Chess forum by Grandmasters

Rossolimo for black OTB, early c3 system for white

Hello Chessmood,

Had a game in the rossolimo variation as black vs 2450 IM. He played rare early c3-d4 setup:

1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 g6 4.c3 Bg7 5.d4 Qa5 (remembered this move from the course) 6.Bxc6 dxc6 7.0-0 Nf6 8.Re1 0-0 9.h3 and here I was stuck for plan as black. In the game I went 9..h6 with idea Be6, but I think white had small edge and in the end I got outplayed.

So please suggest improvement/plan for black, txs

Replies

Hi Paulius!

I believe that it is better to take 6...bxc6 with our Queen already on a5, 7.0-0 cxd4, 8.cxd4 and Nf6, our bishop can go to a6, the b file is open for the rook and we have no problems and lead in development... That said, I asked Gabuzyan to check it out too... He will get back to you soon...

Hi Paulius,

I agree with @Chessmood_Odysseus

3. Bd3 Nf6 line and black plays 7...a5!?

Hello chess friends,

I played the following game and wanted to know what the chessmood line is for 1. e4 e6 2. d4 d5 3. Bd3 Nf6 4. e5 Nfd7 5. Ne2 c5 6. c3 Nc6 7. a3 a5 preventing b4? What are the ideas and plans?

Just for completion my game went

[Event "5m + 0s"]

[Site ""]

[Date "2021.08.04"]

[Round "?"]

[White "Kay"]

[Black "Mentre"]

[Result "1/2-1/2"]

1. e4 e6 2. d4 d5 3. Bd3 Nf6 4. e5 Nfd7 5. Ne2 c5 6. c3 Nc6 7. a3 a5 8. a4 Qb6

9. O-O f6 10. exf6 Nxf6 11. Na3 c4 12. Bc2 Bd6 13. Nb5 Bb8 14. Bf4 O-O 15. Bxb8

Rxb8 16. Qd2 Na7 17. Qf4 Bd7 18. Nxa7 Qxa7 19. Qh4 Rbe8 20. g4 Ne4 21. f3 e5

22. fxe4 exd4 23. exd5 d3+ 24. Nd4 dxc2 25. Rxf8+ Rxf8 26. Rc1 Qc5 27. Rxc2

Qxd5 28. Rf2 Rxf2 29. Kxf2 Qf7+ 30. Kg2 Bxa4 31. Qd8+ Qf8 32. Qd5+ Kh8 33. Qxc4

Bd7 34. h3 h6 35. Qd5 Qc8 36. Qd6 Bc6+ 37. Nxc6 Qxc6+ 38. Qxc6 bxc6 39. Kf3 Kg8

40. Ke4 Kf8 41. Ke5 Ke7 42. Kf5 Kf7 43. Ke5 Ke7 44. Kf5 Kf7 45. Ke5 Ke7 1/2-1/2

Thank you

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Actually, I have the same question.  Perhaps instead 8.Ne2?

after 7..a5 I think you can just go 8.Be3 preparing Nd2, 0-0 and f4 and if 8..Qb6 then you can actually sac on b2 cause after Qxb2 Nd2 black is way behind in development with queens stuck and f4-f5 coming

Hi Kayode, 

This is an interesting question. Let me express my thoughts. If instead of going a3 white plays Bc3 and tries to protect the pawn on d4, black is all the time having cxd4 and after cxd4 - Nb4 moves to bother the bishop. But if we include a3 and a5 I think it favors white since now we can go Bc2 and protect the pawn on d4 without consequences. As well I think a5 move weakens b5 square and in some spots when we get our knight to c3 square it will be a nice outpost.

4NCL online congress this weekend

Thinking of entering.

5x45 15 games over this weekend (bye available if Friday's game is too late) - quite sparse in the open/under 2000 sections and no one particularly strong yet, so players of ~2000 FIDE are good contenders to win, though the prizes with the current number of entries is more beer / (juice?) money. Good chance to try out chessmood openings in long play settings. Anyone interested?

Entry is £7.50 +£5 (non-ECF) (credit card/paypal)

https://www.4ncl.co.uk/fide/online/arrangements_10.htm

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I need a coach- any recommendation?

