Chess forum by Grandmasters

Pirc course vs. Marin's book

Hi,

Just studied the Pirc course: well done!

I have one question.

Marin in his 2017 QualityChess book on the Pirc gives following line: 1.e4 d6 2.d4 Nf6 3.Nc3 g6 4.Bf4 c6 5.Qd2 Nbd7 6.Nf3 and now 6...Bg7!

I don't think this was covered in the ChessMood course. What are your ideas on this?

Greetings,

Thomas from Belgium

Replies

I think that the line that you are looking for is in the Advanced Section /Bg7 with c6. Check it out!

https://chessmood.com/course/11-crushing-the-pirc/episode/1320

My recommendation after 6…Bg7 would be to play 7.Bh6, waiting for 7…O-O (after 7…Bxh6 Black loses a tempo and White has a great game after 8.Qxh6) and then the usual strong attacking idea h4/h5!

Hey Thomas! 
Overall Nf3,Bf4 with Qd2 setup is a very dangerous one for Black. Played by Giri a lot and there is a very nice game Fressiner - Almasi on it. 
https://www.chessbomb.com/arena/2018-bundesliga/05-Fressinet_Laurent-Almasi_Zoltan 
  
Black's best way to fight against the system is to delay with Bg7 and 0-0 moves, but play Nbd7,e5, c6,b5.

In our case after 6...Bg7 7.Bh6! 0-0 8.h4 or 8.0-0-0 first, White gets a very dangerous attack. 

Banned from ChessMood

Dear PRO Members! 
Unfortunately, recently we've informed, that some players during the ChessMood tournaments are sending offensive messages and behaving very badly... 

Please, please, please!!
Whenever such things happen to you or you witness it, inform us. 

We'll not let anyone ruin the nice atmosphere and friendly mood of our ChessMood Family. 
Such people will be banned from ChessMood. 

You can just email us. We'll keep your name anonymous, of course. 
Thank you very much! 

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I had an accusation of playing far better than my low 1885 blitz rating in one of the tournaments.

I'm not going to name, and I respect there are players online who do cheat, but in a tournament designed to help learn with no prizes, aside from an ego trip (winners don't get named on Chessmood which I think is good policy) I don't see what anyone would gain. After a frustrated outburst at the opponent for the disrespect while trying to play (I lost on time in an equal position in the end, but so what), we looked at the game after and I believe the outcome was amicable.

I would ask that if you think someone is potentially being dishonest, don't accuse particularly during the game. Look at it after the tournament on analysis to also check your own play too, perhaps some of the other games they played, gather some evidence and contact Chessmood for an opinion. That way it stays friendly.

Please, guys, inform us in such cases https://chessmood.com/contact 

Sicilian with 2.Bc4

How to play against 2.Bc4 in Sicilian? 
We've uploaded the material. 

Check out here: https://chessmood.com/course/crushing-all-the-sidelines-of-sicilian 

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Big thumbs up from here. Bc4 is usually dismissed in the books as play e6 and you'll be okay. In practice though lower rated players often get an advantage against inaccurate play by Black.

A question is whether 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bc4 [Edit: yes it is, with the 2nd and 3rd move swapped] and 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Bc4 (abracadabra, the pawn just got gambitted with maybe c3 to follow or c3 now then Nxc3 and/or Bc4) get covered here, or are they coming later?

Also Chess and Bridge have noted that GM Pert has released a Chessbase DVD on anti-sicilians for a 2... Nc6 repertoire (https://chess.co.uk/collections/new-chess-products/products/a-black-repertoire-versus-the-anti-sicilians-nicholas-pert-pc-dvd?mc_cid=23efdf3277&mc_eid=8b2935913f). As well as covering the Chessmood 2. Nc3 3. Bb5 variation and all the usual lines there is an interesting minor line 2. Be2 which I've never heard of or seen. Nf6 is suggested against 2. c3 as well. Might be good additional / support material for the course here, as well as, given parts of the course are still in (re)writing interesting source material to evaluate or even improve upon.

Nice add on. However, I was hoping for some more concrete theory on the move 4.d3 next to the model games. 

The move 5.Bg5 is the most popular choice in this line. This move is mentioned in one of the model games but you mention in the following line that white shouldn't give up his dark-squared bishop so easily and we should take with the queen and take b2. But this looks pretty good for white? The computer also likes it. 

