I apologize and then Rook to D1 so now you have some serious problems so do you know what happens if you move the queen away what's White's threat Knight yeah Knight takes E6 so if Queen B7 for example Knight takes E6 King E8 and Knight takes C5 and as black is just completely losing like you can't defend this position uh something like Queen C7 and just even Rook to D7 will end the game so you can't move the queen away this much you can't do so instead black plays C takes B2 which is kind of a funny move just leaving the queen completely hanging so on Rook takes D7 Black's plan is to just make a new Queen out with the old and with the new right so how can white uh keep the initiative going continue making threats cuz right now your Knight's hanging and you're down a piece so you definitely need to play quickly here right if you take the queen right uh so B1 equals Queen and what's the plan here Rook to D1 all right and what if I play Bishop B4 check I think King E2 all right so Queen takes A2 Knight takes E6 well I've just I've defended that yeah so yeah this is what Black's hoping for so instead of taking the queen just castle that's right so if you just Castle here then again you're threatening to take the queen and you're threatening Knight to E6 and your other Rook will defend on B1 so the line you have to calculate though which might be a little confusing is B1 equals Queen here so how can white just win after this which Queen do you take for example yeah you just take on D7 so uh at first glance you might be thinking oh well Black's winning a rook or something but yeah this is just over once you move the queen away or take on F1 m is just Unstoppable on F7 so that won't work so yeah now black is just losing because you can't stop all of these threats at the same time so best is to actually play Bishop to E4 to distract the queen and then moving the queen away and you get some position where uh now white actually does have to save the Knight but he's won a pawn I think yeah he's white is up one Pawn this Pawn on B2 is probably going to fall and Black's going to have to work very very hard to get these pieces into the game and keep his King safe so this is just uh completely winning but I won't go any deeper into this line because this didn't actually happen in the game so after Queen to D7 and instead of going for this kind of insane sacrifice uh Nakamura as I said just played the com Knight to E4 so here Bishop B4 check was played Bishop D2 was played and Bishop takes C4 was played so Nakamura just recaptured but again he missed a chance to uh better his position what could he just take on G7 that's what I was thinking so Knight takes G7 just wins a pawn yeah and uh if King f8 Bishop takes yeah Bishop takes B4 with check oh sorry sorry sorry first we're going to play Knight takes E6 so Queen takes C6 Bishop takes B4 check King to somewhere King E8 and queen takes E4 so for the moment white is just up uh well one one two three pawns and black has really nothing to show for it so I'm not sure why Nakamura didn't go for this line maybe it was a rapid game he just didn't see it but instead he chose the Lesser Queen takes E4 so after some more moves uh Rook to D1 Rook ad D1 trying to kingside cast or queen side castle by hands and uh the game just continued and eventually I'll stop here for example uh because the opening is pretty much over and uh White is just up a clean Pawn out of the opening and Nakamura did eventually go on to convert this but uh yeah this was an example of white holding on to this H5 Pawn he took a long time ago and Black's Central play not really getting him enough but yeah Nakamura did have to work very hard to convert this so one of those other lines might have worked better so just a recap what happened in this game was um after black played D4 here it allowed this nice tactic with Queen F3 and that's when the rest of the tactics started to flow so black definitely should have continued with Queen to C7 so you might be curious um now that we know that H5 is losing a pawn what if black opts for H6 instead so that's the game we're going to go over next if I can just pull it up here it's not a game I just showed some of the line all right so here uh we start off the same of course and after H4 Black Ops for H6 so this used to be the most popular variation like in the 1980s when the shirov line was actually very popular uh black was always playing H6 instead of H5 because of course that H5 line looks pretty frightening just giving up a pawn in the initiative so here White's going to continue with Bishop to E3 trying to combat Black's Central play by threatening to just take a pawn so black plays Knight C6 and white goes ahead and takes on C5 and you might be thinking well what about C takes D4 and I don't think this is so good for black after something like Knight takes D4 when F4 F5 is coming very soon and Black's uh especially since black hasn't played H5 so this G Pawn can stay here to support the pawn so white and black instead goes for Knight to C6 and after d takes C5 Knight takes E5 uh Knight to F4 Bishop H7 just more developing moves like Bishop E5 Knight back to C6 and queen to E2 so setting up some threats along this file maybe some sacrifices