Chess Strategy

In unbalanced positions when one of the players has a Queen, simple evaluation by counting material is mostly useless. Factors that are more important are Queen’s activity and how well can other player coordinate his Rooks and/or pieces.

Chiburdanidze - Dudkova, USSR 1976

Material units are giving slight advantage to White. On the other hand, Black has passed pawn threatening to promote soon and active King - something that would be counted as very important in dynamic evaluation. Some authors even tend to count active King in the endgame as 5 units, or equal to the Rook!

Still, White Rook and minor pieces are coordinating extremely well. Not only that this coordination is dramatically increasing their battle power, but follow-up will prove that seemingly active Black King and Queen and actually very clumsy.

Offtopic: Unrelated to this example, but it can be useful in different situations - Knight is King’s best defender when it comes to declining direct attacks. Nf1-Kg1 (or Nf8-Kg8) is strong resisting setup where Knight is controlling large number of important squares.

43. Ne3 Ke6

43… Kd6 is met by 44. Rxb4.

44. Re4! Kd7

Tough choice for Black, 44… Kf7 45. Re7! Kg8 (45… Kxe7 46. Nd5) 46. Nd5! (idea Bg7 and Nf6) 46… Qa1 47. Kg2 Qa8 48. Rg7! Kh8 49. Rd7! and Black cannot stop Kh3-Bg7-Nf6 mate.

45. Re7 Kc6

Makes it easier for White, but 45… Kc8 was also losing by some fantastic mating patterns 46. Bf4 b3 47. Nd5 Qa1 48. Kg2 b2 49. Rc7 Kd8 50. Bg5 Ke8 51. Re7 Kd8 52. Rg7 Ke8 53. Nc7 Kf8 54. Ne6 Ke8 55. Re7. Analyse alternatives on your board.

46. Rc7 Kxc7 47. Nd5 Kd6 48. Nxc3 bxc3 49. Kg2 and Black resigned soon.

See also “Complex of Squares“