Hi guys - after never having a coach I have decided that it is time to get one.

However, it is difficult since there are many coaches available online. Do any of you have any recommendations? or are any of you interested in coaching me? 

I am currently 2050 FIDE and have been working hard in the last years, I am already 33 years old, so not young by any means... but still with a lot of intentions to improve! 

Thanks in advance,

Pablo 

Replies

Good luck in getting a nice coach . Would you like to join my team? We need serious people like you. In my team I am 1465, another guys are 1650 and fide 2200 .

I know a good coach whose Lichess ID is DeepRabbit. He is also a registered coach on Lichess and Chess.com.

Good luck in improving and I wish you the best!

Hey Pablo! 
Have you read the article about finding the Right coach? Have you filled the form? 

Hi Pablo, 

I am Adrián, 32 years old, also working hard (as much as possible...) and looking forward to improve and enjoy doing it!! :) 2000+ FIDE and 2450+ lichess blitz... I would be interested in playing some training games with longer time controls. For instance, a "match" of 3 15+10 games, once a week or twice a month. Would you be interested?

See u! 

Adrián

Benko Mistakes in the g3 line

Hello CM family!

I found a mistake in the Benko gambit videocourse: section 2 - g3 line, video 18 "theory of the main line g3", minute 2:32.

GM Avetik has just said that b3 was not possible due to N:d5 and the pin on the a1 Rook. However, due to the move Qc2, now the rooks can be connected with a tempo on the black Queen, as showed by stockfish:

1.b3 N:d5?? 2.N:d5 B:a1 Bd2!! attacking the Queen and the a1 Bishop. White wins two pieces for a rook. 

I hope this could help.

Bye!

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PS: in that position b3 is the best move sugged by the engine! White seems to resolve the problem of the c1 bishop. 

You're right... My bad... 
This course is being re-recorded, where we'll add many model games to help you to understand the ideas better. 
Instead of 12...Nd5?? blunder, I would recommend now to use the main downside of b3 move in most of the Benko positions. Which is...
12...c4! and getting a strong counterplay. 
In the course when White doesn't go with early Rb1, I'll recommend early Nb6, instead of Qa5, with the idea to play Bc4 at some point and grab the d5 pawn. 
Or Nc4, Qa5... 

Early b3 in Benko

I have experienced this line from White several times now. d4 Nf6 : c4 c5 : d5 b5 : b3

I thought I saw somewhere in the videos to play b4 not b/c4 . But after Bb2 if I play g6 the snapping off the knight on f6 is irritating structure wise. I seem to toil in this line --- where can I locate the preferred approach ?  Thanks ------ Keven 

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Hi Keven,

I think we don't go b4 after b3. We can take on c4, open up the b file. And very often us it to attack the bishop on b2. When the b file is open I think we have a comfortable game using that.

Scotch Game Question

Hi --- I realise not every tiny issue and move order finesse can be covered but would appreciate any comments on a certain move that occurs in a standard position. Namely e4 e5 : Nf3 Nf6: d4 e/d :Nxd4 Bc5 : Nb3 Bb6 : Nc3 Nf6 : Qe2 d6 :Be3 Ng4 ?!   This seems to force Bxb6 which gives Black an open a file after a/b.  Then f3 allows Ng-e5 and a nice central position. I've played 0--0--0 looking to play h3 and f4 but Be6 seems to get Black's attack under way with Ne5 > c4 etc to come. 

What do members or the coaching team  suggest ?---  as I've had this Ng4 twice now and I usually get d6 + Nf6 in either order  not Ne7 types of positions. 

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And what do our Coaches think about the "ending" that might occur after:

10. h3 (instead of f3) Nge5 11. f4 Qh4+ 12. Qf2 Qxf2+ 13. Kxf2 Ng6

Hello,

Well done Nils , since your answer is my recommendation :-)

I really like that endgame. First of all black's queenside pawns now are fixed. White has more space in the center. Pawn on f4 is very much limiting black knights since it controls e5 square. All the time our knight is threatening to jump to b5 or d5 and attack the pawns on c7. In order to limit blacks activity through a file, we can go a3 and then locate rooks to e and d files. I like this endgame a lot for the white.