1. e4 c5 2. Bc4 Nc6 3. Nf3 Nf6 4. d3 e6

Bo Schlechter

I had my doubts about how well the Schlechter variation in the French (3. Bd3) would stand up against strong players. Although I forgot the key move 8. Ng3 I managed to hold it together and eventually win due to a blunder against a much stronger player (~2200).

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Nd2 with Nc4! against early Bd6 moves :) 

Question about the London System

Hello everyone!

I liked a lot our system against the london opening, but recently I played against 2 Fide masters and both played me Bd3 instead Be2 with the idea to push the pawn on e4 later. I don´t know how to react in this kind of situations. 

Thanks for reading and I hope your kindly answer soon. 

Best regards. 

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Bd3 is supposed to be wrong when d6 is played. I've caught a few in the e5, e4 trap before.

Play e5 the Bishop hangs on d3 if White captures twice on e5. 

Where Bd3 exactly?

This is a good point, we'll wait for the answer from the grandmasters, but maybe we can do the same as against 5.Be2, I'm not sure.

Hello Again!

I think my question is very obvious because I said Bd3 instead Be2 and I asked about the plan in general. I don´t know where is the confusion 

The order is d4, Nf6, Bf4, g6, Nf3, Bg7, e3, d6, h3, 0-0 and Bd3, but to be honest I think it´s unnecesary to put all the moves. 

Thanks for all your replys and sorry for the confusion 

Guys, this is a question, you can ask in the upcoming webinar as well :) 
For now the biggest downside of Bd3 (Why Be2 is more common), is because it allows Nd7, Re7 e5 plan! 
With the Be2, Black can't do that, as after queen exchanges the e5 pawn will be lost. 
With the same reasons, White's not hurting up with Nbd2 move. 

Accelerated Dragon 7. Be2 8. O-O 9. Nxc6

This line isn't covered in the course.

So 7. Be2 O-O 8. O-O d5 9. Nxc6 bxc6 10. e5 - now Ng8 is not possible. Both Ne4 and Nd7 are suggested in the IM Greet book, however looking at the database, Ne8 is an interesting idea - looking to challenge 11. f4 with f6, then capture with the Bishop on f6 after exf6, and bring the knight to f5 via g7.

What's the consensus on this (and perhaps another line to add to the course when it's updated).

Replies

David, Ne8 with f6 is strong! (the 1st line of the engine) 
But Nd7, with e6 and c5 also good for Black. 

Commented Games or Happy pieces?

I would very much appreciate your help and  educated opinion.

I have a three year plan and this year I will totally focus on 1. ChessMood`s opening repertoire, 2. Tactics and 3. Playing.

I will however be able to squeeze in a fourth topic with low priority during 2021. I am thinking of either Happy Pieces or Commented Classical Games.

My current rating is about 1700 and I am very uneducated in either topic. When it comes to opening, middlegame or endgame I have without doubt best knowledge in the endgame.

I would very much appreciate any opinion on which of these two ( Happy Pieces or Commented Classicals ) I should introduce during 2021. Perhaps it does not matter which?

Replies

Goran, at the moment Happy pieces is still not very long, I think that you should do both. It does not take too much time and I am sure that you will learn a lot in both courses. I did all of the courses in Chessmood in one year, working, with 2 kids and many extra activities, you can do it too! Happy learning!

Thank you for your advice. Perhaps doing them in parallell would be nice. When time is available  I then may chose according to my mood. Have no commitment to finish both during 2021 though.

Goran, had you a 1-1 call with a GM? 
When you join ChessMood PRO, you get a welcome 1-1 call, during which we set up a personalized study plan.  
You can reserve a seat on the events page-> 1-1 calls 

Jobava Line - 2.Nc3 instead of 2.Bf4

Hey everyone!

I started watching the "Jobava Line" video repertoire and I noticed that Avetik only covers 2.Bf4, giving 1.d4 Nf6 2.Bf4 g6 3.Nc3 d5 as the line.

However, if White starts with 2.Nc3, then White has some tricky options. For instance:

1.d4 Nf6 2.Nc3 d5 3.Bg5!? stopping g6 systems.

Alternatively, if 1.d4 Nf6 2.Nc3 g6 3.e4! is achieved.

So my question is, what is the best way to approach 2.Nc3? I presume playing 2...d5, and then learning some extra theory if 3.Bg5...?

Replies

I think d5 we should play anyway

You can't avoid the position after 1.d4 Nf6 2.Nc3 d5 3.Bg5 anyway because it can also be reached via 1.d4 Nf6 2.Bg5 d5 (our move) 3.Nc3. Would be good to have this covered in the course.

