Alsop,A – Blundell,J [D00] East Devon Minor (Exeter) (4), 05.03.2000
What went wrong here? Play over this game twice, once fairly quickly to see how it went, and then again slowly to see what went on in more detail, and think of other ideas.
Lessons from this game:
- Play with a plan . If you understand the ideas behind your chosen openings you have a big advantage over your opponent and can often win games very quickly. In this game White played with one idea – to lock up the centre then attack the King’s-side – and carried it out. Black went from move to move without making any huge mistakes, but this is not enough.
- If you think your opponent will stop your plan, play it straight away! Black did have one chance to play …c5, but in trying to make it better, lost the chance.
- Open a file for your Rooks . Rooks are worth half a Queen each, and if you don’t get them working, it’s like being a Queen behind! When you plan where to put your pieces in the opening, you must also think about your Rooks. In this game Black suffered from not getting the c-file open for his Rooks. This started to go wrong at move 3!
- Don’t castle into an attack . In this game White was ‘pointing’ towards the King’s-side. If Black had blocked this attack – or not castled King’s-side – White’s pieces might have been on silly squares.
- Swap off your opponent’s good pieces, keep your own . Black swapped his good Ne4 for a duff White piece on d2, but he did have the good idea of exchanging the Nc6 for the Bd3. Without the Bd3 White would be pretty planless.
None of these criticisms are made because Black is a poor player, it’s just very hard to play positions where you don’t know what to do. It takes a lot of experience before you can plan what to do in positions you haven’t seen before, but it is possible to pinch ideas from other people. So, try to play positions you understand, try to understand the positions you play.
With light notes: