2/18/2006

Tactical vs. Positional



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So I wanted to show a position from a recent game. On move 16 I dropped the exchange in a tactical blunder. Actually on move 15 I dropped a pawn but either my opponent overlooked it or decided to go for bigger fish. In any event, after winning the exchange my opponent made one critical mistake. Instead of making a freeing move to unbind his position, he went immediately for liquidation of the position.

The resulting trades left him materially ahead and positionally crushed. I've reviewed the game with Crafty which did not spot any chances for White here, but I think if I had held on to the exchange and achieved this position I win easily. It just goes to show that you can't rely on tactics or positional parts of the game alone to win. You need to meld elements of both into your style.

2 comments:

Robert Pearson said...

Talk about a bind! Those old annotations about 'Black is gasping for air' come to mind.

King of the Spill said...

Very instructive.

Fritz likes White better before b4-b5. Interesting to look at those other lines, although having White push forward with e4 looks risky to me.