Yeah, it's not Jobava anymore. It's Veresov, which will be covered. 

Trap in the Closed Sicilian 2...Nc6 4...e6

In the 2...Nc6 course in the advance section 4...e6 video 18. Introduction the following variation is discussed 1.e4 c5 2.Nc3 Nc6 3.Bb5 Nd4 4.Nf3 e6 5. Nxd4?! cxd4 6.Ne2 Nf6! 

However in one of my recent games with a strong opponent even better move was played:

1.e4 c5 2.Nc3 Nc6 3.Bb5 Nd4 4.Nf3 e6 5. Nxd4? cxd4 6.Ne2 Qg5!!  The engine gives -1.28 big advantage for Black. 

Somehow I managed to survive, I'll post the game if I find it.

Do not fall for this trap :)

Replies

Hence O-O being the move here whereas Nxd4 for g6 I believe assuming I've got that right.

Could really do with a summary course to the closed sicilian to help navigate through the move-order thicket - particularly as some move orders may be between two different lines.

Ok we just play 5.O-O :)

hahahah thanks for the warning! :) 

Robert, that's true! 
But anyway, we don't play 5.Nd4 :) 

By the way, these lines you'll see soon, when we cover how to play against our openings from the Black side :) 

3....e6 versus the Sicilian. What to do?

3...e6 versus Sicilian.

Hi Guys,

I'm wondering how I should set up versus: 1. e4 c5, 2. Nc3 Nc6, 3. Bb5 e6. I can't find any info on this line in any of the courses (have I missed something?), and yet I also can't find any real advantage against this system. How should I play against it?

Many thanks for your help!

Replies

Moves other than 3...Nd4 are briefly covered here:

Anti-Sicilian with Nc3!? Part 2
1. Welcome

I think you should play f4 and after d5 Nf3 transposed to the position covered in Sicilian part 3

Hi Jeremy!

I do like taking in these positions on c6 as in that case light-squared bishop of black is gonna be limited because of a pawn on e6. Later on, playing with f4 and Nf3 is what I am doing as well.

Also, I think pawn, later on, should be placed on d3 to limit this bishop's abilities if it goes to a6.

Good luck!

Question about Caro-Kann 4..Nf6

I couldn't find the following move order in the course: 1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.exd5 cxd5 4.Bd3 Nf6 5.c3 Bg4

This is from a recent repertoire book on the Caro-Kann by Francesco Rambaldi. Does it transpose to one of our lines? All the moves in the course have Nc6 played before Nf6.

Replies

The same move order was also played by Alireza as black in the last Norway Chess tournament. 

Aryan Tari vs Alireza Firouzja (2020) (chessgames.com)

After 6.Qb3 black played 6...Qc7 and I believe there is no way the position would transpose to any of the ChessMood lines.

After 6.Qb3 Qc7 7.h3 Black has a choice. To go Bh5 and sac. a pawn after g4 with idea g5 and win the d5 pawn. 
Both are advanced, and I just add to my to-do list, to record and add in the the course. 

Beating anti-sicilians 2. Bc4, missing transpositions

Looking at https://database.chessbase.com/?lang=en some main transpositions are not covered, or maybe will be covered in upcoming course sections (Bb5, and perhaps Be2):

After 2) Bc4 Nc6 3) Nf3 Nf6 4) Bc4 e6 - White now has the 'crafty' 5) Bb5 (~2000 games). The idea is if Nd4, then e5 is available and if Ng4 Bxc6, which differs to the line as White since the knight is not on f6 at that point. One suggestion is the knight goes back to g8.

Also instead 5) Be2 [and as mentioned Be2 could do with some coverage (either as a GP, retreat, or even 2) Be2 appears which was covered in the Pert Fighting Anti-sicilian DVD), so if that was added perhaps this transposition could be added here.]

5) Bb5 also appears in the 2) Nf3 Nc6 3) Nc3 g6 4) Bc4 Bg7 5) Bb5  - a Rossolimo a tempo up (800 games) - how best to use this tempo?

Finally after: 2) Bc4 Nc6, there is even 3) Bb5 (2600 games). More amusing is 3...) Nd4 4) Bc4 appears often (White can't makeup their mind!). Again given the popularity it could do with a mention perhaps in the upcoming Bb5 course.

These might seem usual sidelines, but the lines covered in the course often are in single figures compared to hundreds or thousands of games of these lines with average of 2300 FIDE or so. Often all that's needed is a plan if the idea is innocuous - i.e. which of several plans in similar positions is the best here and why.

