A Review of Mikhalchishin's Strategy University Volume 1: The Central Approach

Adrian Mikhalchishin, Strategy University Vol. 1 – The Central Approach. Reviewed by Dennis Monokroussos.

Adrian Mikhalchishin has been a GM for a long time, but for a long time now seems to have focused on his work as a trainer. Given that focus, he has collected and arranged a large quantity of material for didactic purposes, and from what I've seen of his ChessBase DVDs that material tends to be very good.

On this occasion, the material centers on (pun intended) the center; in particular, on different ways of handling it. Mikhalchishin examines different types of pawn centers, different plans for fighting for the center, ways of transforming one central structure to another, combating certain central configurations, and so on. I like this idea a lot, and think it's an excellent resource for amateurs. Many club players only learn about the typical French pawn chain, some standard isolani setups and maybe some open Sicilians. Those are important structures, no doubt about it, but there are so many more to consider. Even players with extremely limited repertoires will experience far more kinds of centers than those listed.

So what is the amateur to do? He'll get some help from opening books - at least sometimes. More often than not, they won't take the time to address a given central configuration in its own right, but will assume that the amateur either understands what's going on there or will pick it up inductively from the analysis in the book. Maybe that's right, sometimes, but not always, and a further problem is that unless the problem is explicitly addressed, the reader may not even notice it as an issue.

This, then, is the strength and value of Mikhalchishin's presentation. Over the course of almost four hours, in 21 clips covering 51 games, the reader sees a wide variety of central structures and plans he can use and apply to his own openings and games, rather than hoping to get lucky generalizing in the opposite direction.

What's covered? Here are some examples:

• The d5 hole in the Sicilian (or ...d4 for Black in the English) - generally its exploitation by a piece, but also the transformed structure when Black takes a piece on d5 and White plays exd5 in reply.
• The d4-d5 advance to create a passed pawn (and its blockade, from Black's point of view).
• The Botvinnik pawn roller in the Carlsbad structure.
• The structure with White pawns on d4 and e4 vs. Black pawns on c6 and e6, with White's c-pawn exchanged for Black's d-pawn.
• The Closed Ruy structure where White closes the center with d4-d5.
• The Closed Ruy structure where White keeps an open center with d4xc5, favored by Fischer and (I think) attributed originally to Rauzer.
• The method of sacrificing a piece for two center (or one center and one near-center) pawns to obtain a massive central presence.
• The ...c5-c4 advance, primarily in QG pawn structures where cxd5 exd5 has occurred (both pro and con). (Part of one of the clips covering this can be seen here.)
  

There's plenty more besides that, but that's enough to give a taste of what you'll find. This will broaden the amateur's knowledge base both conceptually (by thinking about the topic of the center with new tools) and by filling in many particulars. Recommended, especially to players between around 1600 and 2000.

I do have some mild criticisms of this disk, of which I'll note five. These are not intended as reasons to keep potential viewers away, but as suggestions for improving later presentations.

First, while in many cases the games in a given clip reinforced each other and obviously fit together, this wasn't always the case. It would be more helpful, I think, to avoid overly dissimilar examples.

Second, better labeling would be nice. The headers for the clips are almost completely uninformative.

Third, he often zips through portions of the games rather too speedily. In many cases he does this in sections of the games that don't matter very much, but not always! Sometimes it's the portions that are entirely relevant that get breezed through. Naturally, the viewer can stop the recording and slow things down, but I think it would be better if in most of those cases it was Mikhalchishin himself who put on the brakes.

Fourth, he should spend a minute or two (off-camera) reviewing the material before delivering the clip. It's amusing but not really an indication of good prep when he finds himself bending his explanations to what actually happens in the game, when he's forced to construct an ex post facto justification of what happens.

Fifth, a not-very-serious point. If Mikhalchishin or anyone from ChessBase is reading this, they should let Mikhalchishin know that when he uses the word "either" (and he does fairly often), he really means "too" or "also" instead. (An approximate example: "White's bishop is bad, but Black's bishop is bad either." Bad too, Grandmaster!)

