English Chess Forum

Peter Webber wrote: One of my biggest playing problems is of knowing what do when players like this play unrecognisable openings or deviate from standard openings after a few moves.

If you get a chance to repeat the same positions, come armed with ideas looked up from databases or Fritz suggestions. If moves aren't popular ie non-book, it's often because they aren't very good. Development systems can help, for example in the London system as White, you would play d4, Nf3, Bf4, e3, c3, Be2/d3/c4, Nbd2, h3, O-O semi independently of what your opponent was doing. You plan is to set up a coordinated structure. It can become a problem as to what to do when you run out of nothing moves to play. Even as above, you've got two rooks and a queen to place before anything really needs to happen.

The Petroff has a reputation for dire and boring chess. Even if that ultimately becomes a successful style of play, a bit of excitement doesn't come amiss.

Peter Webber wrote: Speaking of openings, would the Petroff Defence be too difficult for me to learn at my level as a way of helping to overcome defeats, please?

I took up the Petroff in 1991 and have been playing it since - it seems to annoy quite a few opponents

At my level, and yours Peter, if not at Roger's level, it doesn't have to be dull and boring

What I have noticed, though, is there is a lot more theory now than there was 24 years ago

EDIT - from games in my database, I have W21, D14, L13 against a range of players my strength, weaker and stronger

The Petroff Defence is reasonably solid, and has the helpful property that developing your pieces to natural squares is unlikely to send you too far wrong.

IM Jack Rudd wrote:The Petroff Defence is reasonably solid, and has the helpful property that developing your pieces to natural squares is unlikely to send you too far wrong.

One problem that you face though is that some white players will not play 2.Nf3, so you also need to know a little bit about the King's Gambit (2.f4), Bishop's Opening (2.Bc4), Centre Game (2.d4), and so on.

You could always learn the French Defence or the Caro-Kann instead

Clive Blackburn wrote:

IM Jack Rudd wrote:The Petroff Defence is reasonably solid, and has the helpful property that developing your pieces to natural squares is unlikely to send you too far wrong.

One problem that you face though is that some white players will not play 2.Nf3, so you also need to know a little bit about the King's Gambit (2.f4), Bishop's Opening (2.Bc4), Centre Game (2.d4), and so on.

You could always learn the French Defence or the Caro-Kann instead

There's the Vienna with 2 Nc3 too

Mick Norris wrote:

Clive Blackburn wrote:

IM Jack Rudd wrote:The Petroff Defence is reasonably solid, and has the helpful property that developing your pieces to natural squares is unlikely to send you too far wrong.

One problem that you face though is that some white players will not play 2.Nf3, so you also need to know a little bit about the King's Gambit (2.f4), Bishop's Opening (2.Bc4), Centre Game (2.d4), and so on.

You could always learn the French Defence or the Caro-Kann instead

There's the Vienna with 2 Nc3 too

Yes, the Vienna comes under the umbrella of "and so on"

Hey! Whoa whoa whoa!!

Isn't this just the criticism of early learning in chess? Don't experts all say 'start with the ending' Don't concentrate on memorising loads of openings?
At the level Peter (claims) to be playing at his opponents won't know these openings. They might have looked at one of them but they'll be just as much at sea as he is after he plays a 'wrong' move. It's a great asset playing 'wrong' moves in an opening. Knocks your opponent for six. They get so cross! He played a 'wrong' move! What do I do now? You know that's true Peter - you said as much earlier in the topic! A J Miles (as black) once opened against a grandmaster with a6! His opponent was furious! It was a 'wrong' move. It was insulting. (He did literally say so). Miles won.

My rather simple advice is to get a simple opening book. Simple opening books have the following characteristics:
(A) Lots of diagrams
(B) Lots of words
(C) Not many variations
(D) Claim to cover all openings

The advantage of this is that:
(A) they are not over-facing
(B) with practice, you can read them without the aid of a board. They do not go further into a line than you might expect to analyise in your own thinking over the board. Then they give you another diagram. So as well as being usable without a chess board they are also improving your internal visualisation - a great help when it comes to a real game.
(C) because of the above you can read them anywhere: in bed; waiting for the bus; during that boring TV programme the rest of the family want to watch; while the boss is giving his cliche ridden pep talk for the twentieth time.

CAUTION
Don't read it all! Instead, read up when you've encountered an opening over the board and didn't know what to do. Otherwise read just the bits about the openings that might occur that deviate from your preferred Petrov (or whatever) - but read these bits often: the ideas will sink in. You may not have as many variations up your sleeve as your opponent who has got his favourite line, but you'll probably have as good an undrstanding of what the opening is actually trying to do.

As a reward for doing this you may then buy yourself a book about the Petrov - but still make sure there are a lot of words!

SECOND CAUTION
Given that my grading is steadily dropping maybe you should ignore the entire post.

Michael Farthing wrote:It's a great asset playing 'wrong' moves in an opening. Knocks your opponent for six. They get so cross! He played a 'wrong' move! What do I do now? You know that's true Peter - you said as much earlier in the topic! A J Miles (as black) once opened against a grandmaster with a6! His opponent was furious! It was a 'wrong' move. It was insulting. (He did literally say so). Miles won.

It's also a great trick when playing in a simul where the GM isn't told the players grades or where they aren't arranged in grade order. The GM forms the opinion that you're a patzer and is more likely to miss your cheapos.

EDIT: Of course it doesn't help if the "wrong" move loses on the spot .

Peter,

Michael Farthing's advice is excellent. At most levels games are determined by the last mistake, not the first one. Consequently the win goes to (s)he who operates best under their own resources, not the player with the greater opening knowledge. By all means learn a very little opening theory to give you the confidence that you can get developed and castled without falling for a known trap, but then concentrate on inventiveness, spotting how your pieces coordinate to make threats. The well known saying that a bad plan is better than no plan is true, and those playing moves simply because the book tells them to have no plan. Most of all play games, without worrying too much about the result. You can't book learn experience. You'll get beaten by people who are objectively no better than you simply because they are more used to handling clocks, notating and handling the whole over the board experience. Don't let this worry you.

One of the big battles in chess is in trying to create a position which suits your style more than the opponents. You will need to play quite a variety of games before getting an idea of what best suits you rather than what you want your style to be. Ultimately of course the top players are reasonably comfortable in all types of positions, but that is a long way down the road even for those of us with more years of experience than we care to admit to.

I have to agree, having looked at the game, you did not make any obvious blunders, so I don't think you would be outclassed in tournaments.

At Brewood we always make sure that newcomers know the basic endgame checkmates. I suspect you would already know all of them, but you can't really underestimate the importance of making sure that a won game, is indeed won. If there is such a thing as the "start of the endgame" then that is what I would study.

The endgame properties usually include:

• The Queens are off the board (but not always)
  You might be trying to queen a passed pawn
  The Kings can become more of an aggressive piece

This may all sound obvious. Written down on this forum, it is. But practically doing this over the board can make a difference in results.