 Good evening ladies and gentlemen, welcome to our masterclass at the trade-wise Gibraltar Chess Festival. I'm very happy to have with us today, giving us a lesson and interacting with us Grandmaster Varujan Akhobyan. Hi Kanya, I'm glad to be here and I prepared this game to go over. Right. Now Var, before we get into the game, tell us why you chose this game and why do you like it so much that you're going to show it tonight? Well, I think it's my best game of this tournament, you know, for the ones I played. I've had a lot of long games, you know, last couple of games was kind of frustrating. I had a lot of long games and they ended in a draw. This one was, you know, I think it's just a really good game, a lot of interesting ideas and I hope to explain to the audience the best way I can so they can understand some of the moves. And I believe I played really precisely. I checked afterwards with the computer just to make sure and it's really like a lot of my moves actually. Right, so you're going to show us your game from today? Yeah, from round 7. Right, and this was against Shardul Gagari from India. Shardul Gagari, Grandmaster from India. His rating is not very high but it's actually a very strong player. Do you think he's one of the underrated in India? Definitely, definitely. It's pretty common. Yes, yes. He beat the Grandmaster Vityugov with black and they beat Eduard Romain with black and had very, very good performance and only lost to Aranya in yesterday. So he's still gaining a lot of rating points and when I was preparing for him, I look at a lot of his games and he had a lot of wins with block against very strong Grandmasters. So I can see that he's a very talented player. But I found that he, you know, his opening repertoire is a little bit narrow and he kind of went into the line that he plays and I had some pretty good preparation. That's actually quite an interesting insight into how top Grandmasters prepare. So you see the openings that your opponent is playing and try and catch their weaknesses. Absolutely. I mean, I look at the statistics, which lines he does well. And in this line, he had a couple of losses. He had a loss against Sashiki Ram in 2015. He had lost to Nigel Short recently in this line. He did have some wins as well but I just look at mainly how does he do against top Grandmasters when he plays and I realize that maybe he's not as comfortable in this line. And I look at the recent theory and check a couple of lines with the computer and just went for it. Is this the first time that you played against him? Yes, the first time I played him but I played some of the very young and talented Indian players. So they've been giving you a lot of hard time in the tournament so far. They're very tricky. Yeah, so I've been losing a lot of rating points but now finally I had a good game. All right, let's go. Let's start. Yeah, so I played d4 and I always play d4 so there's no surprise. And my opponent almost always plays the names of Indian recently. He also played Queens Gamut accepted a couple of years ago but his recent games are all names of Indian. So I could play Nf3 here but then I have to worry about several moves here as block. Bishop b4, check, d5. So that's why I decided to just go for the Nc3 line. At least now I know that we're gonna have the Nf3 defense. Because he only plays the Nf3. Yeah, he plays the Nf3 and in fact when you're preparing, oftentimes you can see me... I play both Nc3 and Nf3 but sometimes I don't play Nf3 if I see my opponents play so many different lines against it. The early b6, bishop b4, d5. So there could be so many different transpositions with Nc3 at least more or less you know it's gonna be a Nf3 defense. So he played bishop b4 and Qc2 and this is a line I was mentioning that you know he plays c5 which is not the main line here. The main lines are you can castle here or you can play for example d5. d5. These are the two the main lines. But I noticed the first thing I noticed when I was preparing that he plays c5 exclusively and that opened up a little window for me to you know try to see if I can get something comfortable. So that was like a signal for you that this could be a hole in his repertoire. Yeah exactly then I realized that you know I should just look at this line and just not to worry about so many different things. I just prepared this and if he plays this I'll play my preparation. If he avoids it then he's playing something completely different. So as expected I took and now he castles. So either way it's good for you because if he plays something different you know it's a new position for him and he doesn't have that experience. Absolutely. And if he plays this you prepared for it. Absolutely but one thing is also is very important to notice when you when I'm playing with white I also look at my opponent to see what he plays as white because sometimes yeah you know he is a d4 player himself. So that's why he would know a lot of the d4 positions because he plays it himself. So it makes a difference when opponent is a e4 player because you know he wouldn't be very familiar with the d4 structure. So yeah so I think a lot of the top players when they prepare they look at this if they're playing some some opponents that they're not familiar with. So look at the other color. Yeah because I wanted to know like what he plays actually against Nimzo. That will give you a little bit. He played knight f3 against Nimzo. Okay. So I just try to play something that he wouldn't be very familiar with. And a3 and in this position he has to take back with the bishop on c5 because the bishop c3 lines they're no longer work here because he is just not going to be able to pick up the pawn back here. I would just play b4 and protect my pawn. So that's why he had to play the move bishop c5 and knight and he had a first surprise of the game because he played the move b6. In the previous five games I saw he always played the move bishop e7 here including his recent game against Nigel Short. So bishop e7 was the move. It's a rare move. He's trying to get a hedgehog set up with d6 knight bd7 and b6 bishop b7. But this move allows e4 and white is better here. And this is what you had in mind. Yeah. This is what I had in mind and I was probably going to play something like bishop f4. But he played the move b6 which is theory. So it just goes into a maroxi setup. He's trying to but with the b6 move it's very hard now to get. Now he's trying to get the maroxi by like let's say if I played something like e3 for example he will just play bishop e7, bishop e2 and actually black goes back bishop e7 I castle d6. Let's say you play b4, knight bd7 and in this position it looks good for white but in fact black is very solid here. So rook fd1, queen c7 and rook comes to c8, queen comes to b8. Exactly queen a8 and it's very difficult to do anything here. So it looks good for white but you can't really prove that you have an advantage here. So that's why you have to play bishop f4 here in this position because this way I'm preventing him from getting that setup here and you will see just in a second bishop e7 and now another very important move rook d1. So not the usual e3? No not yet because if you play e3 he might still be able to get that setup. Bishop e7 and d6. The difference now is when I start with a move rook d1 if you try to get the setup with bishop e7 actually you don't have time. I play e4, d6, e5 very strong and queen is pinned on d8. So that was my idea behind these moves because it's a bit unusual. I mean I'm leaving the bishop here, rook here and not pushing the pawn but rook on d1 is causing a lot of problems here and he can never play the move queen e7 by the way because after b4 the bishop is trapped. And he wasn't very comfortable because he was spending a lot of, yeah it's still theory this but it's a good line for white. White is better here. So he was spending a lot of time like 10-15 minutes each move which you know made me think that he wasn't expecting this. Probably