Sokolov - Winning Chess Middlegames.pdf - training - andy146

Ivn Sokolov

Winning Chess Middlegames

An Essential Guide to Pawn Structures

Published by New In Chess, Alkmaar, The Netherlands

www.newinchess.com

system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical,

photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission from

the publisher.

Cover design: Steven Boland

Front cover photograph: Evgeny Atarov

Supervisor: Peter Boel

Proofreading: Rene Olthof

Production: Anton Schermer

New In Chess 2008

ISBN-13: 978-90-5691-264-2

Foreword

Contents

by Michael Adams

Foreword by Michael Adams .......................... 7

Introduction ..............................

' .......... 9

Chapter 1 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

Doubled Pawns: 12 essential structures

I think the first tournament that I played with Ivan Sokolov was the Oakham Young

Masters (yes, we were young once) back in 1 988.We then started to bump into each

other at tournaments on a regular basis, became friendly and oten socialised to

gether fo llowing our games, sharing some glasses of wine. Our discussions were

many and varied and some of them were even about chess.

I remember one particular conversation where I proposed a certain plan in a mid

dlegame position; Ivan looked a little confused, his eyebrows started twitching, and

he responded 'yes, but this is just a normal position'. In his chess education, he had

broken down structures into various typical situations and analysed these. The Eng

lish school of chess had a slightly more chaotic approach.

In this book, Ivan shares the fruits of his labours, which are invaluable tools for

any player. This structured approach is quite instructive as oten players choose their

opening repertoire according to quite haphazard criteria, randomly picking up lines

without giving serious consideration to how the resulting middlegames would suit

them. To resolve this problem a bit of retro-analysis can prove helpful. By studying

the resulting middlegames and determining your strengths and weaknesses, it is

possible to go back to the earlier stages of the game and set out your stall accordingly.

The book also gives interesting pointers about the direction in which modern

chess is heading. The role of the computer in opening preparation has become

all-important and players' homework can progress right from the starting position

until the end of the game. Reading the book, I was very happy that I was not caught in

Ivan's preparation for his game against Krasenkow featured on page 265! I expect his

opponent also thinks himself lucky that he diverged at an early stage.

Although the general advice will be especially helpful to club players, other topics

covered will certainly be useful to players of a greater strength. Undoubtedly they

will make note of the original opening suggestions, as I certainly have, but also enjoy

the in-depth annotations to some excellent games. Club players shouldn't be dis-

Chapter 2 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85

Isolated Pawns: 10 essential structures

Chapter 3 ......................................... 179

Hanging Pawns: 4 essential structures

Chapter 4. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 221

Pawn Majority in the Centre: 7 essential structures

Index o f Players ................................ . .. 283

List o f Gmes ...................................... 285

Winning Chess Middlegames

heartened if the number of variations sometimes seems a bit daunting. As you can see

from Ivan's own games featured here and elsewhere, aggressive, challenging play al

ways makes it difficult under the rigours of a practical game to find the best defence.

The level of defensive play that is possible at home in your study with some helpful

suggestions from your silicon friend is rarely replicated in the heat of battle.

There are also a few ofIvan's losses in this book, I know from commiserating with

him aterwards that some of them were quite painful, and he can't have enjoyed re

visiting them for publication in this book. But an essential part of improvement,

from which Ivan does not shirk here, is analysing what has gone wrong and being

objective about not only the assessment of the position reached from an opening but

your understanding of the resulting structures. Ater all, most main opening systems

are completely viable but your mastery of them may not be.

Ivan's introduction struck a chord with me in this respect, as I suspect it does with

most other players, as I personally sometimes persisted with unsuited opening sys

tems too long. I would justify my choices to myself, on the grounds that objectively I

had a good position, but the situations arising did not suit my style and I was then

never able to get a good grasp of them.

Everyone must decide for themselves which systems best serve them but this

book will certainly be a great asset in making these sometimes hard choices. Of

course armed with the knowledge gained here you will be considerably better versed

in all of them. I hope you enjoy reading it as much as I did.

Introduction

I started working on this book in March, 2007. As usually happens, due to different

reasons, it took me longer than my publisher and me had planned and I finished my

work in August 2008. In this book I wanted to explore the - in my opinion - four

most important types of pawn structure in chess.

Quite a number of books on pawn structures have been published, and one may

rightly wonder what makes this book different.

Well, I have tried, as much as possible, to

1. systematize the thematic plans used and give clear explanations of them, and

2. incorporate the ideas of the featured opening variation into the pawn struc

ture that ensues.

