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Prophylactical thinking
The following game, which has been played
in 19th century, together with nice
comments by Mark Dvoretsky in his book
"Methods of Chess training" volume 1 made
a very deep impression on me and
significantly influenced my play.
Zukertort : Blackburne, London 1883
1.c4
For me the topic of the examined game is
"Prophylactical thinking", what does it mean
exactly? We are definitely all familar with
term "prophylactics" and everybody have
went through the games of Karpov and
Petrosian, who considered to be great
"prophylactical players". Here in my article
we will take this issue forward and a bit
deeper. Prophylactical thinking is the way to
anticipate your opponent ideas and even
long-term plans. In my opinion this is one of
the elements, that makes difference between
really strong and good players. We are all
pay attention, to concrete threats, created by
last move of our opponent and also we
always try to figure out the plan behind his
last moves, but do we try to realize our
opponent long-term plans, do we ask how he
will react after our move?
1...e6 2.e3 Nf6 3.Nf3 b6 4.Be2 Bb7 5.00
d5 6.d4
Through very strange move order we
reached normal position of Queens Indian
4.e3 line, with one small difference: White
bishop placed on e2, instead of usual d3
square, but here we can make discount, as
this game has been played 130 years ago!
6...Bd6 7.Nc3 00 8.b3 Nbd7 9.Bb2 Qe7?!
This is already the first example of
FIDE Surveys Boris Avrukh
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10.Nb5! Ne4 11.Nd6 cd6 12.Nd2
It's obvious, that White should chase off , or
exchange Black "annoying" knight, from
this point of view White last move looks
very logical, nevertheless Dvoretsky pointed
out, that more accurate would have been
12.Ne1 (with idea 13. f3), logically
explaining, that in position with space
advantage it makes sense to avoid
exchanges. No doubts, this rule is correct,
but I always claim, that we should figure our
concrete variations, so here I disagree with
Mark, since after 12...Qg5!, or even
12...dc4!? 13.bc4 Qg5 White has no
comfortable way to protect e3 pawn, for
example: 13.Qd3 (Or 13.Qc1 Rfc8 14.f3
Nef6 and White queen is obviously
1
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15.Bc4
According to Dvoretsky this is the right
recapture. Funnily enough during several
years, when I examined this game with my
students I was expressing the same opinion.
FIDE Surveys Boris Avrukh
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20.f4?
A remarkable moment. It's amazing, that
Dvoretsky didn't notice it in first edition, but
managed to correct it in second one. It's
amazing, that this tempting move loses all
the advantage! And as always the
"prophylactical thinking" would seriously
help here. What can be more natural than to
push f-pawn lauchning the attack on the
kingside, but if we ask what Black can do in
order to stop White attack, we can easily
understand the problem.
The most simple solution was 20.g4!,
following by advance of f-pawn.
20...g6?
Black misses a golden chance to change the
charachter of the game. After 20...f5! with
the key point, that after 21.ef6 (In case of
21.g4 g6 follwing by Ng7 and Kf7 I don't
believe White has real chances to break
through.) 21...Nf6 22.f5 Black has
22...Ne4!, with normal position.
21.Re3 f5 22.ef6 Nf6
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10.f4!N
A strong novelty found over the board, that
put a lot of questions over Black idea. I have
to admit, that "prophylactical thinking"
really helped me to find it.
10...Ng8
A sad necessity, but White was already
threatening to trap Black light-squared
bishop by means of h3, g4 etc...
11.Nh3
Another interesting option would have been
11.Nd5 Qa5 12.Nc3 Bg5 13.fg5 Qg5
14.Qf2.
11...Bg4 12.Be7 Ne7 13.Nf2 Bc8 14.000
Nd7 15.g4 Qc7
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23.Rc2!
I was not interested to remove tension on the
kingisde by playing 23.g5, so I decided to
make prophgylactics against Black idea of
playing 23...hg 24. hg Rh2, at the same time
transfering the rook to e2.
23...Rb8
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31.Qc5! 1:0.
It's really looks like a nice attacking game,
but actually a deep "prophylactical thinking"
was a reason of White success.
It's quite remarkable, but this method of
"prophylactical thinking" works in the
openings as well, this is my favourite
example.
Volokitin : Avrukh, Biel 2000
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cd4 4.Nd4 Nf6 5.Nc3
Nc6 6.Be2 e5 7.Nf3 h6 8.00 Be7 9.Re1 0
0 10.h3
This line has been popular some ten years
ago. I was intended to react with normal
10...Be6 11. Bf1 Nb8, untill once I noticed
the following remarkable idea:
FIDE Surveys Boris Avrukh
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12...Bd8!
One of the most amazing moves in the
openings I ever met. From the one hand it's
prophylactical, as we anticipate White idea
and we ready to meet it, from another hand
it's very ambitious and Black is trying to
activate his dark-squared bishop via a5, or
b6 squares.
It's clear, that White is better after 12...Be6
13.Nd5 Bd5 14.ed5 Na5 15.b3!, Smirin :
Kotronias, Gausdal 1990. Quite decent for
Black is 12...b5 13.Ng4 Ng4 14.hg4 Be6
15.Nd5 Qb7, as happened in the game
Baramidze : Meins, Heringsdorf 2000, still I
prefer White after calm 16.c3.
13.Ng4
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16Ba5!
Black dark-squared bishop successfully
joined the play and Black enjoys better
chances.
17.Re2 Ne7 18.Rd2 Rfd8 19.Qe2 d5!
and Black took over the initiative.
FIDE Surveys Boris Avrukh
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11.a4!
Having done some serious homework on
this line, I remembered that eventually I
came to the conclusion, that this useful
prophylactical move is the most accurate
one in this concrete position. White's main
choices here are 11. h3 and 11. Re1, but
somehow I got the feeling that I needed the
pawn on h2 and rook on f1.
After 11.h3 Black has the idea 11...Nh5!?
12.Bg5 f6 13.Bd2 f5 14.e4 (Of course
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14.Rb1!
Now White switches to his thematic idea
caryying out b2b4.
14...Nge5 15.b4 cb4?
A very tempting decision, typical of the
Benoni opening, Black gets a nice c5square
for his knight, but his activity appears to be
only a short-term factor, while his structural
problems start to tell in the long term.
The correct decision would have been
15...b6, still I like the white position here, as
I have a choice between clarifying the pawn
structure by means of 16.bc5 (16.Qb3!?) and
retaining the pressure on the queenside:
16...bc5 17.a5.
16.Rb4 Nf3
White would be clearly better after 16...Nc5
17.Ne5 fe5 18.Be3!.
17.ef3!
A key move in White's strategy after
provoking the f7f6 move; the recapture
with the e-pawn makes a lot of sense, as
White not only gains control over the e4
and e5squares, but also gets the e-file at his
disposal.
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23.Bf1!
A very nice positional move, that kills
Black's last chances to create counterplay
connected with the knight move to d3.
23...Rac8 24.Nd1
and it's appered, that Black positionally lost
and I managed to convert my advantage not
without adventures.