expecting the queens with knight f3. Knight f3 yeah. So I played e3 here and now he just cannot get the setup so he went for this idea h6. Bishop e2. White is very comfortable. I'm hoping to castle play the move rook d2, rook fd1 and with a nice pressure on d7. So that's why he decided to play very concrete here while I'm not castled yet. He played the move knight h5 trying to get rid of my strong bishop on f4. Now I think the next few moves are forced. Bishop d6 I have to play. I mean if I go bishop g3 black is just equalizing easily here because he will have the pair of the bishops. But why do you think he went for this slightly forcing way of playing with knight h5 because there's actually no comfortable way for black to develop anymore? Yes I mean he's worse and I think he's very tactical player. A lot of his wins against strong players. He comes up with some really great tactics and you will see in this game he was trying to do a lot of tactics and a lot of tricks he had. I had to watch out for so he's a very good tactical player. So this move I believe he played he spent some time and it was based on a fact that he wanted to try to get some tactical ideas. You will see takes takes it's concrete queen e7. Now if I move the rook back I don't have much advantage actually because he will go back knight f6, castle and he will get that same d6, rook fd8. Yeah it looks like you have a little bit of pressure but not much. Even if you try knight b5 he can even just go knight e8 and then a6, rook a6, knight f6 and black is okay here still. So this is a very important moment here. I really have to play the next move if I want to go for a serious advantage so that's queen d2. How much time did you take at this critical moment? To be honest with you I would have probably played this even quicker if it was a blitz game but I just wanted to just double check the lines and I was just trying to understand where is he going because positionally it looks really bad for him. I mean I have this strong rook on d6 I'm ready to castle play rook fd1 and he's not going to be able to get rid of my rook here so I was just trying to understand where is he going where is his ideas here. So black really needs d6 in this position? He does. He absolutely has to get d6 and or do something else but then I realized knight f6, castle and here he played the only move that would you know keep him in the game knight a5 very strong move and here where tricks begin here because now this move is threatening very strong knight b3 and if let's say I play the move I have few options here I have knight e5 very interesting rook fd1 and b4 so I had to choose between these three moves here so if I play knight e5 I didn't like the move knight b3 attacking my queen and now if I go to d3 he can even play knight c5 so if I go queen d1 now my rook cannot move and now my rook on f1 is stuck as well here so I didn't really like this he can even go here and then rook ac8 I don't like the way my pieces are placed here so I rejected this line I was considering the move knight e5 because the idea now I would like to just take just threatening knight d7 but now he plays this move knight b3 attacking my queen and again I don't want to put the queen on d1 because that will block my rook from coming in and if I go queen d3 knight c5 very strong so I realize that I have to play the move before so you want this d1 square for the rook exactly yeah you don't want to put your queen on d1 and I want to put a queen on d3 and a rook on d1 yes but I got to cover the c5 score so this night is not going to be able to brass me with knight c5 ideas right and I have to ask you that in this position after 9d5 is black also threatening a move like 9d5 or that's not a threat 9d5 it's not a threat immediately because I have for example if you just played something like h3 just h3 knight d5 in fact in this particular position I probably have to play this yeah you cannot take on fd6 because of knight f6 discovery check winning the queen so I have to take back this yeah that's and I can probably get this position which white will have a good compensation but maybe not much more not much more yes that's another threat absolutely so so before you have to play this move of course my main idea was bishop f3 this is where I spent a lot of my time calculating the bishop f3 and all the consequences after this move because after he takes I cannot take back with the bishop because that loses to knight c4 attacking the queen and the rook so I have to play g takes f3 now the knight is under attack so if he goes knight c6 then I can even just play f4 my rook is still very strong on the six so I was considering this move 9b7 to try to remove my rook but then the knight is really misplaced on b7 I go rook d4 and now even if you place the move d6 I will play f4 following it out with bishop f3 putting a lot of pressure the knight is very poorly placed on b7 doesn't have any squares to go to and ideas like e5 I can always capture once and if nothing else I always have this idea and white will always be better here again due to the fact that knight is really badly placed on b7 against the knight so he probably didn't like this idea probably objectively this is probably the best line for him and he's hard to give up this bishop on b7 because you always feel it's very strong it could be just have a look at this line again because I think this is very this is a very important moment so you have to take with the I have to take with the pawn I have to return with my knight to b7 yeah if you go 96 again I just I just play I can play for example even f4 and rook f1 bishop f3 a lot of pressure against d7 pawn right so and knight b7 you just I just go rook d4 and your idea is to go f4 bishop f3 f4 bishop yeah you can try to play a little active with a pawn but I would just play it's it's it's tricky because now you really weaken the b6 pawn as well so I go rook b1 you take there is not much you're gonna be able to do on a file and my plan is again the same idea f4 bishop f3 and playing against the poorly placed knight here so I think slightly better not not a big advantage but I think slightly better for sure for right here that's actually I mean that's very strong positional concept and positional understanding because you're playing against this piece it does you're not obviously I mean it's not like you have a material advantage or anything but but the position is actually quite difficult for black hair absolutely it's nowadays it's very hard to get anything more you know in opening everybody know theory so it's something like this is you know pretty much the maximum we can hope for to get just a comfortable small advantage here but his move is actually quite tricky he played he played a move knight b3 so he didn't see here we can get back I know I know I know but it's this very tricky move so he played this after some consideration here and okay I have two options here Queen d3 and Queen d1 so again I just the concept is you never want to put the Queen on d1 in this in this position and here it's very concrete idea if you go here he had a very nice trick here can anybody see the move that they had in mind I didn't see it at first and then I start calculating I say he must have some trick here because no one's going to blunder the night well well I'm not really trying to take it but if you move the rope next move yeah but then I realized it's just a really nice idea he has anybody exactly see usually don't expect this move it's just such a you know rare idea but the night see one is a beautiful move because it's like a deflection I can't take it because I dropped my rope and then he takes my light school bishop and I don't have anything I might yeah very very nice trick yeah so and then I I had to play this move but I knew that he has something because again if I put this here and the next one player look at the one this night is trapped yes so now he had another trick prepared e5 very strong move and now block