Chien Ming Chess Blog

This endgame fragment is from Ponomariov vs Morozevich, Tal Memorial 2006.

You can view or replay the complete game from start to end at board diagram below, or at new window by clicking HERE.


Note : you can use above board diagram as analysing tools, you can move the branch-variant at some point, and prese R button will get you back to the start of your tree.

This is position reached after 45...Kb6-c5

White is better position, but it seemed unclear if he could win. After 46.Rxd7 Bxd7 or 46.Rd1 Rxd1 47.Bxd1 it is hard to find a breakthrough

Ruslan Ponomariov, 23-year-old former FIDE world champion makes move 46.Kf4! with idea of 47.Rc6+ and 48.Rxc8. this involving "d6 pawn" sacrifice. How many of us will think of this idea :) ?

46...Rxd6
47.exd6 Kxd6

All of this is forced. It looks like White simply dropped a pawn, but here Ponomariov sacrificed the second pawn:

48.c5+! Kxc5 (48...Ke7 perhaps offered chances of survival, 49.Ke5 Ke7)

In an endgame in which pawns are worth their weight in gold, Ponomariov sacrifices not one but two(!) pawns simply in order to penetrate with his king on the weak dark squares of the Black kingside. Like the great Capablanca once said "Position comes first, material second". I am learning more every day about how material is not really all that important, within limits

49.Ke5 Ba6
50.Kf6 Kd6
51.Be4 Be2
52.Kxf7 Bg4 (if 52...Bh5, 53.Kg7! and next Kxh7)
53.Bxg6 1-0.

Final position :

A very fine endgame understanding and technique by Ponomariov. We learn something here that finding the winning pattern/scheme in endgame is often more important than keeping material balance without any idea/plan.

In his book "Teaching Life Skills Through Chess", Fernando Moreno point out many example of chess and life analogy. Below is one of it:

This is position after 1.h4-h5 g7-g6

Should you :

(a) capture the Black pawn, 2.hxg6, or
(b) move forward, 2.h6 ?

The best answer is b.

If the white pawn moves forward, nobody can stop it. It will be promoted to a Queen and later the black King will be checkmated. But if white captures the black pawn, the other black pawn will capture it back and nobody will win. It will be a draw.

ADVICE FOR LIFE from this chess position :

When somebody challenges you, bothers you or steps un your space, your first reaction may be to bother them back or fight. Is this the best decision?

It may be better to :

• think before you move
• focus on your goal,
• and move away from trouble.

Fighting does not resolve anything, nobody wins.

Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.
- Sun Tzu

If you know the enemy and know yourself you need not fear the results of a hundred battles.
- Sun Tzu

We must despise (hate) our opponents strategically, yet respect them tactically.
- Mao Tse Tung

I really like the last quote, one of my motto. It has deep corelation with chess. Never underestimate or overestimate your opponents. You must outplay you opponents strategicaly (initiative, tempo, pressure, control center-square-files-diagonals etc), but in every single moves you must always be alert of any tactical threat (like trap, pin, fork, skewer, discovered check etc). No matter how good your position is, if you overlook a tactical blow, the game is over, even you're a GrandMaster or a WorldChamp.