Just to reiterate, these are areas where the presentation can improve, but overall I like the concept and the material, and think the upper-to-middle class player can benefit from it. (More about the product and ordering information can be found here.)

2011 World Team Championship, Day 2: Russia Rolls, Other Favorites Upset

For a second straight day Russia won with an undefeated 3-1 score, with Hungary taking it on the chin today. Of course Karjakin had no success on board 1 against the unmovable object (Leko), and the board 4 game Balogh-Vitiugov was also comfortably drawn by Black. (Incidentally, if any of you wonder why Balogh didn't play 12.Nxf6+ Nxf6 13.Bxf6 Bxf6 14.Qe4, the answer is that after 14...g6 15.Qxa8 Bb7 16.Qxa7 Ra8 17.Qxa8+ Bxa8 White is doing well materially but stands significantly worse, as the threats to capture on f3 and b2 give Black a dangerous initiative and a strong likelihood of regaining his material, possibly with interest.) That was the end of the good news for Hungary. On board 2, Grischuk had the better of the play with Black in a Caro-Kann against Almasi, but it wasn't anything serious until 36.Bxb6?? After 36...Qxb6+ 37.Kf3 Rd8 it was time to resign, as 38...Rd2 is unstoppable and leads to both a powerful attack and the advance of the c-pawn. On board 3, Polgar had a worse but tenable position against Nepomniachtchi until she allowed 31.Bxa6. That allowed White's pieces to all crash through against Polgar's king, and she was overwhelmed from that point on.

That put the Russians in clear first with a 6-2 score. Armenia led after the first day on the strength of their 3.5-.5 defeat of Israel, but things didn't go their way today against the Americans. On board 1 Kamsky ground Aronian down, and if anything he could have won the game even more quickly and cleanly had he chosen 38.Kg1 rather than 38.Rxf3. Aronian probably should have drawn after that with best play, but Kamsky showed fantastic technique in the queen ending to win. They recouped the point on board two, with Movsesian winning an impressive domination game against Onischuk. Except for 9...Bg4, 31...h4 and three capturing moves, Black never entered White's half of the board the entire game. On board three, Shulman got nothing with White against Akopian, and on board four Seirawan's grim defense held comfortably against Sargissian. So, a 2-2 draw, and that puts Armenia in clear second with 5.5 points.

In third with five points is Azerbaijan, on the strength of a convincing 3-1 victory over India. As he did against Kramnik in the blitz playoff of their Candidates match, Radjabov slowly built up an attack in the Giuoco Piano against Harikrisha that crashed through in impressive style. Mamedyarov-Ganguly was the other Azeri win, and it finished strangely. After 25.Be7, Black could have played 25...h6, with a pawn and a solid enough position for the exchange. White would be better, but Black's position has plenty of resistance in it. Ganguly of course avoided 25...Rfe8? (26.Nf6+ Kh8 [26...gxf6?? 27.Rg4+ Kh8 28.Bxf6#] 27.Nxe8 Rxe8 28.Bxc5 bxc5 29.Rd7 with a dead-won ending), but his choice of 25...f5? 26.exf6 Rf7 wasn't a big help, and he resigned (or maybe ran out of time?) after 27.Nxg7. In the Indian White games Sasikiran had somewhat the better of it against Gashimov while Guseinov had the better chances against Negi, but both games ended in draws.

China is in fourth place with 4.5 points, thanks to their 2.5-1.5 upset of Ukraine. On board 1 Ivanchuk twice outplayed Wang Hao to obtain a winning position, and twice let him slip away. (Fortunately, he didn't go on to lose in penalty kicks.*) Wang Yue - Elyanov was a non-game draw, while Efimenko, like Ivanchuk, tortured his opponent (in this case Li Chao) for a long time, but without breaking his resistance. That left board four, and for the second straight day Areshchenko was the Ukranian's least valuable player, getting kayoed speedily by Ding Liren. As in the game with Shoker, Areshchenko defended very poorly against direct attacks on his king, which is fascinating, really: it's remarkable that even a near-2700 can have such a big flaw in his game. Chess is a tough game!