and after something like Knight G to E7 and queen side castles black actually has a very difficult time getting developed so I think lines like these are why this uh H6 line has fallen out of favor because black simply can't get his pieces out uh so you might be thinking well it's not so difficult to get your pieces out you just play something like Knight to G6 trade off the knights and you're totally fine but unfortunately you can't play Knight to G6 because of the sacrifice so how might white continue from here to uh make good on his sacrifice yeah just Bishop to G5 uh well actually we're going to insert H5 first but Bishop to G5 is the same idea I think it probably transposes well actually Bishop F4 instead but it's the it's all the same idea you're just going to open the eile and put your pieces to attack this poor Knight and yeah black really can't defend against this and the game is just going to end shortly so because of this uh the few times this has been played Black opted for something like Queen A5 instead and after some funny moves such as like Bishop D2 or Rook to D or sorry not Rook to D3 or Rook to H3 uh White scores very well so this is partly why H6 isn't played anymore because it just gives white to free of a hands to uh do whatever he wants in the center keep his kingside play and get his pieces out while black is very constricted all right so moving along uh we'll look at another line where uh black simply goes wrong very quickly so it starts off all the same and here after H4 instead of trying H5 right away which is the main line or H6 which is the old line uh black instead decided to insert this move C takes D4 so this is like the third most popular uh move for black after H5 and H6 so white simply recaptures and now after H5 uh the fun begins so how can white keep uh his Pawn breaks in play now that black has attacked his pivotal G Pawn because remember we really don't want to play G5 and give up this F5 Square to Black and we really don't want to play G takes H5 because simply Bishop takes H5 and black is doing fine uh Bishop to B5 and black will simply play Knight to D7 yeah Knight to C6 is no good but Knight D7 should be okay F4 the idea that's right so black uh White's just going to ignore this threat and continue with F4 so after G takes or H takes G4 of course black White's just going to continue with F5 oh sorry first we're going to throw in this move that you suggested which is Bishop B5 just to put the Knight on the Square and now we're going to continue with F5 so you might be thinking well White's gone insane he's simply hanging all his pawns and you might be right because black can actually insert this move so now what would happen on F takes G6 of course is Rook takes H1 and if you play Rook takes H4 black can recapture with check so White's best move is to just simply move the Rook away continue sorting uh supporting this F Pawn and then Black's best play is to just capture white sacrifices so now what was the point of F5 how does white continue here because you really have something to prove now yeah E6 is Right giving up a fourth Pawn out of the opening so of course black will play F takes C6 right Knight takes C6 is the natural move and it's actually been played quite a few times but uh perhaps a little bit better is Queen to E2 and I'll explain why in a minute so after Knight takes E6 Queen to E7 uh Queen to E2 black has a very nice defensive move here which is just simply Knight to F6 ignoring everything so of course white has made a threat and what was that threat yeah just Knight to C7 foring King and Rook so white will accept the Rook and black will hide his King away but after Knight takes A8 and Knight to E5 it's actually not so clear because White's Knight his traps and black has some very dangerous kingside pawns so play might continue something like Bishop to F4 Knight to F3 check King to D1 and uh black has ideas of playing something like H5 or Bishop H5 Knight to E4 and G3 and uh this is a little bit unclear black certainly has some play here which uh White of course should be better being up a full Rook but uh it's definitely uh going to take some technique so a better line for white might be Queen to E2 right away so black will try to transpose by playing Queen to E7 to just defend this pawn and now White's uh White's Zinger really comes in here so what can white play to distract the queen from the defense of this Pawn this is the pivotal move yeah that's right just Bishop G5 giving up the piece so of course if you play something like Knight G to F6 uh I will just take your rook and we get a similar position as to uh when the Knight took on A8 where white has a rook in exchange for all of these pawns but uh this one is quite a bit better for white because first of all we don't have a knight out of Play Sitting on A8 and we still have plenty of threats along E6 and D5 and I don't think black's pawns are going to be enough here so black is obliged to accept the sacrifice and then how do we continue well not quite Yep this square right so uh that's yeah that's a very good idea but it's not quite the right move because if we take right away uh what is Black's defense here yeah just Queen to E7 when your queen is pinned to your