New answers tagged analysis
2
First, this is not really a Polerio, aka Muzio Gambit (this is the only name I have ever heard it called). That is characterized by the move 3.Nf3 g5 4.Bc4 g4 5.0-0. You left out some of the opening moves, and the way you played it was lost right out of the opening.
My first impression is that I see a lot of tactical mistakes. There is a beautiful tactic ...
3
Overall, a very good game. Here are my thoughts on it.
[FEN ""]
1. e4 c6 2. d4 d5 3. e5 Bf5 4. Bd3 (4. Nf3 {And Be2 was a line that Nigel Short popularized.}) 4... Bxd3 5. Qxd3 Qa5+ {I think that Capablanca was the first to play this Qa5-a6 idea.} 6. Bd2 Qa6 7. Qxa6 Nxa6 8. c3 e6 9. Nf3 Ne7 10. Nh4 $2 {This puts the knight offside, and the Ne7 may ...
1
I know that this is three years late, but Stockfish with partial 7-piece tablebases immediately says 0.00. Now, at a depth of 71, it still says 0.00. I think it is, indeed, a draw.
Of course, there is no harm in trying, and the plan in such endings is to try to walk the king toward your own pawn. Clearly, it should not work based on the computer assessment, ...
2
To be honest, I see very little there, but Re1 also just looks like it is not in the spirit of the opening since it does little to add any pressure to the center. Of course, if black were to play d5, then it would make sense, but black will probably refrain from playing that for quite a while. Bc2 probably should be played there, and follow it up with the ...
6
I think this is the game you mean, and it was on move 7. Qa4+, and Nc6 saves the bishop. Qa4 is a well-known line, and the second most popular move after 7. e3.
This is a black defense to the QGD called the Ragozin Defense. It is considered a very active defense, and black gives away certain positional aspects in exchange for piece activity.
Here are a few ...
7
Well, the Bogo-Indian as an opening is hardly busted, but the way black played that opening, there is no doubt that white has a huge advantage in the final position.
The main reasons that black gives up the dark-squared bishop are not to lose time, but then, and this is more important, because he can regain some dark-square control by placing the pawns on ...
4
IMO, 3...c5 by itself, is not really a problem, after the strongest continuation 4.d4 stockfish gives 0.5, and after 4th move in the game stockfish gives equality. And I think your reasoning is fine, it is generally good to trade a c-pawn for d-pawn.
But it looks like it is a part of bigger problem: You made too many pawn moves 5...h6 And 6...f5, and later ...
4
In short, it did not really dissuade white from playing 4.d4, as it could have been played, and was one of the best moves, along with 4.Nf3. White could take the center, and you were not in a position to successfully fight for it in return.
The main thing that I noticed is that in looking at your opening is that despite it being a relatively closed opening, ...
3
1) Pawns are important. It's great that you never gave up an entire piece (for example, you do notice the fork and don't play 50...Kxb4.) But it's bad that you gave up so many pawns.
2) When a piece is pinned, attacking the defender will sometimes work, but it's usually preferable to attack the pinned piece again. You should at least consider doing so.
3) ...
3
There is not a lot of depth necessary to the analysis. Both sides made a lot of tactical errors. In annotating this game, I did put in a lot of written positional notes along the way. This game, more than anything, shows that you need to spend more time looking at tactics problems. That is the primary thing that you need to do to stop going on these wild ...
1
In addition to the reasons why you are not doing great after g5, it seems to me that there is no urgency to trap the bishop immediately. If you start with Bg4, how can white keep their bishop safe from a future g5? There is nowhere for it to go, and if they try to create an escape route with e4 then dxe4 wins the knight instead. So g5 is still a possibility ...
2
Naman Kumar asks "Now what am I supposed to do?" if the gambit pawn is declined.
Naman, you play the King's Gambit for sharp, tactical games (although I think it was David Bronstein who played it as a positional opening?) so by declining the gambit you already have a small concession by Black.
Your play should be to rapidly develop and castle: so ...
6
There're some notes on this game on Wikipedia.
I think the key point is this: if Bryne takes the knight, he's going into a cheerless endgame after 18...Qxc5!. He'd be down material and have positional weaknesses to boot. The best he can hope for is a draw; against a player of equal caliber, his position is losing.
