Highlights of this issue
Norway Chess 2020: beating the champ, ending his run!
Jan-Krzysztof Duda elaborates on his victory over Magnus Carlsen
CBM Special: AVRO tournament 1938 – clash of the generations
Alekhine, Capablanca and Euwe vs. Keres, Botvinnik & Co
Ruy Lopez: Marshall forever!
Petra Papp frees Black with 8.h3 Bb7 9. d3 d5!?
All in One 1: Semi-Tarrasch
Igor Stohl condenses all you need to know about this trendy opening
All in One 2: Najdorf with 6.Rg1
The advance g2-g4 is on - Anish Giri navigates you through the hot lines
Move by move to total domination
Replay the game Alekhine vs. Capablanca (AVRO 1938) with Simon Williams
London System – no rest for the Bf4
Alexey Kuzmin hits with the active 5...Nh5!?
Technique at its very best: good knight vs. bad bishop
The positional masterpiece Carlsen-Tari from Stavanger, explained in detail by Peter Heine Nielsen
“Capablanca’s drawing clockwork“
The 3rd world champion in sacrificial mode – one of four interactive videos in Oliver Reeh‘s tactics column
Killing the Italian with the Moeller Attack!
Christian Braun pulls an ace from his sleeve
CBM Special: AVRO 1938
This classic tournament from the Netherlands constitutes the focal point for this issue. Our authors, in their various columns, put the games of Alekhine, Capablanca Euwe, Botvinnik, Fine, Flohr, Keres and Reshevsky under the microscope.
Plus 18 selected games of the tournament victor, Paul Keres, with analyses by Yannick Pelletier, Michal Krasenkow, Karsten Müller, Emanuel Berg, Igor Stohl, Evgeny Postny et al.
Top tournament: Norway Chess 2020
Magnus Carlsen’s run of 125 classical tournament games without defeat came to an end, but in Stavanger he was victorious, ahead of Firouzja and Aronian. Jan-Krzysztof Duda annotates his win against the world champion, Alireza Firouzja puts three of his games under the microscope.
Moreover, Peter Heine Nielsen, Romain Edouard, Michal Krasenkow and Spyridon Kapnisis comment on the games by Carlsen, Caruana & Co!
“All in One”
In this issue of CBM, we have two prominent authors dissecting topical opening lines:Anish Giri looks at the Sicilian Najdorf B90:
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 a6 6.Rg1.
And Igor Stohl's object of investigation is the game Carlsen,M - Giri,A 1-0 (Chessable Masters 2020) which features the Semi-Tarrasch Defence D41:
1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nf3 d5 4.Nc3 c5
Opening videos
Erwin l'Ami shows why of late the Philidor endgame has become more attractive for White. Daniel King takes a close look at a new version of the Milner-Barry Gambit with which Carlsen was successful against Harikrishna. And Mihail Marin picks up an idea of Paul Keres in the Leningrad Variation with 7...Nc6.
Erwin l'Ami: The Philidor endgame
1.e4 d6 2.d4 Nf6 3.Nc3 e5 4.dxe5 dxe5 5.Qxd8+ Kxd8 6.Bc4
Daniel King: French Advance Variation – Milner-Barry Gambit
1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.e5 c5 4.c3 Nc6 5.Nf3 Qb6 6.Bd3 cxd4 7.0-0 Bd7 8.Nbd2
Mihail Marin: Dutch Leningrad Variation
1.c4 f5 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.g3 g6 4.Bg2 Bg7 5.Nc3 d6 6.d4 0-0 7.0-0 Nc6 8.d5 Na5 9.Qa4
New ideas for your repertoire
The new issue provides 11 opening articles with new ideas:
Patrick Zelbel: Modern Benoni 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 c5 3.d5 e6 4.Nc3 exd5 5.cxd5 d6 6.Nf3 g6 7.Bg5
Renato Quintiliano: English 1.c4 e5 2.Nc3 Nf6 3.Nf3 Nc6 4.e3 d5 5.cxd5 Nxd5 6.Bb5
Adrien Demuth: Caro-Kann 1.e4 c6 2.Nc3 d5 3.Nf3 dxe4 4.Nxe4 Nf6 5.Qe2
Evgeny Postny: Sicilian Rossolimo 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 e6 4.0-0 Nge7 5.d4 cxd4 6.Nxd4
Robert Ris: Classical Sicilian 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 Nc6 6.Nd5
Tanmay Srinath: French Winawer 6…Ne7 7.Qg4 Qc7 8.Qxg7 Rg8 9.Qxh7 cxd4 10.Ne2 Nbc6 11.f4 Bd7
Krisztian Szabo: King's Gambit 1. e4 e5 2. f4 exf4 3. Nf3 Nf6
Christian Braun: Italian Moeller-Attack 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.c3 Nf6 5.d4 exd4 6.cxd4 Bb4+ 7.Nc3 Nxe4 8.0–0
Petra Papp: Spanish Anti-Marshall 6.Re1 b5 7. Bb3 O-O 8.h3 Bb7 9.d3 d5
Alexey Kuzmin: London System 1.d4 Nf6 2.Bf4 d5 3.e3 c5 4.Nf3 Nc6 5.Nbd2 Nh5
Spyridon Kapnisis: Queen’s Gambit Vienna Variation 1.d4 d5 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.Nf3 dxc4 5.e4 b5
Topical opening traps
Trap expert Rainer Knaak presents nine examples from current online tournament practice - three of them in video format.
“The Classic”
The trainer of the German national team is happy that this time he can demonstrate to you “one of the most classical games it exists": the game Botvinnik-Capablanca from the AVRO tournament of 1938 may well have become famous first and foremost for its finish. But Dorian Rogozenco explains that Botvinnik’s plan in the Rubinstein Variation of the Nimzo-Indian Defence is not only very instructive in itself but has long been elevated to the rank of a strategic classic: White does not develop his king’s knight to f3 but to e2, in order to prepare the advance of his pawns with f2-f3-f4 and e3-e4-e5. And in fact the pawn which had advanced to e7 was decisive in Botvinnik’s masterly combination at the end of the game!
“AVRO 1938 - Strategy”
At the time of AVRO 1938 all the subtleties which accompany doubled pawn structures had not yet been recognised. With the help of your strategy expert, Mihail Marin, find the best moves which were overlooked by the finest connoisseurs of the day. Including several training tasks and an introductory video!
"Move by Move"
At the time of the AVRO tournament in 1938 Alexander Alekhine was the reigning world champion. So, what could be more appropriate than to choose for our training a game of Alekhine’s from that tournament, and specifically his win against the predecessor from whom he had wrested the chess throne, Jose Raul Capablanca! Go through the game with Simon Williams. Play like Alekhine: seize the initiative on both sides of the board and with every move tie down the opponent’s options. All the way to total domination and the resignation of your opponent despite a full board!
Tactics: “Tricky trades and king actions”
Oliver Reeh’s tactics article contains 30 games with training questions, 20 from the Russian Higher League in Sochi, 9 from AVRO 1938, plus one from the German Bundesliga. Oliver Reeh once again recorded his four favourite combinations in interactive video format.
Karsten Müller: “Endgame highlights, then and now”
Karsten Müller has contributed four articles, with above all a collection of the high points of the AVRO tournament of 1938 and from Norway Chess 2020. Moreover, in "Recent pawn endings" the endgame expert from Hamburg presents several instructive examples.
