Thanks for taking the time to write this article - I am off to read the rest of your blogs now

Hi Ivan,

Thanks for the interest! You ask some fair questions, so I'll do my best to answer them here.

10)f4, 12)g4.. isn't the use of the pawns guarding the white king bad practice (madness?) Pushing them forward creates a gap for black to play into?

It's not madness, but it's undoubtedly a dangerous strategy, very double-edged, but if it succeeds then the black army will be squashed flat! If it doesn't succeed tactically, then you are correct -black plays into the gaps and white's king is in trouble (as we saw in the 2 games). 

13... Rxc3.. Isn't this hugley expensive? A rook for an ineffective knight seems madness to me? I see that the d4 pawn is the aim, but it's so easily countered. It leaves the two black a & b pawns as open prey.. one immediately available to whites black bishop

It's expensive, but not hugely so. The point is that if white's pawn to g4, then g5, pushes the black knight from f6, then the Nc3 jumps to d5 and it is far from ineffective! And the attack on the e4-pawn is not easily countered-if it can't be won, it can be forced to move, once more opening up lines to the white king (the gaps behid the pawn thrusts f4 and g4!)

Also, the a and b-pawns are fairly irrelevant as the 'meat' of the play is concentrated in the centre and towards the white king (aside from which, grabbing on a7 with the bishop might allow the simple ...b6 trapping the bishop!)

Why 20... Qb6+  instead of 20)be4??

The reason for this is that Black is attacking (and in general therefore wants to keep as many pieces on as possible) and also, the black knight on g4 is a very strong piece, whereas the white knight on f2 is impotent and restricts its fellow pieces.

At the end of the sequence, I struggle to see how blacks got any real advantage.. cos White can counter by 22)Qg3??

I should probably have given more detail to the game than I did (I was only using it to show where the idea came from that I used in my own game). If white plays 22.Qg3 then black responds with 22...Rg8! White's king and queen are in serious trouble lined up along the g-file. For example 23.h3 Kh8! and now capturing the knight loses the queen (24.hxg4 Rxg4). White has no other sensible moves; if Rb1 then simply ...Qc5 keeping the pin on the knight. The White king can't escape as ALL black's pieces will be working together.

I hope this covers everything Ivan! Don't worry about values of pieces so much - think of what they are able to do in a given situation!! Giving up a rook for knight, leaving a couple of pawns hanging far from the real action, isn't such a problem if the enemy king can be targeted by the rest of your army!!

Thanks again and all the best,

Andy Burnett

Hi Andy streetfighter.. you responded (thanks!) to my maiden blog..

Playing through the second game you posted here, I couldn't help but draw sharp breaths a couple of times.. moves that I can't understand.. obviously due to inexperience. I'd be really grateful for some insight please?? (That's not a sarky comment - the skills at work here are obviously way beyond mine).

10)f4, 12)g4.. isn't the use of the pawns guarding the white king bad practice (madness?) Pushing them forward creates a gap for black to play into?

13... Rxc3.. Isn't this hugley expensive? A rook for an ineffective knight seems madness to me? I see that the d4 pawn is the aim, but it's so easily countered. It leaves the two black a & b pawns as open prey.. one immediately available to whites black bishop..

Why 20... Qb6+  instead of 20)be4??

At the end of the sequence, I struggle to see how blacks got any real advantage.. cos White can counter by 22)Qg3??

Please enlighten me, my game still has a good way to progress yet..

Thanks and respect!

Very interesting! I read somewhere that IM Silman suggest that 30% your (U1900) study hours should be devoted to analyzing master games and only 15% should be invested in Tactics.

I am surprised by the split between Master Games and Tactics and also a bit confused how to really analyze Master Games at patzer level. You easily fall into the trap of "Learning by Nodding" ("Great Move, GM!") without any significant improvement for yourself.

Any comments?

Great annotations and games. Thanks for taking the time to write it all up.

good game

thnx for that

"Do you suggest working through lots of annotated master games to try and assimilate patterns for positional themes?"

Hi Snits

Thanks for taking the time to reply : )

 Absolutely the right idea! It can be very hard work to do this the way Dvoretsky suggests, and time-consuming, but well worth the effort. I know that Scottish GM and 3-time British champion Jonathan Rowson followed this advice and he improved by leaps and bounds.

For those of us with less time available, I would suggest 'toilet reading'! Probably more suited to the male of the species (anyone remember Al Bundy from Married With Children?), this simply involves taking a chess magazine on your daily visit to the little boy's room!

Tactical patterns can be picked up very quickly simply by playing through the Winning Combinations puzzle section that every magazine carries,

while positional themes/patterns will appear time and again in the top masters games. The ones most suited to your personal opening repertoire are the ones you should earmark for a closer look when you have more time.

If you do this for 365 days a year, even only 10 or 15 minutes at a go ("Did you fall in?" is a typical cry from my partner if I've found a really good game or two to read through!) you will see a clear improvement in your results.

@zlhflans: whenever that happens (I am guessing it showed little spinning icons but not the boards)  just reload the page, and eventually you will get the page to come up with the games. I run into this more often than I'd like.

@streetfighter: Nice article. Do you suggest working through lots of annotated master games to try and assimilate patterns for positional themes? I haven't explored it more deeply yet, but I find Dvoretsky's idea of positional sketches interesting, which I imagine would also help with assimilating positional themes.  

Thanks . A great in sight into this amazing game

Thanks for the blog.  I don't play the Sicilian myself, but I still found the themes to be helpful, if perhaps still a little beyond my level.

They came on. I'm going to try that defense next time I can. I usually e5 to e4. I'll let you know how it worked for me. Hehe.

Andy, I couldn't see either game.