I have also reached this position regularly, and have started playing f3 before Be3 to prevent the following Ng4. It offers black to seamingly counter in the center, but after the further Be3 and 0-0-0, I have had some very positive results.

Maroczy Bind with g3

In the following line: 1.c4 c5 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.Nc3 Nc6 4.d4 cxd4 5.Nxd4 g6 6.g3 Bg7 7.Bg2 0-0 8.0-0 Qa5 9.Nb3 Qh5 10.h3 d6 11.g4 Bxg4 12.hxg4 Nxg4 13.Bf4 Be5 14.Qd2 g5 15.Bxe5 Now in the course only 15...Ncxe5 is analysed which only leads to a draw by perpetual check with best play. My question is isn't 15...dxe5!?N a promising winning try for Black? My analysis seems to indicate it is.

What do you guys think. 

Replies

I was hoping that someone would say something about this interesting position, but I asked our GMS to reply to you. Sorry for not doing it earlier @Kevin_D

English 1..c5 rare system for white d3 with Bd2 and h4

1.c4 c5 2.Nc3 g6 3.g3 Bg7 4.Bg2 Nc6 5.d3 d6 6.Bd2!? e5 7.a3 Nge7 8.h4 h6 9.e3 0-0 10.Nge2 Bg4 11.Qc2 Rb8 12.Rb1 a5 13.Nd5 Nxd5 14.cd Ne7 15.Qa4 Bxe2 16.Kxe2

Just had this opening in OTB game against 2500 player. Tried botvinnik setup, but it didnt quite work. Anyone seen this setup for white? I cannot find it in any of my sources, what this system for white is called.

Please advise what I did wrong as in the opening white gained substantial edge, txs.

Replies

Yes I have seen this idea with an early h4 before, it has been employed by British IM Lawrence Trent with devastating effect and is very dangerous practically: https://en.chessbase.com/post/cafe-batavia-chess-tournament-2020-r5

Kept digging and found some games in this line and how black setups against this interesting white play. Atm seems like a solid plan with Qd7, b6, Bb7 and e6 later e5 is the best try. What do chessmood GMs think about this?

Hi Paulius,

I have checked all the games you posted and to be honest I liked blacks position more.

As well I believe in your game you don't need to capture the knight on e2. Can't you just go Bd7 , keep it and try to play on both sides of the board with b5 and sometimes f5?

Should we have alternatives to ChessMood openings?

    Hello ChessMood friends!

Very often my opponents respond to 1.e4 with 1...e5, leading to the ChessMood scotch opening.  However, sometimes I get pretty bored of playing scotch, 3.ed Caro-Kann, etc. because I keep playing them over and over again.  All that said, I am eternally grateful of ChessMood openings in general, but I do wonder: 

Should we have alternatives to ChessMood Openings?  Looking forward to your replies!

Replies

Why not try the Jobava line (section 3 of d4 sidelines). Coach Avetik seems to find it intersting for White. Reminds me a little bit of Yusupov's chapter on closed openings (Torre, Barry, Veresow). 

This site ends most newsletters, if not all, with the following expression: "COGRO", which I believe more or less answers what you have sought in OP.

When you are playing a serious tournament game, I would say stick to your repertoire. This is your bread and butter for your progression.

That being said, if you are not playing a serious game, then spice it up a little, and play anything that strikes your fancy.  Part of our growth is having the right mood, and it is easier to have the right mood if we let loose and just have fun sometimes!

But dont forget to still practice your repertoire too, so you can stay sharp.

I hope this helps!

#COGRO

Hi Brody,

On my own, I am having a lot of openings. Sometimes I mix them trying to surprise my opponents. I would recommend the following, try to take your ChessMood lines to perfection. If you are sure you know well all the lines and you use all the benefits of good preparation trying something new may be an option :-)

For Stephanie Smith

Hello Stephanie!

I can see that you are trying to post a new discussion asking for help, but there must be somehing that you are trying to do and the site does not allow it...

Can you post below this post your question? Do not attach anything, just explain your question and if you need to attach something we will do it later, first, let's stablish contact!

Looking forward to your post...

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@Stephanie_Smith

Let's try to understand the ideas behind Bxf7 sacrifices.