has two threats here so the first threat it's obvious he's starting to play e4 but what is the second threat do you see the second threat yes night exactly the next one this night before blockading the defile and I will have to sacrifice in exchange so now it's a very concrete here it seems like maybe he's taking over the initiative here so he's got two threats yeah e4 just forking and night d4 interference and picking up my exchange I mean I can probably at first I thought this was really strong to be honest because if he plays e4 it doesn't work I have this strong knight takes e4 if bishop takes e4 I take queen b3 and I'm up upon and close to be winning and if he takes back with the knight I was quite happy because I have rook d7 picking up d7 at first I thought maybe I'm just winning but then I realized let's me double check and then you found and then I see this night before move beautiful idea again and now I'm forced to give up an exchange oh another idea if I take hoping that if he takes back he has this move I mean I'm doing great here I'm d3 and rook d3 and then I also take on the seven but the problem here I think he has this move in between move e4 attacking my queen and next one he will pick up my rook so unbelievable so many tricks yeah that's that's amazing just where I've got to go back because there's so much going on in this position and so many pieces hanging yes yes and so many threats so at this moment night d5 is not working at this moment night d5 is not working CD5 CD5 sorry there are few few things here I can do let's see here I think I think I was just gonna do this take you cannot take again and then the night is trapped yeah yeah that's the simplest way so this was your reputation yes for that line yeah so he went e5 yeah and it was very difficult I had to I mean I had to find this idea and calculate really deep here because I could be worse here I mean it's it's so many tricks he has so what do you think what should play here I mean one big point is that this night on b3 is trapped yes exactly and you have to use that but but he has his own threats and sort of my rook is trapped here I mean as a bailout method I had this but I mean this is not something that okay I can play this and claim I have some compensation because I have good pieces and a pawn for exchange this is about equal but then I started to calculate and even before going into this I knew that you know this line is possibly gonna work so I had to just work out the rest of the line so the movies rook takes f6 so I get rid of my rook that was hanging on this six and now I'm just gonna play and try to trap this b3 knight right so and we have a suggestion of knight e4 here but that like you said does not work because night before just rupti seven yes you've got this rupti seven yeah so but now when I took now he played e4 another in between move in fact it's it's the same thing if he plays queen f6 that actually will allow additional move rupti one I might even play this move or I can just play queen c2 which was which is gonna be a transposition into the game you will see e4 knight e1 is the game so he played e4 I go queen c2 and I think he underestimated this position knight e1 I go to a very ugly square but that's the only square I have available for the knight I cannot go to d2 I cannot go to d4 h4 so I have to go to this very ugly square and but the knight is dropped and if he goes knight a1 queen b2 a5 and important to keep it closed you can't take any one because of maybe yes just keep it close and collect the knight and then knight c2 knight e4 is winning so here he started to think and I realized he probably overlooked something or maybe underestimated this position that he thought maybe he'll have some contra play and it seems like nothing really works here and he went for knight d4 idea to you know sacrifice the knight but at least he will gain a pawn yes so he played a move knight d4 I think it's his best option at least he will get a pawn here if d5 yeah that's is another move I have to take he takes c4 I was thinking about this because this opens up the positions and it's good for the player who has two rooks but here I think it's very important move knight e2 the threat is queen c6 now and c3 is hanging so knight e2 is very strong now to put the knight on d4 where is the bishop going let's see ah maybe queen c6 okay so let's me maybe knight to b5 instead yes I just keep this I just basically need to put a bishop on e2 knight on d4 and then knight c2 the knight will come out okay so the setup you're aiming for is bishop on e2 knight d4 yeah like something like this I just just go ahead now first you go to b2 b2 b2 and I'm also still threatening knight a7 too so but let's say he plays a6 I just need to consolidate the position I may as well actually just go bishop d5 here trade pieces eventually the knight will come out either through c2 or g3 knight g2 eventually my pieces will come out and I think you know the two pieces versus rook is gonna prevail so but I had to make sure something like this I was worried about a little bit because position gets open and the rooks can become strong and my pieces are discoordinated but I think I'm just I'm just in time so he played knight d4 took I mean this is still not so easy because I still he has a rook and a pawn for two pieces still I have to play very very precisely here and it's so I spent some time here I was considering given i b5 but I realized what I need to do is I need to put a knight on c2 here knight is very strong on c2 here I can get my rook into the game and then eventually the knight is gonna come to e3 that is a very strong outpost for the knight so the square that you're aiming for for the even knight is e3 I was actually reading this book by Galfin where he talks about finding the right squares for the pieces and that sort of helps you to understand what moves to play next exactly you get that your knight on e1 needs to be the next piece that needs to come out exactly in general when opponent has central pawn there is advanced like this in general just you want to block it with a knight that would be a good good good way to do it so I played the move queen b3 now I would like to play the move knight c2 and if he plays the move e3 I was gonna play knight c2 takes rook f2 knights are guarding every square and in fact if you play the move queen d2 I have just bishop f3 attacking the queen and b7 and queen c1 you got rook f1 just rook f1 and now I'm winning again knight is very strong on c2 is covering very important e3 square so in this line so he probably has to put the queen somewhere here and again we see how strong the knight is on c2 I have to exchange the light score bishop again knight is doing a great job now covering e1 and because because now I will have an outpost for my knight on d5 and I will be able to put one knight on d5 another knight only three and and just basically try to attack him but once once the knight lands on d5 it's gonna be very strong so he doesn't really have any threats like I was looking at lines like knight d5 so again he doesn't even have a check all the scores the knight covers so like even can play here I can just go knight 3 check I have rook f1 and queen will come to c3 h3 king h2 this is a very safe position for white should be just technically winning here so this queen b3 was very important but now he played the move f5 I think he has to try something so he's got a pawn advantage there so he's advancing his pawn so knight c2 and played queen f6 in fact both if he played the move queen e5 my idea is gonna be same and this is very important when opponent is about to advance his pawns and when pawn gets on f4 it's gonna be very annoying you always have to watch out for f3 in some positions even e3 so you want to try to stop that and the way to do it here is f4 again now I would like to put a knight on e3 and block it everything and if he takes on pass on then Bishop takes f3 we get similar position with the knight landing