king and Black's going to be escaping so you can win this piece of course right away but you're just winning your piece back because remember we sacrificed a bishop on G5 so this isn't going to be enough for white when you've already sacrificed all of these three pawns yeah Bishop takes first so this draws the king out so when you take on E6 uh black is forced to move his King again and doesn't have time for Queen to E7 so King to d8 is the only reasonable Square for black and of course white continues by taking on D5 so King to E8 is actually the only reasonable Square for black because uh can anyone find the win after King to C8 G Queen takes G8 uh not quite Queen takes G8 might be an okay move but uh it gives time for black to uh sort out his issues I think so something like Queen to E7 check again might be played when after say King to D1 and Bishop F7 White's lost his Queen so you would have to actually just go in for this end game here I think instead of King to D1 you would have to play Queen to E6 here just to trade Queens which we definitely don't want with Black's King so exposed uh Knight to E6 here that move might win but uh que E3 Che he does have Queen E3 check and then there are some complications so simplest is just Queen to E6 when after King to B8 uh Queen to E5 check and after King to C8 now the point is Knight to E6 when we have Queen C7 and queen to E3 check is defended and black really can't stop this if you try to play like Queen E7 I think just Queens side castles and there are too many threats for your queen to handle coming in on d8 and C7 along the dark squares so black instead goes King to E8 and we actually throw in one more check and after the King goes to F7 how does white justify sacrificing all these pieces because if we're not careful uh Black's going to develop this Knight and hide his King over on h8 behinds all of his pieces Queen D7 well that might uh fall into some of the stuff I was just talking about I think I would have to block with my knight uh Queen D5 straight away uh yeah that seems reasonable I think it might actually just end up repeating after King to E8 because we actually just came from uh this position right so simply Knight takes F5 when uh if something like Knight to F6 the point is6 yeah Knight to D6 check with a discovered attack on the queen so black is forced actually to give up his Queen after Bishop F5 Rook F5 Queen F5 Queen F5 Knight F6 and after something like castles uh I know a lot of pieces were exchang there so let's do a quick count of the material uh we're even on Knights even on these Rooks so black has a rook and a bishop and one Pawn for the queen so this of course should actually be winning for White and the one time this was played in this correspondence game between Eduardo sagone and Horatio Daniel Daniel Daniel Danielle I don't know how to speak Spanish but uh Roa and uh White ended up converting this in the ends so I mean you can't really ask for much more out of the opening besides an extra Queen so let's look at a game where uh black does everything correctly so in this game black does all of the opening correctly and then only to find out that white still has quite a bit of play in the resulting middle game and you have to be very careful so of course we start the same way and after H4 Black Ops for H5 Knight Knight F4 Bishop H7 Knight takes H5 and here black plays Knight to C6 again Black's idea is to Counterattack in the center while white is busy on the king's side so whyatt continues with d takes C5 Bishop C5 Bishop B5 Queen to C7 so if you remember in the Nakamura game black played to d uh Pawn to D4 and got into a lot of trouble because of this queen to F3 move so Queen to C7 is definitely most played and Bishop takes C6 and black actually opts to recapture with the queen which again this is the main main line in this uh Shear of attack and after Queen to F3 uh doing his best to prevent this D4 push for the Moment by placing some pressure both along this way with Knight takes G7 and Knight takes E6 ideas like we saw and also uh keeping this queen just along this diagonal which could be a little weak so after King to f8 defending his G Pawn white opts to cast oh nope white plays Bishop G5 and after Rook to C8 white Ops to Castle King side so you might be thinking uh well this doesn't look so bad for black at all or you might be thinking well this looks terrible terrible for black I guess it just depends on your perspective but uh black does have a very convincing center with this D5 pawn and eventually he's going to push it to D4 and try to break through onto the c c 2 square and but uh his issues are all of these pieces it's going to be very difficult for him to get to get these pieces into play so white continues oh sorry black continues with D4 just trying right away to get everything he wants and here white plays Queen takes C6 Rook takes C6 so I'd say we're pretty much out of the opening here and we've gone into the middle game where uh White's trying to to keep these pieces restricted and uh use his pieces to do something useful in the meantime and Black's trying to break through onto C2 so here uh White played a very interesting move which I'm not going to ask you to find it because it's