Today I played with the Hungarian International Master Andras Meszaros. He was the junior coach of Judit and Sofia Polgar and the young Hungarian Grandmaster Benjamin Gledura. He is a very good tactical player, as you will see also in our gam...
It's been a few days since my last Olympiad blog and there are several for that, namely: 1. The rising flood levels in Budapest threaten to submerge the unfortunately situated island our hotel is on. 2. The infamous Bermuda party. 3. Poor he...
Today I played with Sandor Sztojka from Ukraine. He played the Smith-Morra gambit which I declined and moved to the Alapin Sicilian. He played a bad move Nc3 where I made a mistake. If I would exchange queens and develop quickly then I would had t...
Yesterday We had a rest day in the Olympiad Expo Classic Tournament and I decided to play in the Titled Tuesday Tourney. In the first round I played with Gothamchess, Levy Rozman the biggest chess youtuber. Ha suprised me with the Scandinavia...
In the world of competitive chess, gender disparity has been a long-standing issue. While there are many female chess icons like GM Judit Polgár, girls in chess still face unique challenges in male-dominated environments. Kyla Zhao’s ...
It was an ordinarily hyperactive babysitting afternoon. My little nephew spotted the most fragile thing in the room—a glass chessboard asking for attention, and before I could put it away, there was a clink! The King! In pieces! As I star...
In the following two games we will see a similar theme...sacrificing the Queen for an attack from the Black side of the Ruy. Both these games are featured in the book by Pablo Iglesias: Game 1- Ljubojevic-Planinc Game 2...
Yesterday I played with the 14 years old hungarian talent Bence Baki. I played the Bf4 line against the queen's gambit declined. I played c4-c5 to gain space. He exchanged the a- and b-pawns and minor pieces on the queenside. I got space advantage...
Hey thereeeeeee! In recent days, I've been watching the Olympiad games with some friends, and a few days ago, I published a blog post about round 1 of the women's teams. However, today I thought of bringing you 4 games that caught the atte...
[Blog History] *blowing dust off of the furniture and breaking down the cobwebs, coughing in the process* There, that's better. *Ahem* Greetings everyone! It's been more than four years since my last blog post, and in...
#chesschats #bookreview #fiction TL;DR:This lovely short novel is easy to enjoy and easy to read for chess players young and old. Chess ideas and descriptions are sprinkled like delightful crumbs in the narrative (“I recognised th...
Blundering a piece or missing a simple tactic in chess can quickly turn a winning position into a lost game. To prevent such mistakes, here are five essential tips:1️⃣ Slow Down: Take your time and double-check your moves to avoid careless mistake...
This is a post by Karel van Delft, Science Project Manager at Chessable. GM Yochanan Afek explains a study in café Batavia in Amsterdam to GM Tal Baron, IM Merijn van Delft and IM Manuel Bosboom. (Photo credit, 2017, Lennart Oote...
Welcome, everybody to another idiosyncratic edition of the Osaka Papers. If you're anything like me, then you play the vast majority of your chess online, and never so much as lay eyes on an opponent, as convenient as this is, it does however le...
Round five of the 2024 FIDE Olympiad saw another close shave between Australia and a titan of the chess world, England. It's been 20 years since Australia played England in an Olympiad and last time the score was 2-2. Amazingly, two players from e...
Retro-analytical problems, where solvers logically deduce what must have occurred before a given position is reached, include many interesting sub-genres. Proof games are a popular type that’s regularly featured on my chess problem site. Ano...
Today I played with the best player from Nepal, Candidate Master Bibek Thing. He played the Spanish opening and I replied with the old steinitz defense, where black plays very solidly d6, Bd7. We both missed an opening trap where I could lose...
Previously on this blog I've looked at how one can estimate the values of the pieces, based on the number of moves they have from each square. This post has the same goal of estimating piece values, but will use a different approach- random chess ...
Your opponent has just hit their clock and now it’s your turn to move. Out of all the possible options on the board, how do you decide which move to play? Some people may automatically play whatever move first catches their eye. Others may...
Dear Earthlings, I bet you have already seen movies, books, games, or similar media about hostile aliens invading Earth to destroy us for no reason. Usually, they are just evil and enjoy annihilating random planets for fun. But of course, their ...
Australia scooted up the standings at the 2024 Olympiad on Saturday after defeating our "little brother" across the ditch, New Zealand, by a margin of 2.5-1.5 and we will now play our Commonwealth cousins England in round five. Interestingly, a fe...
#fourknights #openingtactics #history About a week ago, I had this really fun and tactical game of the Four Knights Italian with Black (1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Nc3 Nf6 4. Bc4). This was an unrated daily game against a new friend and subs...
Today I played with Manfredi La Barbera from Italy, a young talented player. He played 4...Nge7 against the Ruy Lopez to suprise me. I became too optimistic and played Ba3 to force his f8 rook the the good e8 square, because I wanted to attac...
Two years on from our tight match against Ukraine at the 2022 Olympiad in Chennai, Team Australia, who are proudly sponsored by Integral Diagnostics (IDX) and DGT, once again paired with the chess powerhouses. This time, Team Ukraine featured four...
Today I played against Mohamed Saeed Laily, a young talented player from the United Arab Emirates. He played the exchange variation of the slav defense with a kingside pawn storm. I made a mistake and I was forced to sacrifice a pawn to stop ...