on d5 and King is actually a little bit exposed now with f5 pawn move so probably this was his best line to play but this is I think still should be technically aiming to open up files for his rook yes so I think yeah he should have probably done something like this I think it's still winning but maybe a little bit more chances for him maybe I just go h3 here rookie 3 I can trade piece the knights are very strong here right and eventually I think white will just win but he didn't he didn't like this so he went back he played king h8 and now I'm very happy with the knight only 3 now basically after this move the the white is just winning here because there is no contraplay the next move is going to be a rook d1 and some 95 96 ideas coming this is I already felt very comfortable here and he went for this Queen d4 move I think he probably overlooked my next move here or the idea so Queen d4 he played he was also alone time 9 p5 and perhaps he was counting on the fact he can play Queen d2 attacking the bishop but here I have a very nice move here fish page 5 that's good to I was thinking to play King f2 actually with idea rook d1 just chopping the Queen yeah with probably Bishop h5 he can go Queen d3 yes it's still winning but yeah I think I really like King f2 because it just controls everything and now you just play the move rook d1 and the Queen is trapped I even looked at this line a5 rook d1 and just could be one and no matter so yeah after King f2 he probably can't even defend against yeah so yeah of course yeah that means he lost like two temples now he had to go back rook d1 but I think after the knight only 3 it's just lost I just had to be a little bit careful here because he will do another aggressive move g5 and this is the right way to play when you're losing you should try to go for the most aggressive idea perhaps confuse your opponent yeah he could have played like some defensive move but then he's just losing after b5 the bishop is getting trapped so at least he's trying to complicate the matters with g5 and you know I just had to be precise here so there's so many ideas here and tempting options I had like for example I was very happy to see this but then it seems like I'm just winning after rook d6 right but then suddenly this check is very annoying so so I didn't want to allow this I didn't want to allow much counter play so yes I mean yeah you have to be careful see if you just play g3 then suddenly he takes takes some checks and some counter play so I had to be precise and luckily I had enough time here so I took a couple of minutes here and calculate the most precise idea maybe this is winning as well to be honest something like this queen h3 with a lot of threats but I just wanted something clean with no counter play and then I was happy to see this idea I just took now if takes back with the pawn I just take knight f5 so he has to take with the queen and now very important move queen c3 check bringing the queen into the game and now the black king is exposed here he has two options King g8 or King h7 he played King h7 but King g8 is also not very good at some point I'll have c5 and bishop c4 check coming so he played here it's lost anyway here and now b5 trapping the bishop the idea behind this move is now if he plays f4 which is his only idea I capture the bishop he takes only three and now knight takes e4 attacking the queen and now the killer of d7 is coming in so that's why I gave you a check to force the king to come to h7 so I can have this idea yeah this line is very strong even with a king on and g8 so but this way it's just even stronger so I think he realized that so he didn't play this so he just played rook a d8 and now again if you can take material just calculate and take don't go for anything more fancy and I'm ahead a lot of material here but I just decided to give up one piece back just to simplify so it takes he took bishop takes and now again the final move of the game queen e3 blockading with idea bishops e2 so he resigned here I just complete everything so so yeah I'm happy to play a good game after I had a really long three days in a row I played a hundred and five moves in round four and then I had another six and a half hour two games so so I was happy to have a little short game but I have to say I mean it might have been a short game but there was a lot of calculation yeah yeah yes I mean it's and the most important thing is the what makes me happy when you go back and start check to see the lines you calculate are good yes that they actually work that shows that you know your your brain was working you know you you know doing a good job because you can calculate a lot of stuff but it's if it's not correct a lot of these lines are very precise even after checking with the computer you know you were saying this idea with night a5 and night b3 is very interesting and it was interesting but it just seemed to end up in a position that was worse for black yes where do you think he what was the point I think actually went wrong then I think I think he choose the line okay the first to start with the c5 it's not a move that equalizes because then everybody would be playing this so this this is I think this line is slightly inferior to start with and then he didn't play he didn't play the the very main main lines you know so I think like like for example there are there are some other lines in this position like he like his bishop e7 move was a possibility he could have maybe played that that's a little bit more solid so it seems like this b6 line it's slightly better for white one thing I can pinpoint I think this move is interesting there's a night h5 move here that you can try to play with ideas f5 a little bit more aggressive but still I think white is I looked at this move not very deeply but I looked at it yeah I was just to get to get some ideas so and I think he really based on his calculation on this move night a5 I think he let's see here if we can get that position so he was counting on the fact that this night a5 is gonna work I mean it was a very long line and it perhaps he just overlooked the very strange looking 91 move at the end of that line it's it is a very good tactical player but it's possible to miscalculate and just 91 is a hard move to see maybe in a long line he missed that I do have this 91 square for my night to go to but yeah it looks like it's just it's just not gonna work this concept and probably the best option was just to take on b3 and we discussed this line so bishop f3 and play this g takes it this doesn't work so I have to play and you just go back with the night yeah go back and just I think it's slightly worse not not I mean just the night is misplaced but it's just very slightly worse the problem with moves like night b3 is that if it doesn't work yes you're probably just losing yes and yeah it didn't quite work out but again there were so many nice tricks and he was probably interested in you know seeing some queen d1 night c1 idea it was very very tempting you know but yeah I calculated that you know I have queen d3 and looks like yeah there is nothing really black can do yeah I mean yeah this move is hard because you just you just give up the rook for a night and then you just calculate that the night is trapped yeah I mean yeah perhaps this 91 move and taking only on f3 first does not work because you just take bishop f3 no actually if you do that if you take just go rook takes it's even better bishop takes f3 bishop f3 the rook is hanging and the night is trapped this is just completely winning right yeah so the rook made some nice to a rook d6 rook f6 rook f3 yeah so and he couldn't also play gf because then his king is first of all completely exposed and now I think I will just do the same idea queen c2 it's important to move the queen away from this e4 threat so g takes f was still keeping the threat of e4 so that's why I go queen c2 now the knight is trapped and if you play this move and now I don't have to go back to on e1 I