Why is chess hard?

       

Lots of reasons, I expect, but here's one: you know you need to be careful, and spot what your opponent is threatening, but your next move might create a new threat that wasn't there before you moved!

1. When you move a piece, it attacks/defends new squares, but will also stop attacking/defending some squares.

The Master touch (CCpgn)

       

Some master touches by Capablanca:

Move 8: Avoid isolated pawn

Move 18: develop before attacking

Move 20: look at every capture!

Move 29: keep control instead of grabbing a pawn and losing the d-file

Move 32: swap pieces when you are ahead

 

Christmas Puzzles 2020

I hope you have fun with these!

Very easy: White to play and mate in 6 moves (Mums and Dads) 

[Event "?"]
[Site "?"]
[Date "????.??.??"]
[Round "?"]
[Annotator "Fox/James"]
[White "#6"]
[Black "B"]
[Result "1-0"]
[SetUp "1"]
[FEN "K1k5/P1Pp4/1p1P4/8/p7/P2P4/8/8 w - - 0 1"]
[PlyCount "11"]

{[#]} 1. *

Fairly easy: White to play and mate in 6 moves (U9s/U11s)

Adolf Anderssen

Adolf Anderssen was the best player in the world for a lot of his life, but was never 'World Champion' because there was no official match or organisation to arrange an official match.

He was a wonderful attacking player, but lost matches to Morphy (1859) and Steinitz (1866), who both knew how to attack, but understood more than Anderssen about developing and defending. But he was a great favourite, not just among chess fans, but also chess players, for being a decent chap as well as a terrific player. Frederick Edge describes Anderssen:

Blunders -- Backwards moves

All pieces, except pawns, can move backwards.

But because the opponent's pieces are trying to attack us, we get used to them moving down the board towards us, and our pieces moving up the board in the other direction.

So that means, backwards moves are sometimes hard to spot.

Here are some junior players missing a backwards moves.

Click [...] or F3/C3 to see all the games

Magnus Carlsen

Chess has got better over the years and the top players today play a very subtle game, which is not easy to explain.

So what can we learn from the best player, Magnus Carlsen?

 

The eternal advice to 'look at every check and every capture, every move' applies to super-Grandmasters as much as the rest of us!

On move 26, Carlsen allows a tactic -- and Anand doesn't notice either!

Xavery Tartakower

Xavery (Saveilly) Tartakower was the wittiest of masters, and, it was said, "too in love with chess to ever become world champion", as he would often play an interesting move over a plain one, and perhaps throw the result into question. He was the champion of chess journalists, and his epigrams, or Tartakowerisms, will be quoted as long as chess is played. Everyone loved to talk with Tartakower, not just for his wit, but also his great knowledge and appreciation of books and art.

"The blunders are all there on the board, waiting to be made."

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