Replies

Hi David,

Some of the variations you are asking for are under construction and will be appearing on the website in near future.

Good luck!

David, I didn't understand the 1st question. 
You said Bc4 two times. 
I didn't get where Bb5? 

About 2.Nc3 Nc6 3. Bb5 Nd4 will be a different section. (in the Bc4 section was covered just Bc4 systems) 
About 2.Nc3 Nc6 3.Nf3 g6 4.Bb5 Bg7 transpoces to Rossolimo. 

London 5 Be2 Option 1 8 Nfd2 9 Bg3 improvement

After 9. Bg3 Nxg2+ 10. Kf1 the video gives Nh4. However, looking at this on the computer, stronger is 10. Bh3 and now if 11. Kg1 Qc8 12. Bf1 Nh4 - the rook on h1 is out of action.

Replies

David, I just showed that Black is fine. Often it's easier to explain the variation with 2nd best move, than to show the 1st line which goes a few moves. 

French 3... dxe4 5... Bd6

Interesting idea to play 5... Bd6 instead of c5, and I didn't handle it right. The aim is to keep the queens on and cause problems in turn on White's queenside, which happened. Looks like the correct way to deal with this was Nd2-Nc4 after Black castles instead of castling myself (which seemed natural, but it's too slow) gaining a tempo on the bishop and putting the knight somewhere useful.

Fortunately Black rushed the endgame, so instead of converting it, lost it.

Replies

Hi David! 
That's correct. 
The biggest downside of Bd6 move is Nd2 with Nc4. It's better to do without casting and don't show our cards. 

ChessMood - Interesting additional weapon: 1.e4 c5 2.Nc3 d6 3.f4 g6 4.d4!?

A fresh and interesting try that fits in well with our ChessMood repertoire:

Replies

The above line is a favorite of the Cuban GM Holden Carmenates Hernandez

1.e4 c5 2.Nc3 d6 3.f4 g6 4.d4 cxd4 5.Qxd4 Nf6 6.Bd3!? Bg7 7.Nf3

The variation compares favorably to a line of the Austrian Attack against the Pirc [1.e4 d6 2.d4 Nf6 3.Nc3 g6 4.f4 Bg7 5.Nf3 c5 6.dxc5 Qa5 7.Bd3 Qxc5 8.Qe2 0-0] with an extra tempo for White, and offers similar attacking chances of the type we get with the ChessMood Courses.  Please note the Chessmood line is perfectly okay, but it pays to have viable options so as not to become predictable.

I hope you like my suggestion and enjoy success with it.

Where is this idea from? 

NEW ARTICLE: What’s the “But” that’s Holding You Back?

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At the end of 2013 I had a tough tournament which ended with a very painful lose against a 2100 (at that moment my rating was 1780). The guy played 1.d3  2.g3  and so on. I didn't know which pawn structure to adopt against this setup and I chose a very bad one because he 0-0-0 and pawn storm me. When I arrive home as always the 1st. thing I do is to analyze and annotate the game. When I finished entering moves and glanced at the final position I wanted to cry. All my Qside pieces where in their initial position. Shocked by his opening I forgot to develope my pieces. All what I learned beginning with Morphy's games didn't served at all. I got so depressed that I said to myself> chess is not meant for you, so I threw the towel.

At the end of 2018 was the Magnus vs. Caruana WC match and I decided to follow it. There was such a good coverage by the media that I got excited with chess and decided to give it a last try. So I nearly had no time to train online because I wanted to begin OTB with the coming 2019. 

What a disaster, I played 37 games and lost 220 rating points so instead of playing in the A group now I was relegated to the B group. Things are curious in the B group. They basically don't have an opening repertoire and to my Najdorf they meet it with Closed Sicilian or Maroczy Bind structures. The Caro-Kann is also quite popular in group B, followed by the French and something I didn't know that existed. To 1.e4 he played 1...Nc6. When I arrived home I run to the opening explorer and learnt that it was called the Nimzowitch defence. Well, in resume, nobody in the group B plays the Sicilian so in 37 games, lets say 18 with white playing 1.e4 not a single time it was met by 1...c5.