Like you mention, it prevents castling, and we know that an uncastled king in a open position (one where the pawns aren't locked in the centre) can be a liability. The thing is you've given a bishop (about 3 points, and likely to be better than a knight in the upcoming positions) for a pawn (1) and the impediment of not being able to castle in one move.

The questions to ask, is how does White follow this up (if they do nothing, then Black will develop their pieces, find somewhere safe for the king and, all things being equal, win). White's problem in following up this attack is going to be the knight on f6 which defends against queen checks from h5 and f3, and supports d5 if the queen checks from b3. Getting rid of that knight isn't going to be easy, Bg5 and Bxf6 will cost another move tempo and bring another defender - either Be7-f6 or Qxf6. g4-g5 is too slow, and even then the f-file is closed so no quick White O-O and attack with the rook. d4 exd4 and e5 (before castling)doesn't work because of Qe7 pinning and d6 is likely to be a solid move reinforcing the centre straight after castling, or the move after if Black plays Bc5 first. One further thing is that Black may also sacrifice material back if needed to stop the attack or for gaining another advantage, which is an option that needs to be considered throughout the game, whereas White cannot do the same unless there is some forced tactic. Also Black can castle manually with Be7, Rf8/e8, Kg8 at the cost of one extra move (a very rough guide is a pawn is worth about 3 moves, but here you've sacrificed a bishop for just a pawn).

A few games against even 1500 opposition should convince you that Bxf7 doesn't work here. I suspect the computer won't look on it favourable (even older computers such as crafty or gnu chess will give Bxf7 a bad evaluation). You could then go to a database to see what other players played against it, but I suspect there won't be too many examples if any. Often this is a key sign that something is up with the move (particularly this early on).

Now given the question, I'm going to take the liberty to assume your rating is sub-1500, probably a fair bit lower. That's not a problem, nor is trying ideas such as Bxf7 here, we all started somewhere. The thing with sacrifices early in the opening, don't make them unless you know they work, or are just trying to understand why they don't work. Certainly computer and database work (of any seriousness) is better left for much later.

The usual advice is develop all your pieces, castle, avoid moving too many pawns etc, etc. I'm not always sure such advice is useful long term, because many openings don't follow those rules exactly, and you can then end in a position where all the pieces are developed, but there is no follow on plan. Also before you attack you will need some kind of superiority in the area you are trying to attack and be able to bring in your pieces quickly without your own king being counter-attacked - something that White is not ready to do this early, unless it's one of a few known exceptions.

Better advice for learning opening play (other than lots of practice and/or consulting a coach) is to find one or two players in history and see how they played and try to play what they did. Sure they've been eclipsed, but the eclipsing somewhat mirrors chess development. So at this stage I would consider looking at the games of Morphy, Lasker, Capablanca, maybe even Alekhine for example, but not in too much detail. Certainly games and players from about 1850-1945 (prior to the Soviet chess era). Try to get a feel for the sort of opening moves they would play (Morphy is great to study because he had opening strategy worked out better than many of the weaker plays of the time, so you can clearly see the difference in play and how bad opening play was punished).

On the subject of Bxf7 and attacks against the uncastled king, you might want to look at for example the Evans Gambit, or Muzio King's Gambit as examples which are better prepared. The book 'The Art of Attack' also demonstrates a number of such attacks. Also instead of Bxf7, experiment with Ng5 instead (it's not sound though hard to refute, but there are lots of hairy tactics which are good for building that skill, just make sure you know the Fried Liver 'trap' so you can try to punish that).

As your opening play matures, you might want to look at the Scotch game course here. There are a lot of attacks which in some lines are easier to play for White than Black. Supplement that with solving tactical problems on chesstempo and learning a few basic endgames.

Certainly don't spend your time looking for quick wins with the computer, at this stage the computer will be useful only as a blunder check.

Post Your Methods and Routines for Training and Improving

I am an aspiring 18 year old chess improver.  I have my own methods and I'll share them if you wish but I want to here from other chess player what they are doing to improve in chess.  No rating requirement or anything, let's just bounce ideas off of each other and all get better!