it's rather difficult maybe you there at home YouTube viewers can pause the video and try to find it but uh the problem is uh White doesn't really want to spend the time to move this Knight out of the way right now so instead he brings his Rook into the game so this is actually a very powerful idea so I'll ask you what happens on D takes C3 yeah Rook to d8 with oh excuse me with Checkmate actually so black of course cannot take this but uh he instead decided to try to develop his Knights to H6 and this was actually his losing move which is uh it seems very odd because uh it's just a natural developing move it's putting pressure on this Pawn but uh after this next line which is very convincing uh black just simply ends up in a much much worse position so what do you think the move is here well first let's let's Identify some of the uh well let's just identify what's going on so black would love to crash through with this Rook the only problem is there's a d Pawn in the way right so white needs to do his best to remove this D pawn and to do that he has to get rid of this bishop because this Bishop's uh just going to defend this Pawn until the end of its days yep Dennis Knight a yeah so just Knight A4 but now the problem is Bishop takes C2 with a fork so how does white justify allowing this Fork yeah so we'll start with Knight C5 and Bishop D1 H first yeah sorry we're going to check first I shouldn't have pressed forward but yeah so check first and now well let's check so if Rook takes D1 King takes D7 what's the material count down exch yeah you're just down in exchange so white wants a little more compensation than than just simply winning on D4 because after you take D4 black can actually run with his King to the queen side and uh you still have to solve this problem and you're probably going to give black time to solve his problems on G7 by playing something like F6 uh maybe sacrificing a pawn but getting rid of his weak Pawn in the process so we need something better than Rook to D1 here Knight G7 check uh you have the almost the right idea so we would like to take more pawns before we give up our Knight right because you know if you have a couple pawns for the exchange it's not so not so difficult but uh Knight G7 I think black can just take here and uh we get a similar position where uh We've simply done everything in a different order but yeah Mario has the right answer with Knight to F6 check so after takes and takes with check uh we're winning this G Pawn like you wanted to play uh but we're just doing it with check now so it's a little bit better so after sorry after King to f8 Rook to D1 and uh black has a lot of problems here first of all if we just do a quick count uh White has one Pawn for the exchange but really he has one Pawn a knight and a rook for the exchange because black really really can't get these pieces into play very easily and uh for example King to G7 trying to get the Rook into play Rook takes here and Rook to C8 and after Rook to D7 uh your pawns are beginning to fall so White's up to two pawns for the exchange because black had to sacrifice this D4 Pawn in order to get his Rook into the game and uh he's going to win a few more as we see so Knight to G8 again trying to get his pieces back into play so after Rook takes B7 Knight takes F6 G takes F6 King G6 uh we end up in this end game where white is going to be up something like three or four pawns for the exchange and hopefully white can convert this so in the game way way way way way better here black was like huh I don't like that end game for me so instead he played the move Bishop to E7 trying to keep some activity for his pieces so after this how can white continue should white respond to this threat on his Bishop so should white just crash through through D4 should white play something else like C3 maybe yeah that one's that PA Pawn for the moment but the problem is after Bishop E7 King E7 Knight G7 uh this rook's in the game and you've allowed this Knight to take on G4 so those are two problems that you don't really want to end up solving for your opponent yeah Dennis F3 F3 that's an interesting move uh so yeah the the idea is to just defend the pawn and ask black what he's doing but uh I think the the next move does do everything F3 wants to do except uh it activates your pieces a little bit more yeah it just R takes D4 so of course this uh defends the pawn sideways laterally and uh what happens on Bishop takes G5 for example yeah you just take it and after Knight to G8 Black's pieces have seen much much better days and something like Rook to D7 should be more than enough uh just taking all the pawns or even you can probably take time to defend C2 if you want uh probably a lot of move here moves here are very good for white so instead black uh tried Bishop takes C2 and after Rook to D7 he has quite a few problems so of course what happens on Bishop takes A4 yeah Bishop takes E7 and then King to E8 well yeah that that's probably okay but white has something stronger there probably D yeah so Rook to d8 uh sacrificing the bishop in exchange for this Rook on h8 and up the exchange should be more than enough for white so instead black would have to play King to G8 and then uh just Rook takes B7 