Finally, Israel bounced back from yesterday's loss with a comfortable 3-1 win over Egypt. Sutovsky won when Adly made the last time trouble error in a rook ending** and Nabaty outplayed Ezat in a middlegame where White's (Ezat's) bishop proved worthless on d6. The other games (Amin-Smirin and Postny-Shoker) were both drawn, and here I'll note once again that Shoker proved himself a remarkably adept defender. In this game too he freely sacrificed material to keep play going in a bad position, and while he didn't win this game the draw was an achievement.

Full Standings:

• 1. Russia 6 (of 8)
• 2. Armenia 5.5
• 3. Azerbaijan 5
• 4. China 4.5
• 5. Ukraine 4
• 6. Israel 3.5
• 7-9. India, Hungary, USA 3
• 10. Egypt 2.5

Event website here.

* I'm still traumatized by the Women's World Cup finale. What a horror!

** But why in the world did Adly play on so long? That was really insulting.

Biel, Round 1

After a short lull in high-class events, it's back to a surfeit with both the World Team Championship and now Biel underway. Actually Biel, which started today, is a slightly odd event, with a cluster of four players right around 2700 with one outlier each both above and below them. The big favorite is Magnus Carlsen, who is almost 100 points higher-rated than the second seed, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave. Meanwhile, on the other end, local entrant Yannick Pelletier is, at 2590, more than 100 points below the next lowest-rated player, Alexander Morozevich (and that's with him at or near his lowest rating in over a decade). (The other two players, Alexei Shirov and Fabiano Caruana, are of course rated between Vachier-Lagrave and Morozevich.)

Round 1 of this double round-robin played out as one would expect. The four middle players were paired and drew - Shirov and Morozevich quickly, Caruana and Vachier-Lagrave after a good hard fight - while Pelletier-Carlsen was won by the Norwegian star in a long ending. (I haven't looked at the game closely or with an engine, but when I watched the game from time to time as it was going on, I expected it to be over far sooner, and then later I wasn't sure if Carlsen was even winning anymore. It'll be interesting to discover the truth of the matter.)

2011 World Team Championship, Day 1

Here are the results from the first round of the World Team Championship:

Russia 3 - USA 1

Armenia 3.5 - Israel .5

Ukraine 2.5 - Egypt 1.5

China 2 - Azerbaijan 2

Hungary 2 - India 2

Russia beat the United States in textbook fashion, winning both games with White and drawing with Black.

On board 1, Kamsky chose an interesting anti-Berlin approach, sacrificing a pawn to saddle Karjakin with tripled, isolated c-pawns. Unfortunately for the US, Karjakin's plan of counter-pressure on the b-file tied Kamsky down, and after just 23 moves there was nothing to do but repeat.

On board 2, Nepomniachtchi beat Onischuk with White in the Scotch. Black kept taking on fresh weaknesses, and by move 20 all five of his remaining pawns were potentially weak. In the final position Onischuk was a pawn down with an awkward king and a weak pawn on f5, so while further resistance might have been possible it was likely futile.

Board 3 was pretty disappointing. Shulman brought nothing new to the table against Svidler in a 8.Rb1 Gruenfeld. Svidler followed the well-known recipe from the game Gelfand-Shirov, Odessa 2007 (also mentioned and discussed in the second volume of Avrukh's new Gruenfeld book) and drew with ease. Svidler varied on move 22, but the basic idea was the same and the point was split 11 moves later.