The latter is actually quite important. In the pre-computer era players normally pol

ished their opening repertoire over the years, and even though opening preparation

did not go nearly as far as today, years of theoretical and practical experience brush

ing up one's repertoire would normally result in a reasonably good strategic under

standing of the positions arising from the openings played.

In the past ISyears, the involvement of computer programs and databases has

made it considerably easier to prepare a particular variation for a particular oppo

nent. However, thorough study and good strategic understanding of the positions

still remains a must in order to capitalize successfully on your opening preparation. I

still remember watching one of Anatoly Karpov's post-mortems, when he had won

from some initially inferior Ruy Lopez with black. His opponent, slightly annoyed,

remarked: 'Here, after the opening, you were definitely worse', to which the 12th

World Champion calmly replied: 'Yes, but soon I was better'.

Indeed, Karpov has won from quite a number of inferior positions (his encoun

ters with Garry Kasparov included), due to his superior strategic understanding of

the openings he was playing. Kasparov has won many Najdorfs and King's Indians

not only because he had the best novelties, but because he fundamentally understood

those positions better than his opponents. On the other hand he was too stubborn to

admit that the Berlin Variation of the Ruy Lopez was not 'his cup of tea', which ulti

mately cost him his World Championship title against Vladimir Kramnik in 2000.

Kramnik, on the other hand, being devastating in Catalan-type systems with

white and Meran Slavs with black, at some stage started to opt for sharp Sicilians with

white and King's Indians with black. That adventure did not last very long. Nowadays

he is a merciless killing machine with his Catalans again, squeezing out the smallest

of microscopic advantages, while the King's Indian with black is a long-forgotten

voyage.

Michael Adam s, Octobe r 2008

Chapter 1: DOl bled Pawns

Winning Chess Middlegames

1.8

1.4

Structure 1.4 (Game 4 - Bronstein-Najdorf and Game 5

- Spassky-Hiibner) and Structure I.S (Game 6 - Kotov

Keres) deal with the positions arising from the Samisch

Variation. They are essential for an understanding of this

variation, which was very popular SO years ago, and

played by the world's greatest players of that time.

Structre 1.8 (Game 14- Bronstein-Simagin) shows an

original strategic idea by Bronstein, played almost SO

years ago and still very viable.

Structure 1.9 (Game 15 - Botvinnik-Chekhover and

Game 16- Kuzubov-Van der Wiel) shows an important

strategic idea for White. He does not mind making the

centre static, seemingly isolating his c4 pawn weakness

even more, by exchanging his d4 pawn, in order to open

the d-file and gain an important outpost on the central

dS-square. An idea which was beautifully executed by

fo rmer World Champion Mikhail Botvinnik 70years ago

(!) and still highly topical.

1.6

Structure 1.6 (Game 7 - Keres-Spassky) explains why

fo r White it does not have to be bad to lose his c3 pawn in

positions with a full centre and doubled pawns on c3 and

c4. This idea is in use in a few Nimzo-Indian lines, and

useful to remember and understand.

Structure 1.10 (Game 1 7 -Topalov -Aronian) deals with

an idea similar to the one demonstrated in Structure 1.9,

with the difference that Black's e-pawn and White's

f-pawn have disappeared here and White has to rely more

on his bishop pair.

Structure 1.7 (Game 8 - Gligoric-Ivkov, Game 9 -

Vyzhmanavin-Beliavsky, and, with a mobile centre: Game

10 - Z.Polgar-Sokolov, Game 11 - Sokolov-Bologan,

Game 1 2 - Sokolov -Dizdarevic and Game 1 3 -

Radjabov-Anand) shows a plan that is often seen in a dif

ferent type of position with doubled pawns in a full-cen

tre Nimzo-Indian: Black targets (and often wins) White's

weak c4 pawn, but by doing this, he gets his knight tem

porarily or permanently stranded on the edge of the

board, i.e. on the as-square. As you will see from the

games analysed, most of the time White gets plenty of

initiative on the kingside to compensate for the loss of his

c4 pawn, but the game remains double-edged and White

has to be energetic and accurate in developing and exe

cuting his kingside attack.

Structure 1.11 (Game 18- Kaidanov-Onischuk) shows

a beautiful positional exchange sacrifice idea in the

Samisch Variation of the Nimzo-Indian.

Structure 1.12 (Game 19 - Kasparov-Ivanchuk) deals

with pOSitions arising from the English Opening where

White has doubled c-pawns. Mostly White also takes cen

tral control, but his d-pawn has not yet been pushed to d4

(which brings some clear advantages here). Further

more, White's f-pawn has been exchanged for and Black's

e-pawn, so that the f-ile is open for White's rook.

Sokolov - Winning Chess Middlegames.pdf

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