Searching for simple themes

Searching for simple themes and clear guidance

By Matthew Sadler

The past month has been rather hectic as I started a new job after 2½ years working at the same customer. Whenever I change jobs, opening books get traded in for technical manuals and chess takes a back seat. In this case, it was unfortunate timing as the last weekend of the 4NCL was looming with champions Guildford (my team) and challengers Cheddleton neck-and-neck at the top and heading for a last-round shootout. Not the right time to lose interest in chess! I was looking for a low-effort way to keep my feeling for chess alive, and so I was very happy to spot four recent DVD’s on positional themes: two by Sergei Tiviakov and two by Adrian Mikhalchishin. Looking at the titles, I hoped that I would get some instruction and inspiration across a broad range of topics.

What do I look for in a DVD? I’ve mentioned before that I mostly watch them slumped on the sofa in a catatonic state after a day’s information overload, so I don’t want anything complicated. No long variations, no enormous digressions, just simple themes, lively examples and clear guidance. In general, these DVD’s gave me pretty much what I was looking for!

We’ll start off with Tiviakov’s The Art of Defence. When reviewing Soltis’ New Art of Defence in New In Chess 2015/2, I mentioned that there were very few good books on this topic. Sergei is renowned as an excellent defender, so I was looking forward to hearing his views on the topic.

The DVD is divided up into six sections covering different defensive techniques:

1. Exchanges (including exchanging into a fortress)
2. Eliminating dangerous pieces
3. Running with the king
4. Improving pieces
5. Counterattack
6. Prophylaxis

I will have to be honest and say that the quality of the first foursections felt uneven to me. I regularly had a troubled look on my face, wondering whether some examples really fitted the chosen theme, or perhaps more accurately, feeling that the essence of an example was something other than the theme Sergei was demonstrating. I’ll just give you an example from the very first chapter to show you what I mean.

The first section explains the common defensive technique of exchanging as many pieces as possible to simplify the situation. Tiviakov notes that this technique is also linked to another defensive technique: exchanging the opponent’s most dangerous pieces. He starts off with this classic example:

I love the example, but this is surely more an example of forcing a tactical crisis in the position before the opponent has time to mobilise completely than a demonstration of exchanging to neutralise the opponent’s position. With forcing play, Black sucks White’s pieces forward into Black’s position (Ne4-d6) and while Black’s position is collapsing (20.e4) he manages to aim a low blow at the advanced white knight (20...Rfd8), which leads to wholesale liquidation. The result of the whole operation is indeed mass exchanges, but the amount of calculation and judgement required to ensure that the position resulting after move 23 is completely drawn makes this – in my opinion – something else than a demonstration of the technique of piece exchanges.

This feeling was reinforced by the very next example:

As in the previous example, the result of the operation was mass exchanges, but I do feel again that the primary defensive technique used here was not really tightly related to the theme of the section.

In general I was lukewarm about the first four sections, which made me all the happier when the last two sections really started to grab my attention. The section on counterattack begins with a very thorough explanation of the famous game Taimanov-Larsen, Vinkovci 1970, where Tiviakov deals with all facets of this defensive technique: technical and psychological.

The DVD rounded off with a very good explanation of prophylaxis in which I particularly enjoyed the 15 minutes Tiviakov spent discussing the game Schlechter-Nimzowitsch.

Tiviakov’s explanation of the plans of both opponents (on both wings) and the cleverness of Nimzowitsch’s choices is masterly and made me look at this well-known fragment in a completely new light. In conclusion, a good DVD, with a slightly weaker start and a very strong finish! Recommended!

You can order Sergei Tiviakov's Art of Defence in the New in Chess Shop.

Another instalment in Tiviakov’s DVD strategy series is The Art of the Positional Exchange Sacrifice and a very fine achievement it is too!

Strangely enough, it’s not the first work on the subject: Russell Enterprises had brought out Sergey Kasparov’s The Exchange Sacrifice: A Practical Guide last year. That book was high on entertainment value, but I found it a little too confusing to be sure I was drawing the correct lessons from it. Tiviakov does the didactic part much better. I really liked the way he started off with a consid-eration of Nimzowitsch’s famous example position from My System.

Nimzowitsch used this as an example of the power of blockade but it’s also a very effective way of giving the viewer a feel for what the Positional Exchange Sacrifice entails and what the advantages could be.

In his ensuing discussion of the position, Tiviakov postulates some very astute ideas about the way you should play after sacrificing the exchange in this way – don’t exchange pieces, use long pawn chains – and he regularly flags these ideas when they come up later in the following sections. The material is based for 90% on classic games of Petrosian, Gligoric and Botvinnik with a few fine efforts from Sergei himself (his game against Van der Weide is particularly good) thrown in for good measure. I enjoyed it greatly, and it definitely had an effect on my thinking. When I reached the following position against Ivan Sokolov on the last day of the 4NCL weekend:

All in all, another fantastic effort from Sergei. I think we’ll stretch this one to five stars!

Order Sergei Tiviakov's Art of the Positional Exchange Sacrifice in the NiC Shop.

The above review appeared in the 4/2017 edition of New in Chess magazine.

New In Chess (NIC) was founded in 1984 and appears eight times a year. Dirk Jan ten Geuzendam is the editor-in-chief. Besides on-the-spot tournament reports, interviews, chess training and historical articles, the magazine’s hallmark are game comments by the world’s leading players, such as Magnus Carlsen, Vladimir Kramnik, Wesley So, Levon Aronian, Fabiano Caruana, Vishy Anand, Hikaru Nakamura, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, Anish Giri, Judit Polgar and many others. It is read by club players in 116 countries. A yearly subscription for eight issues costs €79.99 and can be ordered here.