picking up the pawns something like Rook to C2 trying to get activity and Knight to F6 is a neat sacrifice when uh uh black really doesn't have much chance in an end game like this because his pieces uh he does have two pieces for one Rook but uh White has well after something like Rook takes B2 white will have three pawns for it and his pieces are is very uncoordinated and there's not much chance of stopping these pawns from getting down the board so in face of this I think Knight it actually resigned here unless I'm mistaken yeah I think he did resign here uh yeah I think these are just moves I've inputed but uh so yeah instead of Bishop takes C2 well actually after Bishop takes C2 BL could have tried something like F6 if he wanted but after gf6 or ef6 gf6 and Rook E7 uh you can't play King takes E7 because of Bishop F6 so uh F takes G Rook takes B7 and uh again we're threatening Rook to B8 so you don't have time for Bishop takes A4 so something like Rook to G8 Knight to G Knight to F6 Rook to G7 and uh we get a very similar endgame where White's going to have a lot of Pawns and a rook in exchange for two pieces so Knight H uh I mean sorry gulkan his opponent probably calculated through all these lines and just decided to throw in the towel and resign so yeah very active play by white but that's how you have to play in order to score points with this opening you can't be taking time to just like defend C2 or just move your KN out of the way you need to get your pieces into the game to take advantage of Black's misplaced King side so yeah so something better for black might have been Knight to E7 here instead of Knight H6 uh sorry after Rook D1 just Knight to E7 when uh you get a similar position after Knight to A4 and white plays all the same sacrificing moves but uh the difference is this Knight's just on E7 instead of H6 and it's just just much better placed here it can go to D5 someday it can uh it's already out of the way of this Rook to come into the game it's helping the seventh rank a little bit so yeah that would have been much better for gaulin excuse me uh so yeah that's another example of how black did everything correctly in the opening but uh White still had enough initiative to get a very nice attacking game and then the last thing I want to go over for you is a game of Peter Fiddlers so here we're going to look at a different line that black chose which is also totally acceptable so we start with all the same first moves and after H4 H5 Knight F4 Bishop H7 again sacrificing this Pawn on H5 uh black chose to take in the center first whereas in the other games we've looked at black has been playing Knight to C6 so after takes and Knight to B5 Knight to C6 Knight takes D4 and Knight G to E7 uh white again needs to develop with some activity in order to restrain Black's development over here so how can he go about doing this bishop Bishop B5 uh that's a move that's going to come later I think unless I'm mistaken instead we're just going to play C3 just Shoring up our uh Pawn structure so this is actually a very interesting move because it's sort of asking black what he wants to do because black really can't uh spend time doing things like this because of Moves Like Bishop to B5 like Mario suggested just taking advantage of the weak light squares that this bishop can no longer defend and uh you still always have this threat of Knight to G7 if you think about moving this bishop out of the way so here black decides all right you made a waiting move I can wait as well and plays A6 so the idea is to just prevent things like Bishop to B5 and Knight to B5 so now white continues with Rook to H3 which is kind of a strange maneuver that you don't really see I mean you see it in beginner games right away of course when they play one H4 two Rook H3 to get the Rook into the game but uh here it's a little bit more uh more acceptable uh developing The Rook behind the pawns and thinking about bringing it to the center where it can attack the king so black accepts the pawn on E5 and after Bishop G5 Queen C7 stepping out of the pin and Rook to E3 getting the Rook into the game as I suggested uh black still has some problems to solve so of course this bishop on f8 is not developed this Rook on h8 is not develops and uh there are some serious sacrifi sacrificial opportunities coming on E6 if this Knight ever decides to move thanks to this Rook on E3 so black decided to play queenside castle stepping out of the center and after Knight to F4 again really putting pressure on the C6 Pawn black decided to play Knight to C4 so here black or white has a decision to make excuse me because uh obviously his Rooks attacked this B Pawn is attacks and uh if he moves The Rook off of this file then these ideas become very terrible and of course it loses a piece to this Fork so white has to decide between a couple moves one is Bishop takes C4 just taking the Knight off the board and two is Knight takes uh E6 either Knight really so do you guys think the Knight the sacrifice on E6 is worth it or not because these uh these are questions you have to be asking yourself because sometimes uh the sacrifice just isn't working and you just can't play whatever you want and you to show a little bit of restraints