actually have a better square h4 and then eventually night will come to a 5 so and the knight is still trapped yeah even if he goes something like queen e5 you can always after taking the knight on b3 or g3 exactly yeah knight is very safe here and so I calculated this too just in case so yeah this this I think what's amazing is that this this game actually illustrates the problems that black can face if if they're not able to play moves like d6 and d5 in such situations once you get this bind in with rook on d6 exactly very hard yeah I mean very hard to do anything I mean if I'm just basically one more move I let's say you let's say he would play this move then I play this and next one was before coming and you really cannot do anything to remove this you cannot even play bishop c8 with idea 98 because that runs into rook c6 yes so you really don't really have a way to remove this bind bishop c8 defending the d7 pawn is not here but drops yeah drops that so okay maybe he can yes but yeah but then knight b8 yeah maybe something like this just to get 98 and but I did I just have the eight yeah here I might just play just a useful move h3 98 and I've looked it read and this is hanging so I looked the four knight c6 but even this the seven hang so you cannot win the six I play d6 first and do I have time now for this 95 we have to calculate bishop f3 almost always will be better for white yeah I mean something like this lots of pressure but you can perhaps just play night c6 in that it works night c6 96 94 and it looks like you're first yeah 92 yeah so yeah but but yeah I mean this takes lots of efforts you know to put all the nights back I'm sure we can play I'm pretty sure we can play better for white you know maybe we just need to play for something I'm sure we can play better for white to to have a decent advantage here perhaps just e4 night c6 it'll cost back to d3 yeah because at night only it is also not coming back yeah yeah and at some point you have to watch out for some e5 ideas 95 95 you don't have enough defense and takes and the eight thanks yes instead of castle so we have a suggestion instead of black going castle on move five yeah a queen c7 here okay yes yes yes you can play this you can also play bishop c5 here immediately this is another rail line this was played by a copian the point of this move is that you actually you can actually get a hedgehog here I actually played a couple of times as black the point here is that you very quickly go queen b6 so you're not allowing the bishop to come out so you force them e3 and then you drop back on e7 I mean you lose a lot of temples but you play a six queen c7 d6 eventually you can get a hedgehog and then white wants to develop this bishop on b2 yes but in this line white can be sometimes aggressive like b3 bishop b2 and this is g4 g5 idea could be played so because black loses a lot of temples so sometimes white can play something like this even Carlson had a game long time ago like you want with this g4 g5 because you have lots of extra ten pieces so it's a possibility but I think objectively the line it's it's white is still better doing really well in this line even with queen c7 but yeah in this particular game we just came down to that one temple if he had extra temple he could try to remove the rook but he just didn't have that extra temple so going back to the game so again it's a very important move rook d1 here because it's not the most obvious move here it looks like you should just play e3 bishop b2 but then you come up with the rook d1 first again the point here is that if the bishop drops back I don't want to play bishop d6 I would like to play the move e4 here which is very strong not allowing these not allowing d6 d6 is probably loses to e5 here and we take on d6 and so many times that happens when we were playing especially at the beginning of the game we make these what we call hand moves you know moves like e3 just taking out our bishop we are missing out on critical moments like this then it happens all the time like if I didn't know the idea or it was a blitz game maybe I would have just played e3 very natural move but this I just knew about this idea because there are some lines here that knight h5 white even goes back like bishop g5 s6 you actually go back on c1 after creating a weakness and now you basically threatening g4 just trapping the yeah trapping if you go bishop h4 then the knight has the f4 score so he has to play f5 so this this is this theory perhaps this is the direction now the black should go for but it looks it looks better for white but this this could be I think maybe g3 bishop g2 it's a possibility here as well that's very interesting and I think what at least what's fascinating for me in this game is that there's this very strong positional concept in it of binding blacks pieces not allowing but at the same time there are so many tactical tricks that you have to be aware of so it's sort of combining positional and tactical aspects absolutely yeah I had to I had to watch out like like this is the critical position right here where he has two threats I mean the most obvious is e4 and the other one which is harder to see is so it's possible you can just play think of there's a great move of the one you play thinking okay I stopped this move e4 next move I just play Qc2 and I'm just winning the game the knight is just gonna be trapped and then suddenly out of nowhere knight d4 comes in and now this is gonna be a new game okay white is just about equal here so okay I have one study position so we need to load the questions about the game if you have four all right so we're ready to solve the study okay yeah let's take a look at the study here let's see where is it oh yeah yeah I see yeah just the second one yes okay I've I'm a big fan of studies and I have lots of them I've done many of them in my this is like when we were training we would do a lot of these studies when I was growing up here in Armenia and this is one of the studies I really like and you might be familiar with it some of you it's a famous one I guess but it it's white to play here and and you need to try to make a draw and here's the problem here a black is just gonna queen and you're not in a square to stop his passport but he is in a square to be able to stop your breakthroughs here so that's what makes it difficult here so let's see if you can find this idea here perhaps gonna give a couple of minutes yeah let's give couple of minutes to you know the audience and see if they can solve it absolutely now are the wilder thinking and coming up with a solution were you when you were growing up were you solving a lot of studies as well absolutely yeah when I was growing up this is a big part of my homework and my coach would give me a lot of homework very difficult I mean it was this was very difficult for me when I was you know but I was just trying to solve lots of Petrosian and Kasparian studies you know he was very you know very composer so we would solve a lot of Kasparian studies here so this is from his book and how do you how do you feel the process of solving many studies what is what aspect of the game does that help you it helps that you become more creative you look for ideas creativity it improves your calculation and you just start looking at unexpected moves on orthodox ideas unusual moves so and then you just become more creative it helps your calculation and also your end game right so imagination and your yeah because it studies are usually it's like end game they're not so many pieces on the board forced lines yeah yeah and I'm not a big fan of the very crazy ones where you have like everything is hanging and you just you just have to figure out the neat move you know I'm more like this kind of studies where it's really the idea you have to come up with the idea first we do have one suggestion from Nana Zagnice from Georgia she plays for sure top board so she suggests F4 here okay F4 okay so so first what we need to do is we need to