Luke McShane is chess columnist for The Spectator.
It is one of life’s comforts to see a forgotten trinket being dusted off and appreciated afresh. So in chess, I am gently heartened to see a chess opening pass through that same phase of life. The game has its share of magpies, for whom a shiny new opening gambit is irresistible. Their approach has
Mastrovasilis–Marechal, Cappelle la Grande 2011. Black is a whole rook up, so his last move 34… Nd5-e7, angling for an exchange of knights, looks plausible. Which move did White play to expose a hidden flaw? Answers should be emailed to chess@spectator.co.uk by Monday 11 January. There is a prize of £20 for the first correct
This Christmas, government guidance says that board games are out and quizzes are in. Thus, 12 questions for Christmas. Answers here. 1. The Candidates tournament decides a challenger for the World Championship. Seven rounds were played in Yekaterinburg in March, but scheduling the second half is proving difficult. Which player declared ‘I’m ready to play,
White to play and mate in five moves. Composed by Kohtz & Kockelkorn, 1875. Be careful — four moves isn’t enough! What is White’s key first move? Answers should be emailed to chess@spectator.co.uk by Monday 4 January. There is a prize of £20 for the first correct answer out of a hat. Please include a
1. Alexander Grischuk 2. Stephen King 3. Iepe Rubingh 4. Shohreh Bayat 5. Ding Liren vs Magnus Carlsen 6. White plays 1 Bd2, 2 Ba5, 3 b4. Regardless of Black’s moves, the result is a draw by stalemate 7. The Bongcloud (Attack) 8. Agadmator 9. The Complete Chess Swindler, by David Smerdon 10. Irina Krush
The Magnus Carlsen Chess Tour is back. This time, the series of online events is rebranded as the Champions Chess Tour with a total $1.5 million prize fund. It marks an ambitious step forward for the Play Magnus group, which floated on the Oslo Stock Exchange in October and is currently valued in the ballpark
Four puzzles in one, composed by Werner Speckmann, 1963. In each case, White to play and mate in two. (a) As in diagram; (b) In (a), move Qh7 to a7; (c) In (b), move Ke6 to c6; (d) In (c), move Ke4 to c4. We regret that there is no prize for this puzzle, owing
The juicy prospect of improvement constantly dangles above a chess player. Those morsels of knowledge one has acquired whet the appetite for others which lie just out of reach. Even players at peace with their ambient proficiency can’t help but acknowledge that their better games coexist with lousy ones. Once you admit that, it’s a
White to play. A position taken from Chess Improvement (perhaps from Luchowski–Gridnew, Moscow 1992.) Black’s menacing pieces make the situation look desperate. How can White turn the tables? Answers should be emailed to chess@spectator.co.uk by Monday 7 December. There is a prize of £20 for the first correct answer out of a hat. Please include
Put yourself in the shoes of Aryan Gholami, the teenage master from Iran who was paired with an Israeli opponent in Sweden in January 2019. It’s a blitz tournament, so you’re due to begin in minutes. For political reasons, your country expects that you will refuse to play the game, and there may be repercussions
White to play and win. E. Pogosjants, Shakhmaty v SSSR 1976. Promoting the a-pawn allows Black a perpetual check. Which move wins the game? Answers should be emailed to chess@spectator.co.uk by Monday 30 December. There is a prize of £20 for the first correct answer out of a hat. Please include a postal address and
Writing in January, I described internet bullet chess, where the players have one minute for all their moves, as ‘popular, addictive and pointless’. Bullet games are shallow and unwholesome because if you stop to think, you lose the game on time. Never mind a junk food tax: taxing bullet chess is the real social imperative
White to play and mate in two moves. Composed by Sam Loyd, 1857. Answers should be emailed to chess@spectator.co.uk by Monday 23 November. There is a prize of £20 for the first correct answer out of a hat. Please include a postal address and allow six weeks for prize delivery. Last week’s solution 1 Qg7+!!
I own a few chess books that could serve as a murder weapon, but none so hefty as Chess: 5334 Problems, Combinations and Games. Nicknamed ‘The Brick’ by its fans, its thousand-odd pages forgo instructional text in favour of an escalating procession of puzzles, mostly mates in 1, 2 or 3 moves. These illustrate the
White to play. Mista–Kloza, Poland 1955 (supposedly). Which move does White play to force a quick checkmate? Answers should be emailed to chess@spectator.co.uk by Tuesday 17 November. There is a prize of £20 for the first correct answer out of a hat. Please include a postal address and allow six weeks for prize delivery. Last
‘It’s chess. We’re all prima donnas.’ You can hear it spoken with a wink in the Netflix miniseries The Queen’s Gambit, released two weeks ago in seven episodes of about an hour. My heart swelled to hear the game’s essence so appreciated: of course nothing else matters when you’re playing chess. So yes, we are
White to play and mate in 3. A puzzle featured in The Queen’s Gambit, apparently composed by W. Atkinson in 1890. What is White’s first move? Email answers to chess@spectator.co.uk by Tuesday 10 November. There is a prize of £20 for the first correct answer out of a hat. Please include a postal address and
Geometry shmometry. The pirouette of a knight may be pleasing to the eye, but sometimes what I really crave is a demolition. I don’t mean a smash-and-grab king hunt. I want to see a crumbling edifice, a colossal concrete barrier wilting beneath a torrent of water, as in The Dam Busters. On the chessboard, diagonal
White to play. Wade–Korchnoi, Buenos Aires, 1960. Bob Wade’s next move prepared a surprising and decisive breakthrough. What did he play? Answers should be emailed to chess@spectator.co.uk by Monday 2 November. There is a prize of £20 for the first correct answer out of a hat. Please include a postal address. Last week’s solution 1…f5!
It’s over. Magnus Carlsen’s undefeated streak in classical chess has finally come to an end, after 125 games. It is hard to exaggerate what an unlikely accomplishment this is: Carlsen faced top-flight opposition in almost every game, winning 42 and drawing 83. He was beaten by the Polish grandmaster Jan-Krzysztof Duda at the Altibox Norway
