English Chess Forum

Congratulations to Nigel Short on his hard-fought victory. I'd like to withdraw my criticism in this forum of the short draw in Game 2. No one can deny the final was hard-fought. There were 5 very tough games. I can see that in any sport or contest players may opt to take a breather, before preparin...

Amid the self-congratulation that surrounds the London Classic, we had the 10 move draw between Short and Howell in Game 2 of the final. This may be a support event, but their actions devalue the game and the competition, and shows a disregard for paying spectators, and chess fans like myself who we...

Keith has put his finger on it at the end. Nobody picked up the racehorse analogy. Blinkers are applied to a horse to aid concentration. A GM shouldn't need this, but for a young player entering a higher grade of competition, it can only help to cut out distraction and focus on the board. If the kid...

The performances and appearance of Jeffery Xiong and Carissa Yip in the US Championship have been equally eye- catching. Jeffery's face is totally covered by his hoody and Carissa's by the peak of her baseball cap. Cricketers wear caps to cut out sunlight and aid concentration and racehorses can be ...