Therefore he goes for the complexities of ...
7
About the second line, 1.e4 e5 2.f4 exf4 3. Nf3 d6:
This line is known as the King's Gambit, Fischer defense. One thing it isn't is "ignoring your gambit" - Black is stopping you from playing Ne5 after the well-known Black maneuver ...g5-g4 in the King's gambit main lines.
The most common line now is 4. d4, when 4...g5 5. h4 g4 forces White to play 6. Ng1 (...
10
Well, it is funny that 4.Nc3 is then the most popular move, with 4.d4 a distant second. In practice though, 4.d4 scores a very high 73.3% for white, compared to only a typical 56.7% for 4.Nc3. In addition, Stockfish much prefers 4.d4, and it is not even close (-.54 to +.92).
I will take that big center, and get my pawn back with an open f-file any day. The ...
1
In that position, 12...Qe5 is the main line since the other lines all lead to clear advantages for white. 12...Qd5 and 12...Qg6 are forced losses in short order, while 12...Qg4, even though not best, it leads to crazy lines, which I also added to the analysis. Even then, there are a thousand more lines, but I added in only some of the most reasonable ...
11
I would not normally answer this question since the other answer points out the basis for the first move of the variation, but only the first move. It left out why white is so lost in that variation, and why Byrne did not play it.
At the end of both lines below, there are written notes explaining the resulting position.
[Event "New York Rosenwald-03"]
[...
2
What are the priorities/responsibilities of my pieces?(there are times where a piece is protecting more than a single square.)
Is there a move that can force the opponent a certain move? If there is, how can I take advantage of it?
Is there a move that has multiple purposes?
How will my opponent respond to my move?
Is the sacrifice worth it?
These are the ...
4
You have the bishop pair plus that dark knight at h6 is not at a good position. Taking that knight may also open the g-file giving an opening for the rook at h8 to attack while leaving the Dark King at the center.
Exchanging that dark square bishop may weaken the pawn island on the dark squares.
4
After f6 White takes with the bishop and Black loses a piece (bishop on c5 since d6 square is attacked by the white knight and f8 is attacked by the white pawn; no other piece is protecting the bishop).
4
After white takes the knight, black could play Qxc5 and then white couldn't retake with xc5 as the d-pawn is pinned to the white queen.
6
I would recomend getting tips on how to think from CJS Purdy's blog; see the associated links on the right hand pane.
CJS Purdy was the first World Correspondence Chess Champion. Bobby Fischer praised his didactic abilities.
My view is that the basis of winning chess revolves around the double threat. (A triple threat is rarer but even better!) The double ...
9
First, black is hardly busted here, and Stockfish 11 confirms this with both 10...Be7 and 10...b5 being 0.00 at a depth of 30. 10...Bb4 is also reasonable. That said, as I force in the moves it believes are best, it eventually sometimes thinks white has a slight pull, which is not surprising given the clear space advantage. At the same time, in practice, per ...
8
The first thing is that you should have a general idea where your play is, whether on the queenside, center, or kingside. Your plan as to where your place your pieces, and how you open that part of the board is going to be based on the opening pawn structure.
If it is later in the game, you want to try to figure out where the opponent is weakest. From there,...
23
Is my dark squared bishop that important in this position or what's
the idea behind this?
Yes, your dark squared bishop is very important in this position. Your opponent doesn't have one, so yours is unopposed. Furthermore you have the minor advantages of the two bishops.
Doubling your opponent's pawns isn't as big a plus as you imagine in this position. ...
9
The main reason is, simply, not that Bxh6 is bad, but that the computer, being so strong sees that many more lines that are crushing for white. After looking at it with a computer, what I saw is that black simply cannot finish development without serious concessions....much more than Bxh6, which did not even make the top 5. That is the answer to the question ...
7
Yes, Ne6 staves off mate, but it does not stave off the loss for long, but more importantly, it does not demonstrate the main point of the tactic, which is why they continue with the "worse" gxf6 in the solution.
Technically speaking, the computer thinks that after 1.Qxf6, that 1...Qc7 is the "best" move, in which case, black should just resign anyway after ...