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I create my own Chessbase files from the ChessMood Online video courses. Add my own annotations. Then use the Chessbase Repertoire training feature to practice the lines. The ones I get wrong, I transfer to a pgn file and upload them to Chessable to do regular drills on my trouble spots.

I have a schedule that I try to follow every day...

Day 1: 1 hour of tactic exercises and 2 hours of chessmood opening

Day 2: 2 hours of tactic exercises and 1 hour of endgame studies.

It depends on how much time you can dedicate to chess, but there is only one thing that never changes...TACTICS!!

Please help w/ Blindfold Training

I just started getting back into Blindfold training 2 weeks ago and am starting to be able to visualize some fragments of the chess board mainly the 4 central squares and the a1-h8 diagonal and the h1-a8 diagonal.  Any advice on how to improve on my Blindfold chess and Visualization?

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For improving visualization,  you have to see the position on a board with pieces.  But solve it for next three moves on a board woth no pieces.  

And do this again and again but increase the number of moves as you got the command on previous one. 

Do NOT let them castle idea AND chess engines. HELP please

 I been trying to post so many times and the website keeps doing funny things and not allowing my post to go through.. OK, here we go again.. I'm just copy-pasting my messages:

Hey guys,

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Here's the PGN I mentioned above..

Do NOT let them castle AND chess engine. HELP

Hey guys,

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Do NOT let them castle AND chess engine. HELP

Hey guys,

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How do you embed games into forum?

I always see people who are posting their games into the forum without a link, but rather it just is already there. How do you do this?

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I asked this when I first joined (use search function)

Just upload pgn into the forum post. (Add file)

this is a test.

Avoiding Benko strategies

Hello CM family, Veleno is here!

After watching the Benko and d4 sidelines videocourses, I was asking myself "what if white would try to avoid the Benko by playing a different move order or by avoiding playing c4?" For example by playing 1.Nf3 or 1.d4 Nf6, 2.Nf3...

Are there any videos coming up which will explain how to handle these "avoiding benko strategies?"

I tried to search it in the forum but I didn't find any answer.

Thanks for your replies and best wishes. 

Veleno

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After 1.Nf3 we play 1...c5 in the chessmood repertoire, which after 2.e4 transposes into an open Sicilian or else most likely transposes into an English Opening after an eventual c4 - and after 1.d4 Nf6 2.Nf3 chessmood recommends 2...g6 (also 2...c5 is playable on lower amateur level), and then maybe transposing into a Benko line after 3.c4 c5 ... or else we continue with 3...Bg7/d6...

Can you defend with honor?

(From a recent game against 2540 GM) In the following position shown in attachment, white pushed his f pawn forward to f5. How should black fend off this last offensive attempt from white and reach a more or less autopilot drawn ending?

P.S. I nearly played ef?! before slowing down and taking about 15-20 minutes to realize what needed to be done here and successfully held in the end. 

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I see that f5 is a strong move and exf5 could be deadly mistake that costs you the game but I don't see how black can go for any sort of auto-pilot  draw with seemingly slightly worse placed pieces and a worse pawn structure with 3 pawn islands and down one pawn on the Queenside.  This looks like one of those positions where Magnus Carlsen grinds you down in a drawn position.  In this position looking for or believing there is an easy way out when you have so many unsolved problems in your position is how you lose these position or go down the path of losing these positions like how Vishy lost a drawn Queen and Rook endgame in the World Championship Match against Magnus Carlsen because he went for the more defensive endgame when it wasn't needed.  In my opinion I feel like it takes discipline and will to hold these positions and recognize that you can almost never go into auto pilot when the Queens are on the board.  The reason why you almost played exf5 was because you were in the mindset of finding an easy draw when unfortunately there was likely none on the board.  I'm not telling you any specific move to play because you are far stronger than me, but I'm telling you my approach and philosophy to holding these "drawish" endgames that human constantly fail to hold.

Open sicilian experiement

Hello ChessMood friends!

I was curious how I would do with the open sicilian(along with the ruy lopez) as white in my next chess tournament (next week) so, I will commit and post my games as they are played!

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Hi Brody,

Do you mean you are going to play the Ruy Lopez and the Open Sicilian without having any idea of the theory or usual variations? It is good to try new things from time to time, but if you keep changing openings you will not master them... Let us know the result.