Luke McShane

The Lindores Abbey Distillery in Fife, Scotland was an idyllic setting for an exciting rapid event last year, won by Magnus Carlsen. This year, the ‘views’ were of a different sort, as the Lindores Abbey Rapid Challenge was held online. The Tironensian Abbey is now a ruin, but a quaint entry in the inventory records

Twenty years ago, I was an avid fan of the cult TV programme Robot Wars. Teams of contestants would design and nurture their metal offspring, and then set them to fight. The goal of these remote-controlled battles was to cripple the enemy robot, or eject it from the arena. They sliced, bashed, torched, shoved and

A lost cause at the chessboard is hard to define, but, like obscenity, I know it when I see it. There comes a point where prolonging the matter is downright indecent, so thank goodness that custom permits us to save our blushes with a timely resignation. Then again, there are a great many chess positions

I like a memorial tournament. It’s true that the champions they celebrate may be less skilled than their modern counterparts. That’s to be expected, as players of today stand upon the shoulders of their predecessors. So I tend to picture the world champions as squabbling gods of myth, made vital by their flaws, and memorial

Fifty years ago, the USSR faced a ‘Rest of the World’ team in a match in Belgrade, with the likes of Spassky, Petrosian, Larsen and Fischer doing battle on the top boards. The Soviet team, which included five world champions, managed a narrow 20.5-19.5 victory. In 2020, there are three chess superpowers: the USA, Russia

‘I haven’t felt this kind of tension in a long while. This was real!’ Those were Magnus Carlsen’s words, after barely scraping through his semi-final match with Ding Liren at the Magnus Carlsen Invitational, which concluded last weekend. The event was hosted on the chess24 website and boasted a $250,000 prize fund. (Carlsen’s company, Play

‘I am extraordinarily patient — provided I get my own way in the end’. That’s a disposition fit for a chess player, even if it was Margaret Thatcher who said it. Learning when, and how, to mark time is an essential practical skill, so the classic text Endgame Strategy by Shereshevsky dedicates a whole chapter

‘I’m just completely collapsing in these games… unbelievable.’ World Champion Magnus Carlsen didn’t hide his anguish after losing a game against Alireza Firouzja, the 16-year-old who went on to defeat him 8.5-7.5 in an online blitz match last week. It was a dream final for the Chess24 website’s ‘Banter Blitz’ knockout tournament. Carlsen is the

‘Old wine in new bottles’ must be the most protean idiom in the English language. I encountered it a few years ago, as a title to an article by the Romanian grandmaster Mihail Marin, who likes to lean upon his deep knowledge of the chess classics to elucidate games played in the modern era. (Recently

If there were regulatory oversight of chess openings, some would come with a litany of disclaimers. ‘You may lose more than your initial gambit.’ ‘Possible side effects may include dizziness and nausea.’ ‘Use at your own risk.’ Nonetheless, such openings as the King’s Gambit, the Dragon Sicilian, or the Botvinnik Semi-Slav often enjoy a cult

A variation from the game above. Although White is a pawn down, he can rustle up decisive counterplay with one accurate move. Which one? Answers should be emailed to chess@spectator.co.uk by Monday 6 April. There is a prize of £20 for the first correct answer out of a hat. Please include a postal address and