Throughout this book, starting with the first section, I have stressed the importance of the king's role in the endgame. With this in mind it is clear ti1at it pays to restrict the freedom of the opponent's king, and a good way to do this is to put a rook on the 7th rank - usually hitting a pawn or two in the process.
Q. What should White, to move, play in the position below?
A. Perhaps the most instinctive move here is 1 �a8-b7, the logic be
ing that with the black king close to its pawn, the white rook cannot cope alone. In this case the white king is too far away to make an impact, but there is a standard move here which wins on the spot: Ufa7-a5! . The aim of this move is to cut the connection between the black king and pawn. In fact the white king now has all the time in the world to come back be
cause Black is unable to advance his pawn, e.g. 1...g4-g3 2 l:.a5-a3 g3-g2 3 .l:.a3-g3. Note that in a couple of moves White will have to move his rook along the 5th rank so that his king can come by on the left of the rook.
Cutting off the king is a useful concept which the reader would do well to look out for. I would like to think that I would not miss such an opportunity again. I say this because, in the following critical game, I needed a win (which I thought I de
served) in order to gain first place in the tournament. The more I look at it, the more disappointed I feel that I was such a fool !
I had actually arrived quite late for the game because they had moved the round forward by half an hour, and the only notification had been signs in German around the Ham
burg tournament hall ! So I was rather short of time in the diagram position, but that is a poor excuse for my somewhat careless move 74 a2-a4?!.
w Ward - K.Miiller
Wichern 1992
Oddly enough, the computer data
base proves that this is actually a good move (the quickest way to win, in fact), but only with a very precise follow-up. From a practical view
point it is a bad decision, for those without a silicon brain ! Instead, I . would have done far better to play:
74 ltd4-e4!
This move cuts off the enemy king one file further away than it al
ready is. Play might have continued:
74 ... <Ji>f6-f5 Sometimes when the defender's king is cut off like this it is possible for him to defend with the rook in front of the pawn (note this is in con
trast to our usual principle of placing rooks behind passed pawns). After 74 . . J:�h3-h8 75 a2-a4, if it were not for the fact that the white rook is de
fending the a4-pawn, then Black could keep checking the king (on a8, b8 and c8). As it is the white king can just approach the rook.
Strengths and Weaknesses 97
75 l:te4-e8 76 a2-a4 77 �b4-c5 78 �c5-b5 79 �b5-a6
.l:r.h3-h2 :h2-b2+
l:tb2-a2 l:.a2-b2+
.l:r.b2-a2 Black persists in harassing the white king and pawn. Nevertheless they keep marching on. The only dif
ficulty will be extracting the king from in front of the pawn in readi
ness for promotion.
80 a4-a5 81 'itiia6-b6 82 �b6-a7 83 a5-a6 84 'ifiia7-a8 85 l:.e8-el
�f5-f6 l:ta2-b2+
ltb2-a2 :a2-b2
�f6-t7
Keeping the black king in the wil
derness to prove the point, although 85 lte8-b8 immediately would work here, too.
85 86 a6-a7
ltb2-b3 ltb3-b2 (D)
Essentially this was the position I reached in the game, but with one major difference. My rook and the black king were each one file to the
98 Strengths and Weaknesses
left. It is not swprising that this makes a significant difference to the game's outcome.
87 nel-hl
The white king and pawn have made it as far as is presently possi
ble. Now the white rook sets out to force the black rook off the b-file.
87 . • . rJ;;f7-e7
88 .l:.hl-h8 cJiie7-d7 The alternative to letting the white king out to c5, as in the text, is to of
fer him the c8-square with 88 .. . cJiie7-d6. White then wins with 89 nh8-b8 ltb2-h2 90 �a8-b7 lth2-b2+ 9 1
�b7-c8 .l:.b2-c2+ 9 2 ri;;c8-d8 nc2-h2 93 .l:.b8-b6+ �d6-c5 94 l::tb6-c6+ ! (intending to promote with check after 94 . . . cJiid6xc6) 94 .. . cJiic5-b5 95 lk6-c8.
89 .l:.h8-b8 90 �a8-b7 91 �b7-a6 92 �a6-b6 93 �b6-c5
nh2-h2 .:th2-b2+
l::.b2-a2+
.l:.a2-b2+
1-0
With spite checks running out, the a-pawn is destined to promote.
1 6) Zugzwang!
I gave the definition o f this German word earlier. This situation, in which a player's position goes from being OK to terrible simply because he has to make a move, is most often seen in the endgame stage (when fewer pieces mean less options). In a tour
nament in Denmark in 1 995 I had two incredible examples of it in suc
cessive games !
B Jansa - Ward Hiller# Politiken Cup 1995 My opponent, a pawn up but his knight in trouble, had just retreated his king with 62 cJiid4-e3. This was an amazing tournament for me. Be
fore round 1 I knew that I would need 7 out of 9 for a grandmaster norm, but I started disastrously with a draw and a loss in the first two games. I won in rounds 3 and 4 and I was eager to keep on a roll in the 5th round, despite the quality of my op
ponent.
Capturing the errant knight comes to mind, but this means losing my trump card (the f-pawn) and so de
nies Black any winning chances (there is no win because the bishop is the 'wrong' colour for the pawn). As things stand, the knight is far away from the queenside on h2, so instead I concentrated on the fact that White has a chance of running out of moves in this position.
62 �g3-g2
63 b2-b3
Already White starts to feel the strain. He is not able to move his knight because of . . . f2-fl 'ii, and the king must remain on either e3 or e2 in order to meet . . . �g2xh2 with ..t>(e2 or e3)xf2. Thus pawn moves are his only option, and we have al
ready seen that there is a limit to the number of waiting moves which can be made by pawns.
