“In order to improve your game, you must study the endgame before everything else, for whereas the endings can be studied and mastered by themselves, the middle game and the opening must be studied in relation to the endgame.” – José Raúl Capablanca
In a similar position, sometimes a reduction of material cannot save the weaker side even if it is attacking the remaining pawn by both the king and bishop. This rare case occurred in the game of the former world champion Max Euwe and the first ladies’ world champion- the legendary Vera Menchik, Hastings, 1930. […]
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When the enemy king is far and there is no possibility of directly attacking its pawns, sometimes the win may be achieved by a pawn sacrifice in order to enable a quicker penetration of the king. A nice example on the theme is shown in a study by G. Mattison, 1929.
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Rook against Bishop and Two Pawns Bishop and Two Pawns are in endgame usually much stronger than a rook. Evaluation of the position mostly depends on pawn structure, distance to promotion square and piece activity. We will divide these endgames accordingly: with connected pawns, with isolated (disconnected) pawns, with doubled pawns. a ) Endings […]
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When the bishop is actively positioned on the a1-h8 diagonal and obstructs the approach to the g-pawn, i.e. threatens with a back-rank attack on the opponent’s pawns, White will have to show the highest skill to realize the win. As an illustration, let us see the Radev – Pribyl endgame ( Tbilisi, 1971 ). […]
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White to move wins, he must prevent the lifesaving h5 by realizing g4. ← Basic EndingsBasic Endings →
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Another drawn position is with the bishop on the long diagonal of defence. A critical moment hiding «the wisdom» of these endgames is presented in the mirror image of the study by Y. Averbakh from 1981. Namely, the outcome of the battle is determined by who is to move! A rescuing solution is easy […]
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In similar positions there are two impenetrable positions which must be known in the very beginning. Both are based on preventing the breakthrough of the white rim pawn onto the fifth rank! Let us first examine the bishop defence on the shorter defence diagonal, which is possible when the white g-pawn had stepped on […]
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When in a similar position Black has a bishop of the same colour as where the pawns are positioned, then the decisive the colour where the black pawn are. If the are fixed on the squares of the bishop’s colour, Black may only offer symbolic resistance ( R. Fine, 1941 ) . Although the […]
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A similar position with the black king on b7 is drawn because White cannot use his king to invade the c6 square (Y. Averbakh, 1962.). White to move cannot win because he is not able to drive the black king up to the c6 square, nor can he decline the bishop away from the […]
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The best prospects for the Black are in connected pawns along the edge of the board. Right from the start, one should distinguish two basic cases – Black may have the «wrong», or the bishop of the same colour as the corner where his pawns are positioned. First, a typical position with the «wrong» […]
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