but uh sometimes you need to realize that the time is ripe uh and uh you really need to strike now or else Black's simply going to develop his pieces and end up with a better position you just want to take the Knight I don't see yeah that's right so on Knight takes E6 like this is just not working at all so this is one of those times when you have to realize after Knight takes E3 I mean your queen is attacked if you just recapture after takes takes and something as simple as Queen to D7 you just you have no pieces left so you like you can't always just be playing the moves that uh strike you as uh interesting or attacking because sometimes there's just nothing there and after like Knight takes d8 Queen takes d8 for example uh black is just up a piece and white really has nothing to show for it so sther of course played the mature move just Bishop takes C4 so black has the threat of course of E5 so white stopped it by playing Queen to E2 and here black slipped up a little bit with his next move he played Bishop to D3 so this move off the right off the bat looks pretty bad because um you're you know I can take this and then take a pawn for free but uh Black's idea was to play E5 as we'll see so after Rook takes D3 and E5 you have some more problems to solve as white so first of all if you just move this Knight away what is black going to try to do right that's one way but uh fortunately Our Queen is still defending the square so yeah it's nothing spectacular but uh just going to break the P by exchanging Rooks yeah he's just going to break the pin exchange Rooks and play something like Knight to C6 and his position is totally fine um for the moment white is up a pawn but it's going to be very difficult to keep track of all of your kingside pawns after something like F6 and Bishop C5 and uh yeah black just has a totally fine game here so Sidler instead decided to sacrifice his peace with queenside castles rather than let black escape with a a relatively okay end game so black accepts the piece and white recaptures on D4 so black trades pieces because he doesn't want to get checkmated so white trades again and black plays B5 to try to give his King some space so now uh we really need to play accurately because we've sacrificed a piece and we don't have too much material left to uh do some check mating with I have a question yep so what was the purpose of B5 B5 um B5 well yeah Rook to C4 was threatened uh pinning the king to the queen and it also gives the king some more flight squares in some lines but uh yeah it is kind of a strange move yeah mhm uh well eventually white is going to try to do this but I think sther threw in uh Queen to E4 instead trying to take advantage of these newly weakened light squares after B7 was pushed to B5 so black has to stop checkmates somehow because after something like Bishop to F4 Queen to A8 is just going to be devastating so he played Queen to C6 trying to trade Queens and uh this was kind of a bailout because now white has an option to trade into an end game so the end game occurs after Bishop takes E7 Bishop takes E7 sorry not Bishop takes E7 for black Bishop takes E7 for white uh black throws in Queen takes E4 Rook takes E4 Bishop takes E7 and Rook takes E7 and uh what white has to do now is decide if this end game is worth giving up his Initiative for so that line would win his peace back and you would have a rook end game where white might be able to win you guys are leaning towards trying to keep the initiative with tactical Solutions like Rook to d8 or queen to D3 preparing Rook to d8 but uh fidler actually opted to just go in for this end game because after Rook takes H4 F3 White's going to win a second Pawn on the king's side and black actually resigned here cuz this is just technically winning but uh I'm not actually 100% sure on all of these moves I don't think Rook to d8 is winning because simply King to C7 sorry King to B7 would be better and uh black might be escaping and uh after something like Queen to D3 which was more along the lines of what I was suggesting as an alternative uh black can probably probably and up escaping here somehow for example H well this is actually kind of difficult maybe just uh Queen to C7 here no not Queen to C7 yeah it's tough but uh all right maybe I'll try something like Knight to G6 and how would you like to continue from here C C4 wow okay so I'll develop my Bishop okay so I'll recapture and yeah so sometimes your attack just Fizzles out right I'm not saying that C4 was best maybe white has something better here like Rook to d8 but you do have to be very careful so Sidler spotted that this was just a winning Rook end game and decided to trade into it and yeah like I said he didn't even have to show his technique because black resigned instead of facing the S game after F3 so yeah you have to know when to uh trade your initiative in and to cash out for an end game or some other type of Advantage material or otherwise so those are all the games I have for you today this again was the shirov variation in the [Music] kocon

Channel: Saint Louis Chess Club

Views: 48,810

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Id: 3eIXuNhW9HE

Length: 56min 49sec (3409 seconds)

Published: Fri Jul 07 2017