understand why black can't take right if he takes he might even lose because of h4 and now black is no longer in the square and so basically you're just not in time so that's why this doesn't work as well as if he tries to push his pawn the king on be it will be in check yes if you try to push the pawn after capture in fact white will win this we only trying to draw this but now we're gonna win because we're gonna be able to coin with a check so so that's why now black will play the best move King C7 and this way now he's getting closer to where the break is coming F takes see I takes now it looks like he's just gonna push yeah yes King G3 correct yes so it's a self a self-stealmate so you build your own yeah yeah self-stealmate very good very good very good yeah so yeah I I recommend also a lot of players I mean in you know in the you know for Russian Soviet schools you know they it was kind of the coaches would do a lot of studies I don't know if nowadays but I think even some top players they really enjoy doing a lot of the studies it really helps with the creativity and just to be able to see that it like this idea it's a self-stealmate idea there are few other positions like this studies out there this is not the only one there are few others that I know of yeah you have to sort of visualize how you can trap yourself yeah yes because you just everything else doesn't work if you play H4 he will just take and now the king is just so much closer yes to any of the to any of the break so King is just gonna easily be able to time to stop that so so that's why we have to start off with move F4 and you take the material and again we're just we're just late with our break first he will just prevent our upon control it and then he will push his and you're just not in time with your game so that's that's the other thing about studies is the precision that it requires calculation yeah absolutely yeah and the fact that there's only one correct move order to the solution oh yeah you can't stop at King G3 in this position exact the correct the studies they just have to have one solution yes there are multiple solution that means it's not very precise anymore now I tell us that you you're from Armenia you're Armenian born but now you play for the US yeah and long time already long time 17 years I live in US 17 years already yes right now which you when you were growing up you went to the Petrosian school of chess yes tell us a bit about that yeah so when when I was about seven years old I went to the Tigran Petrosian World Champion number nine school in Yerevan Armenia and and I was enrolled in a group lessons with my first coach and that's where I learned how to play and but I was already I already knew a little bit how to play like my father taught me how to play so but I took it more seriously and then I grew up actually you know with some very very top players like Levon Aronian he's playing here so he's one year older than you so we played a lot against each other was he in the same school as you not in the same school he was coached privately but we would compete against each other in a Armenian junior championships and other it was another close friend Gabriel Sargissian he's in the Armenian national team he's actually exactly the same age as me and we had the same coach so we trained a lot together so so three of us and then a few other guys and then how did the move why did the move to the US and I moved to US in January 2001 and just yeah things were you know very difficult in Armenia and the work and economy so and just my family I had a lot of family in Los Angeles already my grandmother my my relatives were already living there like 15 years so my family decided to take a chance and move to US and you know and try to pursue the American dream and how's it how's it how's that going it's going great I mean it couldn't be happier I mean it's living you know living here for 17 years in US and everything is going great for me I mean I'm still playing but I'm doing a lot of coaching nowadays and I have many private students that I train and but I still enjoy the playing part still when you play a good game you analyze you still enjoy that but I would say that I coach more than I play but this year I'm hoping to play more are you also training some because there are so many talented youngsters coming up from US as well yes I've trained about three young grandmasters and you know still working with them can't reveal all the names but you know I work with some of the very top players in US and and some of my other private students are about international master's strength already that I I start training them from 1500 rating to an international master's and you enjoy using yeah actually enjoy training yeah I enjoy you know teaching you know it's like a passion you know that I can explain my moves and try to help them understand the game better and yeah and I've been doing this for a very long time this game that you showed us and just your way of explaining yeah this is you know I've been doing this for a very long time and the lectures and you probably know the St. Louis chess club and scholastic center so I've been working with them since 2012 going there as a lecturer giving lectures and you know I like to show them my games because I think that's the best way I can explain if I take somebody else's the great game I want to know the ideas and salaries you know but my games I can explain exactly the way that I was thinking yeah that's very important yeah because not just showing the variations but what was the thinking process how did you come to that move and how what made you realize what should be played at that point absolutely yeah well we're open to questions from our online viewers you can send them to us on twitch anything from the audience we're waiting yes go ahead originally from Armenia yes no no when I moved to us I was like a promising player but I wasn't a grandmaster I became a grandmaster in us so I was a young international master but I did win a couple of medals for the Armenian team already in the junior tournaments the Olympiad champion we were under 16 in a team with Levon Aronia and Gabriel Sarvesian Tigran Petroesian so we had like my generation was pretty strong so it was strong competition you know always you know no there wasn't anything like that they weren't happy but you know you know no no no it was it was already like you know it was 2001 so it wasn't anything like that yeah interesting we have a question from twitch so who do you think will be the challenger for the world well I'm gonna go with my friend Levon of course I mean I feel like he's due you know he's due and he's had some fantastic results last year if you remember he won several tournaments including the World Cup the only way he could have qualified yes because he wasn't gonna qualify by raiding or Grand Prix so I'm going for Levon and I think he won Norway chess and he's just been doing really well since Louis rapid emblaz and so I think this is a his I think last tournament before the candidates so I think he won a good game today against Nigel and if he can finish strong I think this will send some more positive notes for him and I think I'm hoping that he can win because I feel like you know he's playing really good chess and he's due for something like that to at least play a match for the world championship and you also believe that he's probably the one who can put up the best fight against Magnus Carlsen I think I think at the moment it's just it's my opinion but also I think Magnus mentioned recently also in his interviews that you know Levon is the guy who can outplay him yes and you know this happened many times and I think from the people I mean that are in the field you know maybe not a person that could be Kramnik that it could be a difficult opponent for him but it seems like against others he has he has an advantage yes so somehow he will he will be a big fair but against Levon I think he will be very close right