5
The video's author might be overstating it by calling it a "disaster" as there is no clear knockout blow.
Nevertheless, white is clearly better, and the attack will continue with best play, but it requires accuracy or the extra piece may tell the final tale. White will remain down a piece for two pawns, and will probably win a third in the near future due ...
2
If after making a move the engine’s score for the position is virtually unchanged - it’s good move!
4
Is there any way to find good moves that I made, rather than just non-mistakes?
Actually, in most cases, it's doing this already. The reason your moves aren't showing up is probably that they're not actually good moves!
the evaluation shows I made a suboptimal move even though against this particular opponent it resulted in me winning a piece
The ...
5
I annotated the whole game, and a few things stuck out.
The first is a lesson for all players, and that is in this game, white was supposed to be playing on the queenside, and black had play on the kingside. White allowed the play on the queenside to be blocked, and thus had to just wait for the axe to fall on the other side of the board. You can never let ...
2
Imagine there'd be no other pawns on the board, except for the b2 pawn and the e5 pawn. Then ask yourself the question: is black's position won? If the answer is yes, there is no need for calculation, right?
The answer is yes, because of an elementary (yet crucial) manoeuvre: keeping the black rook on the fourth rank, thereby cutting off the enemy king. ...
0
Objectively, black is lost but that's not the question you asked. You asked if it was possible that black could someone win the game. Obviously, the answer is yes. Theoretically white could drop his queen on the next move.
I think black's best chances are to consolidate his pieces, castle queenside and use the weak light squares to generate an attack.
13
In short, the plan you proposed is possible, but it is just too slow, even if black allows it, which is not mandatory. If black permits it, here is a simple win that, although I checked it with a computer, I could see it in my head fairly easily, which means those two could see it that much more easily.
[FEN "8/8/1R4p1/4P1P1/2r2K1p/7P/1p6/2k5 w - - 0 1"]
...
7
While it may appear that White can whisk around Black's rook and promote, there is a indeed problem that you have missed: Black can promote first!
White's king is currently in check from Black's rook, so the monarch must be moved to either the f3 or e3, cutting the king off from half of the board.
Since White lost a tempo moving their king, Black now ...
2
Run Stockfish in multi-PV mode. This makes Stockfish suggest multiple moves. If the move you chose is preferred by Stockfish to others, then it's a "good move".
9
Sorry, computer engines are not designed to think like a human. It's a machine, it's written to play strong chess. There is no intelligence in there to think like that.
The "good moves" you mentioned were actually bad moves at Stockfish's level.
5
it doesn't seem to find any good moves that I've made
You are expecting too much is the real issue here, so don't be so hard on yourself. First, and I do not say this to be mean, but your level of play is going to contain mostly bad moves, but they look that much worse because you are being evaluated by a silicon beast. Keep in mind that Stockfish is FAR ...
15
Look at the diagram. The engine tells you the best move (Rd8).
The idea behind that move is that it pins the white knight to the queen and at the same time attacks the knight a second time.
Moving the knight white would lose the queen (for a rook).
If white tries to defend the knight (with c4, Bc4 or Bf3), black would play c6 attacking the pinned knight ...
0
I would much prefer to play Black.
Rb4, then pawn c4 looks like a very promising break.
But then I am not a GM.
3
First, I think that your lack of faith in strong computers is misplaced. My Stockfish 11 quickly gets up to a depth of over 40 ply, and still reads 0.00. Just because a position is imbalanced, it does not mean they are wrong. It would be a truly exceptional case at that depth for them to be wrong. That said, regarding your sentence about who has the ...
10
My initial impression was that in a practical game, white would win.
If it were not for the plan that the computer found, my impression would be that Rb1-b7, and winning back one pawn, with the remaining weak pawns, white would then likely win back the second, and just be clearly better. White is also ahead in development, and has an incredibly strong ...
8
There is no doubt that this position is currently equal, and should end in a draw, but white has two pluses that are might make it worth playing on, at least for a while.
First, there e5 square, and the Nf3 can outpost there and possibly create some discomfort for black. Black does not have a similarly strong square for the Nf6. Note that if black ever ...
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