Well after losing all that that material and blundering a lot I decided to leave OTB but this time not to throw the towel but to study chess. At the end I thought, what Fischer did in 1968-69? In 1968 he played only a couple of medium tournaments in Europe and in 1969 there is only one game registered vs, A.Saidy. Then he came back in 1970 with a never seen force. Crushing all his opponents until he achieved his goal. He wanted to destroy the soviet chess dominance and be crowned chess World Champion. Once accomplished his mission he retired.

Then what he did in 1968-69 without playing chess to come back with such a strength? He studied chess. So the lesson I take is that playing chess is fun and is important but studying chess is not such fun but at the end of the day is what pays off the most,

GM's not active on the forum?

In every opening course, you mention if we any questions we can ask in the forums. But the last few weeks I noticed there are a lot of pro member topics with questions about opening courses, but none of the staff is responding. What is the reason behind this? From the pro-member section:

"In this "Only Pro Members" forum channel all the discussions and topics are on a higher level, and our Grandmasters are there to answer all your questions."

I expected a bit more of this. 

Replies

I will have to second this one, especially as there are only a few pro-member questions per day. Overall I'm super satisfied being a CM member, and I really appreciate the obviously hard work that @GM_Avetik_Grigoryan is putting into this, but quick forum answers from the CM team was a huge selling point for me so I hope this could improve.

Btw - maybe Discord would be a better option...

I agree with Yair. One of the problems of having so much stuff in flight, there are so many hours in the day and only so much that can be done.

There is spam starting to appear in the forum which doesn't need a GM to deal with. Hopefully the new website will have a captcha system to stop bots, because otherwise the site could get flooded.

Also everywhere there it mentions 'ask in the forums if unsure', and when that is not being responded to (most are eventually) or is slow (more than a couple of days), plus the issues already mentioned with events, it doesn't look a good advert to get pro member signups or to keep interest for some who have.

On the flip side some good material has come out recently and the Friday tournament coverage events are really useful and it's clear there is a lot of hard work going in.

Perhaps it's a priority thing, but also some patience our side too.

Getting current pro members significantly improved is more of an advert than anything else, if volume of signups is a problem. Plenty of places offer material (of various quality), but which ones can show massive improvements through all rating levels?). It seems to have been more personal in the past (this was the aim as well as a family feel looking at some of the old events and posts a couple of years ago). Now outside of a few places (Friday tournament feedback and daily lessons) it seems to have lost much of that and despite some really good material, is in danger of becoming just another site.

Hey guys! 
I express my apologies for the delayed answers in the past month. 
And also thanks for all the words, which were related to understanding us. 

It's true, that there is a limited time, we all have. 
Especially when me, or GM Gabuzyan are getting sick or we are in another accident, it's becoming tough. 

It's also tough to launch so many courses, articles and the rest at the same time. 
Many changes are coming with new Website, and many things will be fixed. 

One thing I can say for sure, is that ChessMood will never ever become like other websites. 
Now we're bringing more Grandmasters to ChessMood, which are related with big expenses. 
And thanks to many of our students, who're referring to their friends, we survived already 2 years without investors. 

Thanks for your understanding and patience. Tomorrow myself, I'll answer all the unanswered questions.  

Solving puzzles

Just wondering...Do you find it easy to decide whether the puzzle to draw or win?

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I realize it always when I have to form a fortress and draw the game. Blockading moves are difficult for me to find, although my puzzle ratings is 2019 on chess.com and 2043 on lichess. When it is to win, I get some trouble and usually can't solve it by the first time.

How to overcome time pressure?

 Today, I played a blitz session with 9 Games. (Time control - 3+2) Got 6.5 out of 9. But, in almost all the games I was in time trouble. In one game I was in time trouble just before reaching the middlegame (I was below 20 secs), but somehow I won that game. My question is how can we overcome this?

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Hi Sidharth

Caoch covers this in the webinar on Time Management

https://chessmood.com/event/webinar-time-management

Hope that helps!

I would compare with 90/30 time control and ask yourself if you can convert the same position with 90/30 in an offline environment. If the answer is yes, then there should be no regret or hard feelings to losing on time. After all, people are not invited to tier S events because they have a 3k online rating. 

Your fav. Chess Piece?

We all love chess but in chess we sometimes starts to like a piece a lot. May be it can be knight or bishop. So what's your fav. chess piece. 

Note: Forget about board piece placement.

Mine is Bishops. Because in my life there is no Queen heheeh. 

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Strong piece :D

I don't know. Maybe the knight. I love maneuvering with my knights and double attacks. Well, in closed positions, if I have a 2 knights advantage, I win the game. 

all of them! <3

Rook, I love Rook lifts.