after I ask you also now you you're part of the US Federation but you also have really like you said great relationship with with Armenia Armenian players so when you were at the Olympia now Armenian chess team is also a one that's to look out for they do really well they've got this team spirit and you know it's always fun to watch them and they won medals as well led by Levon yes yes and now there's the US team which one in Baku who are you who do you root for what is it that well first of all Armenian team didn't play in Baku no they didn't I could have played but I think technically yeah they could have probably gone but they didn't go so it was pretty clear I cheer for the US team yes at that time and Armenian team won the Olympia a couple of times three years but to be honest nowadays it's the other teams are just getting a lot stronger in fact the US team is very strong and we'll see what will this Olympia bring but I think the competition is getting tougher so I think definitely the with the US team at the moment so I'm hoping to be part of team I'm very close to qualify so it will come down to the US championship that's the last tournament and if I have it's right now a very close race between few of us so the first three places are locked for our top players because they're just so high ranked so the US champion will qualify automatically if any of the guys wins besides the top three or then there is a formula rating formula there is about four people now you know fighting for those two Olympia spots so in a very close race so every game even played here it's important yeah going forward to my next tournament in March and then middle of April with a US championship so that will be the most important event for me this year right and why there has been a lot of talk so to say about all the players that are coming to the US I mean this time in Baku for example we saw this amazing team you know they just they were the favorites there's such a strong team but you've got a lot of competition when their players coming from a lot of different countries now playing for the US Federation how do you what do you how do you feel about that for me it's it's normal I think competition you need competition to work on your game to get better if there is no competition you feel like I'm always gonna qualify for the team you know for a few years I didn't have to really work very hard I was always on a team but now last Olympiad I didn't I didn't qualify yeah so there were other people who were a little bit higher they qualify and they went with a strong team and they won the gold medal so now I want to be back it's a healthy competition so I want to be back try to prove I can be part of the team and hopefully win another medal so the competition motivates you yeah I think people are coming you probably know we have a lot of universities who offer scholarships and it's very attractive to the foreign GM's you know who are thinking about professional career but they know it's very tough so they have an opportunity to come to US St. Louis Dallas a few other places to get very good education and for free actually if you you know if you pass the test and you get a full scholarship so it's it's a good competition we have a lot of people also applying for a green card and you know when you apply at some point you can maybe even switch your Federation so there's always this process in fact I sometimes help people with a letter of recommendation for their green card which is fine people help me when I move so now it's my turn to help others just becoming really big knowing the United States yes yeah it's all thanks to the St. Louis you know because before that it was yeah we had some tournaments I'm open tournament but now you know since the chess club in St. Louis opened in 2009 and every year every year is getting bigger a lot more tournaments and this year there can be a lot of events happening there as well so the calendar is full almost every month they have tournaments and we've got before we move on to other stuff you've got a question from one of the chess comm members when when speed or when I see I'm not sure if I'm saying it right but he wants to know that which kind of endgame studies should I start with if I'm new to this form of training so what sort of endgame studies to look at I would I would recommend a couple of names I mean you have to try a few of them see how difficult they are the studies are usually pretty difficult so it's I would I would I would recommend Kasparian Kasparian it's you know Kubel Kasparian Kubel the ring Platonov brothers they're very famous Platonov brothers what is it that is so special or why do you why do you recommend their studies specifically I think they just make the best studies I'm just familiar with those names there's some other composers as well but they just from the quantity of the studies that I've done I just this names pop out and I usually like those studies it's something similar that we see here there's unusual idea with a self-steal mate but you will see a different ideas you will learn them you know under promotion idea you will learn in some examples so I would go with like a big names because their studies will be more instructive like Kasparian Kasparian Pervakov is the one that currently is very popular Pervakov studies right and also why you're quite a regular at the trade wise you brought a chess festival this is you were saying that you've been here yeah it's a fifth or sixth yeah I was here last year yes I had a fantastic I had a great tournament last year I had finished seven out of ten no losses four wins plus four and I was playing Fabiano Caron and last game and it was a very long game and I was defending and then maybe I was even better but it ended in a draw so I finished with plus four and in a very strong company with Peter Svidler Caron I was some very strong players so it just shows how strong this tournament is you know that you know have such a elite players just just getting seven out of ten it's very difficult I like the atmosphere of this tournament it's I think the most fun open tournament it's just a really nice atmosphere the organizers doing a good job and you know bring you know players and it seems like a lot of regular players here I think there are some people who played maybe in every every edition of the event so this is my fifth or sixth event I really enjoy coming here and to play some very strong players as well and you're on five out of seven are you I mean you must be happy with the way things are going so far I wasn't very happy before this game to be honest I've had a bit of a frustration last three days three draws long games I had seven and a half hour game 105 moves I held a draw then I held another draw and yesterday I was pressing for a long time and I couldn't win so it was a bit of a frustration so I needed this win to get into a better mood and hopefully have a strong finish so yeah also the quality of today's game was fantastic yeah it was a good game yeah it makes me happy I mean you can win games I mean we win a lot of games but when you win a good game and without like an you know he wasn't very obvious where he went wrong I mean it was a bit suspicious this night be trading but overall I think you know my ideas were lots of tricks lots of tricks and you know being able to calculate precisely until the end what might actually get dropped so three more games to go see well do we have any more questions from the audience yes yes yes oh this is very interesting yeah I'm just gonna read it for our online yeah so Nakamura is gonna have the Fisher random match against Magnus yeah and what's your opinion about who would you think is gonna win I think it's gonna be very exciting because I heard it's like unofficial world championship right something like this is gonna be like a big event I'm not sure how I know Carlson does really well in the Fisher random games when they play on chess.com but I'm gonna go with Hikaru on this