63 . • • a6-a5
64 a3-a4
This at least forces the bishop off of one of the two key diagonals. At present the bishop prevents both ..t>e3-e2 and c5-c6. The text tempo
rarily stops this excellent long-range piece from fulfilling both of these objectives, but Black has plans to re
group.
The alternative 64 b3-b4 results in an even earlier arrival of 'zugzwang' , e.g. 64 . . . a5-a4 65 c5-c6 i..b5xc6 66
�e3-e2 i..c6-b5+ 67 �e2-e3 i..b5-c4.
64
65 'iPe3-e2 66 �e2-e3
i..c6-e8 i..e8-b5+
i..b5-f3!! (D)
Strengths and Weaknesses 99
With the black bishop once again performing two crucial tasks (hold
ing back the c-pawn and denying White's king vital squares) we see that White is in total zugzwang ! 67 b3-b4 is futile in view of 67 . . . a5xb4, so instead White spoilt the party by continuing with 67 tl\h2xf3 f2-fl 'ii, resigning a few moves later.
In round 6, playing White, I man
aged to achieve a comfortable plus from the opening. With the queens off I was looking to convert this endgame:
B
Ward - Ahlander Hiller¢d Politiken Cup 1995 While Black was contemplating his 13th move I considered myself to be half a pawn up. Black has doubled c-pawns and, in contrast, White has an effective pawn majority on the kingside. As rook endings tend to of
fer more chances for the defender, I made it my aim to eliminate the rooks.
JOO Strengths and Weaknesses
By move 30, after considerable manoeuvring, this goal had been at
tained. Obviously a king and pawn ending is ideal, but I 'knew' that I should be able to win a minor-piece ending thanks to my structural ad
vantage. In particular my potential for an outside passed pawn had to be realised by a kingside pawn advance, in conjunction with the usual cen
tralisation of the king.
With Black to make his 43rd move, we join the action with me feeling in a confident mood !
43 'it>d6-e5
Clearly the g-pawn is intended as a decoy, but Black will have to deal with it sooner rather than later.
44 llib3xc5 lbb7 -d6+
Going into a pawn ending would be suicidal for Black. He needs to preserve the knight to make things awkward for me.
45 'it>c4-b4 46 �b4-a5 47 �a5-a6 48 �a6xa7 49 llic5-b7 50 a4-a5
�e5-f4 'it>f4xg4 'it>g4-f4 'iitf4-e5 lbd6-e4
White sacrifices the c-pawn, pin
ning all his hopes on the rook's pawn, encouraged by the fact that knights are poor at halting extreme wing pawns.
50 51 a5-a6 52 <it>a7-b6
lbe4xc3
�e5-d5 lbc3-b5 (D)
The black knight is now rooted to this post, where it is required to stop a6-a7(-a8'ii'). White's next task is to remove the defending knight.
53 llib7-c5 �d5-d6
54 lt:Jc5-a4 �d6-d7 55 �b6-b7
A precautionary measure to stop Black's king coming to the rescue via c8 and b8.
55 lt:Jb5-d6+
56 �b7-b8 lt:Jd6-b5 57 lt:Ja4-c3 ( D)
Offering a deflection sacrifice which cannot be taken. The result of this move is that White is now able to push the pawn a square nearer to pro
motion.
57 58 a6-a7 59 lt:Jc3-e4
lt:Jb5-c7
�d7-d8 lt:Jc7-a8 The point of this cheeky move is that after 60 �b8xa8 �d8-c8 6 1 tbe4-d6+ 'ifi>c8-c7 62 lt:Jd6-e8+ �c7-c8 there is no way out for the white king. Even without the c-pawn the position is still drawn.
60 tbe4-c5 lt:Ja8-b6 61 rJi>b8-b7 lt:Jb6-a8 62 �b7xc6
Now Black is in big trouble.
62 .. . tba8-c7 loses to 63 tbc5-e6+. I
Strengths and Weaknesses IOI
was expecting 62 . . . �d8-e7, when after the simple continuation 63 lt:Jc5-a4 rJ;e7-d8 64 lt:Ja4-b6 lt:Ja8-c7 65 �c6-b7 Black has no moves.
62 �d8-c8
63 lt:Jc5-e6! ( D)
1-0
Zugzwang ! The black king has no legal moves, leaving only the los
ing 63 .. . lt:Ja8-c7 64 lt:Je6xc7 and 63 ... tba8-b6 64 �c6xb6.
Certainly these two examples have added a lot of weight to the argument that pawns become more valuable the nearer they are to promoting.
Nevertheless, as I warned earlier the intention is not to give the reader an inflated idea of the value of pawns when compared with pieces, rather to remind you that these foot soldiers can sometimes win the battle.
Perhaps it is my imagination, but in endgame texts today a certain term seems to be all the rage. So tell me ...
102 Strengths and Weaknesses
Q. What do you think is a 'Mutual Zugzwang' ?
A . Well, zugzwang normally means that if you are compelled to move (as of course you are) then in certain critical positions you are heavily disadvantaged for having to do so. If such a zugzwang is mutual, then it applies to both players. As a basic example, take a simple king and pawn endgame.
Whoever has the move will lose.
After 1 �f5-g4 'it>d4xe4 Black wins because the white king is misplaced.
Similarly after 1. .. 'ii>d4-c5 2 'ii>f5xe5 Black cannot get his king to e7.