Finishing the opening

In part one of How to play the opening we discussed the three golden rules.

 

1. rule one: pawn(s) in the centre

 

2. rule two: develop your pieces, in a way that they look at the centre but not standing in eachothers way.

 

3. rule three: bring your king into safety, if possible with castling because then the rook gets developed.

 

Developing pieces

 

When have we developed all of our pieces?

 

* The knights and bishops are standing on a usefull square

 

* The queen has entered the game

 

* The rooks are connected

 

An example:

 

1. e4 – e5 2. Nf3 – Nc6 3. Nc3 – Nf6 4. Bb5 – Bc5 5. d3 – d6 6. Bg5 – Be6 7. 0-0 – 0-0 8. Qd2 – Qe7

 

In above position you notice that both players have brought their pieces into the game.

The rooks can move freely and can go to the e- and d-line (central lines) to make it possible for the pawns to advance. We say the rooks are connected.

 

Only if all pieces have entered the game the true battle can begin!

 

Useless moves

 

 1. e4 – e5 2. Nc3 – Nc6 3. f4 – Nf6 4. fxe5 – Nxe5 5. d4 – Nc6 6. e5 – Ng8

 

 

 White controls the centre.

The black knight of f6 had to go back to its startingposition.

White can develop his pieces more freely then black because he isn’t bothered by (white or black) pawns.

7. Nf3 – h6 8. Bc4 – Be7 9. Be3 – d6 10. Qe2 – b6 11. 0-0 – a6

After eleven moves white has finished his development while black has occupied himself with useless pawn moves. As a result white can now launch a winning attack.

12. Bxf7+ – Kxf7 13. Ng5+ – Kg6 14. Nf7

White doesn’t only win material, the black king remains standing in an unsafe position.

 

Counting moves 

 

How the opening is going you can easily judge by counting how much moves it requires to finish the opening.

 

In how many moves is the development finished?

In above diagram we can see that white still has to play the d-pawn and bring his bishop on c1 into the game. This are two moves to finish white’s development.

Black on the otherhand has to develop both his bishops and, what counts the heaviest in this position, has to bring his king into safety (preferable by castling). This are three moves to finish black’s development.

With other words, white is ahead (although slightly) in development. He now has the chance to open up the position and attack. In this position he can do that by playing d4.