Finally, board 4 went horribly wrong for Black in a hurry in Vitiugov - Hess. White chose the rare Flexible (/Kasparov) Variation against the Nimzo-Indian, and achieved an edge after the opening. Black is only slightly worse after 15...Ne5, but after the natural-looking 15...Rad8? 16.Ne3! Black was lost. Nf5 is a terrible threat (17.Nf5 Qe5 18.Bg3), and with all the pins it's even worse. Black wriggled and managed not to lose his d-pawn to the end of the game on move 23. The bad news is that he managed to immolate his queen. White threatens to win it with 24.f4, and after the only defense, 23...g5, White rolls with 24.Bxd6 Rfe8 25.e5. One comical continuation is 25...Ng8 26.f4 Qg6 27.Bd3 f5 28.Bxf5 Qf7 29.e6, which is clearly not something you want the chess world to see if you're Black.

In the Armenia-Israel match, Aronian beat Sutovsky in a wild game that's fun to analyze, while Akopian and Sargissian won in a more calm and technical fashion.

Ukraine vs. Egypt was surprisingly tough, thanks to Areshchenko's shock loss with White on board four against Shoker, whom he outrated by 200 points. White castled long in a Pirc, and Shoker felt free to sac material in his pursuit of White's king. In fact White could have successfully pursued the material, but it had to be done judiciously. The key position came on White's 23rd move. 23.Qg7 would have won, but not if handled too straightforwardly. For instance, 23.Qg7 Rc8! 24.Qxh8+ Ke7 25.Qg7 would lose as in the game: 25...Na3+ 26.Kb2 Rxc2+ 27.Ka1 Nc4 forces mate (unless White goes for the "combination" 28.Qxf6+ Kxf6 29.Rxd6+ Nxd6 30.Rxd6+ Qxd6 31.e5+ Qxe5+ 32.Nxe5 Kxe5). But while 23.Qg7 is right, the key is to meet 23...Rc8 with the fantastic 24.Ne5!!, which is surely what White missed. The lines are long, so I'll note instead that the key idea is to open the d-file for White's rooks. This wins, while Areshchenko's more gentle 23.e5, also aiming to open the d-file, was too slow. Shoker ignored it with 23...Rc8, and after the further error 24.exf6 Black had a forced mate.

Fortunately for Ukraine, they too were able to win with Black: Ivanchuk beat Adly (who could have resigned about 20 moves sooner than he did, and with a clear conscience) and Moiseenko beat El Gindy. It came down to Efimenko - Amin, which was a very interesting and prolonged battle that finally ended in a draw.

The key game of the China - Azerbaijan match was Li Chao - Mamedov. Mamedyarov and and Wang Yue had ground out a win apiece for their respective sides, and Mamedov was pushing for the decisive result for the Azeris. I suspect that if colors were reversed, the technically adept Li Chao would have squeezed out a win, but as things were Mamedov didn't, and the match was drawn.

Hungary - India saw the return of Peter Leko to professional chess, and he celebrated it in characteristic fashion, with a draw. At first he was better, then he was almost in some trouble, but finally he reached the result that makes him such a fan favorite. On board 2, Almasi was better for a long time, but after slipping a while his 60th move left him in trouble, and he finally lost to Sasikiran after 85 moves. Balogh was also unable to convert a superior position against Gopal, and drew, but the Hungarian squad was bailed out by Judit Polgar. She had nothing against Ganguly for a long time, but almost imperceptibly seized the initiative after move 40. Her advantage slowly increased, but even as late as move 59, with 59.Rg4, Ganguly might have survived. (Might.) After 59.Rf3?(?) d3 60.Qf2 d2, it was over, and the overall match was drawn.

Tournament site here (in Chinese), TWIC coverage here, and the Areshchenko-Shoker game, with my notes, here.

2011 World Cup Field Set

You can find the full listings, and how they qualified, here. The World Cup is one branch of the qualifying process for the 2014 world championship, so there are lots of heavy hitters there. One surprising absence from the list is Hikaru Nakamura. As he can also qualify for the next Candidates by being one of the top three highest-rated players in the world (excepting the world champion) not already qualified some other way, he's not officially out of the cycle.

