I’ve spent a bit of time recently taking a look at Alekhine’s opening repertoire. 3 things struck me in particular. First of all, Alekhine played gambits until the end of his life, even against the strongest players in the world. Some examples:   1.e4 e5 2.d4 exd4 3.c3     was a regular guest in …

My “Chess for Life” co-author Natasha pointed out to me that one of our role models and one of the greats of British Chess, GM Tony Miles, was born 61 years ago on this day. It seems incredible to think that Tony has already been dead for 15 years: you still see so many references …

During our interview with Terry Chapman for “Chess for Life”, Terry mentioned one of the most memorable moves of his career played in a rook ending during his victory over the Russian Grandmaster Alexander Cherniaev. We didn’t have the space to include the game in the book, so we published it instead in a video …

Last weekend was my debut as a birthday present! A colleague asked me whether I would be interested in giving a chess lesson to his brother who had just turned 50 and who was keen on chess. Not only did it turn out to be a lovely Sunday, I also learnt a lot myself! The …

My nostalgic article about a king hunt I played as a 10-year old and the effect it had on my future playing style (https://matthewsadler.me.uk/chess-for-life/when-we-were-young/) inspired my “Chess for Life” co-author Natasha Regan to dig up an old photo and one of her key chess moments.     The photo was taken when Natasha was 12, …