one because I think he's more experienced and he defeated LeWon in a Fisher random match in St. Louis a couple of years ago and I feel like this is his you know he can do well in this one but I'm not sure because we don't know so much about Carlson's Fisher random so I know he has some experience playing but I think I'll go for Hikaru in this match I'm not sure the format the time control is that actually makes a difference too how many games they play or the time control but I think Hikaru is gonna do well talking about Hikaru he's your I mean you've known him for many years and you know him really well what is it that that makes him so strong in open tournaments I mean he's yeah he's an absolute beast yes in open events he's this is just his type of tournaments and also I know he won this tournament several times but also let's not forget he won this very strong millionaire tournament with a very big price one as well and he is just very good he's like Carlson when he comes down to playoffs he almost never loses a playoff maybe he's never lost the play I don't know I can't even think of because in even that millionaire tournament he had to go to this qualifier playoff first to qualify to the final four and then he ended up beating every opponent in that as well so I think his style is a very difficult opponent to play I think maybe against the very very top players when he plays them all the time it's it's not as easy but against people below him I think he's very difficult yeah and also he can play for a win on demand like last year if you remember he played Eduardo Romain in the last game with Black yes and he had to win because he was half point behind Anton and he won so so he had to win but he could play he played a very sharp opening in complications you know he's a guy who can try to make things happen I mean I haven't I can't think of like open tournaments where he does badly you know like maybe some of the elite super elite events he doesn't do as well but I think this kind of open tournaments he does really well suits his style yes okay now time traveler wants to know that will you ever play the Dutch defense oh Dutch I don't know that's tough on issues doesn't really suit my style I don't think I ever played a Dutch defense you know I might try it I've tried the Stonewall system I don't know that's probably not Dutch though I've played the Stonewall a couple of times but it's possible maybe I'll try in some Blitz games or something why do you say it's not suited to your style because I like to control the center so if you play the Dutch you're not really controlling the center too much are you creating some weaknesses I try to avoid creating weaknesses early on but you know some people like it so you know playable opening we had Mickey Adams when we were doing the rapid fire around and we asked them the question what is the one opening they would never play I think it was Mickey who said that he would never play the Dutch and maybe he had because he's also got that similar yeah it's hard to imagine Mickey played a doctor he's just so so classical you know just goes against all his principles and beliefs yeah well great do we have any final questions for why yeah yeah yeah you can tell us about the carpal school of chess yes carpal school in chess it's actually in this very small place called Linzburg Kansas that's actually the only chess school carpal has in us so I was founded I think in 2003 or 4 and I've I've been there many many times teaching the summer chess camps and and in fact my friend Mark Cobb who is in audience he used to be the president of that school so he is traveling and it's a very nice it's very nice little place where it's it's very small place you would wouldn't imagine like there would be a chess club there so you know we and the summer camps would get like 25 students or something so we have it's really the middle of nowhere like you really have to either have a long drive there or fly and then drive so it's location it's it's hard to reach but we would have good to turn off for the summer chess camps and they have every summer they have chess camps and you go have you trained there I've been training I haven't done the last few years but I've been doing that regularly before that you know so right yeah anything else from our Twitch audience or anything online just coming in we set up some goals for the future maybe playing in or also in country so your goals for the future are my well I don't have any big goals at the moment big ambitions or anything my my goal is I actually made a good run last year I got my reading up to 2680 so I was hoping this might be that breakthrough that I was looking for for a long time I had a couple of good results US championship then I won another round robin tournament in Saint Louis a strong round robin so well yeah that's that's the goal yeah that's the goal yeah that's the people who know me who are close to me they know that that's my goal you know to get there and then from there we'll see but it's very tough because you know even if I'm playing here you just have to be really precise just playing a decent game it's not gonna be enough to even be 2,500 players because nowadays everybody know how to play everybody know how you know the openings work it's you don't get easy wins you have to work really hard to get a win even against like 2,500 opponent a lot of people actually talk about this inflation that has happened in rating but actually if you think about it it's really hard in chess now because the middle-level players the strength of players from even 2,100 to 2,200 till about 24-2500 has really gone up from the past it's much stronger than what it used to be the ability to defend resources that they find so so I I actually think that chess has become tougher well absolutely I mean before like five six years ago the US Open tournaments I would do really well there and I would win a lot of games you know like I would just play well and you know effortlessly they would just make mistakes and I would win but nowadays it's very tough you play those US Open tournaments you're likely to drop rating then actually game because you will play some 22-2300 players and it's not guaranteed you're gonna win those games so it's I agree with you I'm I'm much rather play a tournament with the 2650 opponents all the games then I just know I'm playing somebody his strength and if I have a good day I can win and it's just but a lot of times when you play like the first round I played in this tournament I'm playing a very young boy from India there's like 13 years old 23 dirt dirty rating and clearly underrated and you know you play really well I was black and couldn't do much the game didn't draw I mean frustrating but what are you gonna do I mean it's just if it doesn't make a mistake or blunder I mean he I put all the tricks in a king upon a game he could go wrong and I would win he just didn't make any mistakes and they're opening preparation as well I mean I played he played e4 and I played tricoracan and he knew the theory and yeah not much I can do I mean it's really hard to win it chess game nowadays and then a tournament like this is very challenging know it's very young stars and yeah it's it's very challenging again I would it's easier to play let's say a round robin tournament with the people around your rating because you have you know you don't have to worry about winning every game so but but also this is different because here you have an opportunity to play some very top players because you know like players my rating at the moment doesn't have opportunity to play Levon or MVL or Hikaru on a regular basis you know so this is an opportunity to play some of the top guys and you learn a lot from playing them you can study their games but actually you learn a lot when you actually play you see how they play and prepare right well thank you so much war for this super instructive masterclass thank you yeah that was amazing thank you very much okay