Month: February 2017

February 23, 2017 Matthew Sadler 4 comments

An oft-quoted maxim of Wilhelm Steinitz is that “the king must be treated as a strong piece both for attack and defence”. While sceptical about the truth of this statement while queens are on the board, I thought of it more than once while analysing a series of tactical queenless middlegame from a book “Damen…

February 16, 2017 Matthew Sadler 2 comments

The 4NCL continued in Northampton on 14th-15th January 2017. Fortified by 2 lovely meals courtesy of our generous captain Roger Emerson, I managed to produce a nice attacking finish on the Sunday morning. Presumably I’d need 4 great meals to play well both days! The attack had some unusual points and my investigations prompted the…

February 9, 2017 Matthew Sadler 4 comments

In this final article in this series on the rook and bishop versus rook ending, I would like to examine both some typical mistakes and some unexpected saving resources from over 600 master games.   Cochrane’s Defence. The hidden pitfall.   Cochrane’s Defence is the most reliable way to defend this ending when starting from…

February 3, 2017 Matthew Sadler No comments exist

In a previous article, I examined the winning technique from the Philidor position in detail. In the next couple of articles, I want to spend some time on the best way to defend the rook and bishop against rook ending.   To help me, I put together a database of decisive rook and bishop against…