Punish this Greedy Player

The chess champion and philosopher E. Lasker was not fond of greed and spoke of ways of punishing greed and avarice in life and chess.

Lordi, a 50 year old player at the Internet Chess Club, must not be familiar with Lasker's aversion for pawn grabbing out of the opening. With the White pieces, Lordi misplaces a Bishop at a3 and a Knight at a4 to win the Black c5 pawn. Dan Heisman would get nauseous and Rowson would excoriate the Indian player fot not "talking to the Horse and Prelate" before engaging in such unprincipled abuse of the Royal Game! You see this idea in the Nimzo Indian Defense, but the pawn chains are more locked up or closed.

So how do we punish this careless and materialistic Caissa sacrilege? The move is not  obvious, but it refutes White's poor understanding of material and piece coordination. Alex Yermolinsky student Rikkitikkitavi also still battles the addiction of pawn grabbing in opening and late middle game. The relatively slow move solution appears under the diagram.

Qe7!

Capturing c3 Knight in Nimzo Indian Defense Unprovoked

The Nimzo-Indian Defense reaction to 1.d4 2. c4 3.Nc3 is likely the best Black Defense. There are many die hard Gruenfeld and Slav Defense players who would vehemently contest this claim, but Super GMs such as Anatoly Karpov and Michael Adams play move orders that avoid the Nimzo-Indian which is characterized by Bb4 pinning the c3 Knight and "threatening pawn doubling".

In the diagrammed position, BIV of the United  States playing at the ICC, ill-advisedly played Bishop captures Knight without being provoked by a3. The drawback to the premature capture, giving up the mini exchange according to Fischer, is that White has not blocked his f-pawn with Nf3. The f pawn can spearhead a line-opening attack against the Black King. The lines being the f file and the c1-h6 diagonal.

Also the  e2 White Knight can become fatally aggressive by hopping to g3 and h5 accentuating the pinned Black Horse at f6.

Black greedily went after one of the doubled c pawns at c4 by misplacing his Knight at a5 millions of miles from the King Side where it might play a defensive role. The materialist plan of winning the the c4 pawn with the aforementioned Knight and Bishop to a6 is unsound as proved in this game where Black was crushed to death by a merciless White attack for his greedy forays on the other side of the board!

GM Roman Dzindzichashvili, who was sort of a sleazy, Bohemian, con-artist type back in the 80s and early 90s at many United States USCF tournaments, has written some excellent stuff regarding the demerits of capturing at c3 too early in the Nimzo-Indian.

The definition Rudy and Jimbo Loved

The Rudolf Spielmann definition(The late NM Jim Gallagher of San Antonio,TX was quite fond of this definition) of a chess sacrifice is the giving up of material where the goal is not necessarily to recover the material, but to create a difficult to defend position. Also the consequences of a true sacrifice are incalculable.




In the following position, with Black to Move, Bishop captures at h3 is to be considered. Black gets two pawns for the sacrificed Bishop and pressure on the the White Monarch. Since White has not done anything wrong other than not play for the initiative, you wouldn't expect him to be losing.

I have seen these type of sacrifices be well defended where the defender takes it to the ending while maybe dropping another pawn yielding an imbalance( A mainstay in Jeremy Silman's lexicon) of 3 pawns for the piece.

So a relatively common outcome for this type of sacrifice would be a minor piece and six pawns versus two minors and three pawns. All truly in keeping with the incalculable aspect of the piece sac definition Jim was so fond of.

Also it is vital that a strong chess player realizes that the goal of sacrifice is to not necessarily recover the material or to quickly checkmate the enemy King. A sacrifice can place psychological(the word that Fischer hated) pressure on the defender inducing mistakes leading to excellent practical results. Just don't sacrifice against Carlsen, even in a simul, as he proved in his win against Anand that he does not not make mistakes even under the blistering weather of an attack, e.g. how he got his Knight to e8 defending the mating square g7 on Black side of Nimzo Indian.

Capturing at c3 too early in the Nimzo Indian

The below chess diagram is an example of a theoretical opening mistake by Black with significant practical implications.

Specifically in this Nimzo Indian Defense Black captured the c3 Knight with his f8 Bishop without any provocation which is OK only after White has placed his King's Knight on f3.

Why is this important? Capturing the c3 Knight is part of a long term blockade strategy for Black where he intends to construct an unbreakable pawn barrier comprised of the c5,d6, and e5 pawns and fight like hell to keep the position closed.



A natural enemy to this is the White f4 pawn which seeks to open files and diagonals that will favor the c1 Bishop which is currently quite immobile and immured by his own pawns.

Note that in the diagram, the White Knight developed to the e2 square staying out of the way of the f2 pawn which will advance in an attempt to liberate the Queen's Bishop aimed at the Black Kingside. This may not seem like a big deal,but remember Black has no dark squared Bishop to oppose White's.

Black gave up that piece to produce a rigid, blocking pawn structure and give White weak doubled c pawns.

Huebner System: A Tough Nut to Crack

The Huebner blockading variation of the Nimzo Indian defense is so feared by many Chess grandmasters that they will play White systems that avoid it. This is the ultimate compliment to arguably the best defense in chess to a queen pawn opening.

Roman Dzindzichashvili, in his excellent video on this opening largely due to the efforts of German GM Robert Huebner, points out subtleties like what White should do if Black captures the Knight at c3 too early with his Bishop. If the White Knight has not already developed to f3 prior to this capture, then Ne2 gives White the option of not blocking the f pawn and allowing its advance which will very likely turn the c1 Bishop into a menace.



In the diagrammed position White, also, wants to play the pawn lever f4, but it will require much preparation with Black taking all measures to keep the character of the position closed while eyeing the weak c4 pawn.