Still, it's a somewhat risky decision, as making the aforementioned top three is based on the average of the July 2011 and January 2012 ratings. On the July list he's #6, and with the world champion and possible non-participant Magus Carlsen included in those above him, he's not in bad shape. On the other hand, five players are within ten rating points of him, so a bad tournament or two from him and/or some fine results by the chase pack, and he could be out.

HT: Thomas

Another Polugaevsky Memorial Without the Polugaevsky Variation

Lev Polugaevsky was a great player, worthy of commemorating with a chess tournament or two, but alas: both in the recent event won by Dvoirys and in the famous Buenos Aires tournament in 1994, held a year or so before his death, none of the players saw fit to honor him by playing his signature variation. The Polugaevsky Variation (1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 a6 6.Bg5 e6 7.f4 b5!?) is quite risky, of course, but it would be a fine tribute. (A suggestion to players, in case there are any subsequent Polugaevsky Memorial events: if Black is in sufficiently bad shape in the main line, perhaps the players could agree in advance to simply avoid the main line.)

Korchnoi Wins Swiss Championship

And Viktor Korchnoi is 80 years old, too. Amazing!

It was an open championship, and in fact Christian Bauer won the tournament with 7.5/9, with Andrei Sokolov coming second with 7. They're both French, however, so Korchnoi and Joseph Gallagher, as the best performing Swiss players (on tiebreak; there were other Swiss players with 6.5 points) went to a two-game playoff. Korchnoi won the first game of the playoff, and that was good enough, as he would win on tiebreaks in case the playoff finished in a draw.

Maybe they'll dethrone him when he's 90?

This Week's ChessVideos Show: Beliavsky vs. the Velimirovic Attack

If last week's show has you suffering the Berlin blues, cheer up! This week's show is as different as can be. No turgid maneuvers with a premium on flexibility, nosirree. The Velimirovic Attack against the Classical Sicilian is an ultra-sharp line requiring imagination, the ability to calculate deeply (and nowadays, of course, the ability to remember your computer preparation). White often sacs at least a piece and often more going in a straightforward and bloodthirsty manner for the poor Black king.

Sometimes it seems incredible that the aforementioned monarch could ever survive such an attack, but Black has its champions too, and we'll see a couple of nice examples of Alexander Beliavsky successfully snuffing out White's fire. The games are exciting, and I present the show so you can take it as an exercise in calculation, too. Whether you decide to take the challenge or not, you'll find the games and analyses entertaining, so have a look. The show is free, as always (free registration required), and will be available on-demand for the next month or so.

World Team Championship Starts Sunday

The World Team Championship is a very strong event, starting this Sunday in Ningbo, China. Like the Olympiad, 5-man teams do battle on 4 boards per round (each team gets an alternate); unlike the Olympiad, only a few teams get to participate. There's China (with only one team, unlike the absurd situation in the last Olympiad where the hosting Russians had something crazy like five teams playing), the United States, Russia, Armenia, India, Azerbaijan, Israel, Ukraine, Hungary and Egypt.

Notable participants include (but are not restricted to) Levon Aronian (#3 in the world), Sergey Karjakin (#4) and Peter Leko (playing after about a year's absence from chess). Notable absences include world champ Viswanathan Anand (I assume the reason he hasn't represented India in team events for years is some sort of dispute with his national chess federation, but I don't know), Vladimir Kramnik (playing in Dortmund, which starts the 21st of the month), Ruslan Ponomariov (ditto), Hikaru Nakamura (not because of poker, but because he too is playing in Dortmund) and Boris Gelfand (not sure why he's not playing).

You can see the full player list here.

Recent Games of Interest

Perhaps there haven't been any super-tournaments lately, but that doesn't mean that interesting chess is in abeyance. Over the past couple of weeks several games have caught my eye, which I present here. These five games may not have been perfectly played or models of instruction, but they are all remarkable in their own ways. Sit back, click the link, and prepare to be entertained.