Planning in chess

How does a beginner play? He tres to create a threat and hopes that his opponent will overlook it. He does not plan his game, his decisions are taken at random. For example, he first attacks a pawn on the queenside and then attempts to undertake something quite different on the kingside. He often does not oven consider what his opponent will reply or whether the opponent has also set up some threats. In general, in a game between beginners, the winner is not necessarily the better player but only the one who is paying more attention. There is no plan in a beginner's game and you cannot oven spot any strategic direction. The decisions taken in the game are normally very primitive: if a check is possible, then it is given; if a capture can be made, then the material is taken, and if pieces can be exchanged, well that is what happens, whether the operation is a good one for the player or for his opponent.

How does a master play? A master tries to understand the position. He seeks out the weaknesses in his opponents position and attempts to exploit them. He spots his opponents plans and tries to thwart them. He struggles for the initiative. The master coordinates his pieces and tries to play in such a way that all his pieces and pawns are working actively and supporting each other. He draws up a plan in order to deploy his forces in an optimal manner. It often happens that he does not oven Nave to look for a plan, because he has already studied many typical situations and pawn structures, and thus in the position in his game he immediately recognizes the correct plan.

Candidate moves The basis for the calculation of variations lies in the candidate moves. Before we actually calculate concrete variations, we first select some interesting possibilities. This is how we choose candidate moves. Unlike the computer, which takes almost all possibilities into consideration, we limit ourselves to a few possibilities. That is the strength, but at the same time the main weakness of the human way of thinking: if the choice we make is much too small, we can miss the strongest continuation. As was correctly stated by Kotov: it is possible to calculate variations in depth accurately, but without having included, the most important moves. If we thus exclude from our calculation of variations the best choices, then all the calculations we have made are a useless collection of individual moves and variations.'

To avoid this human failing, we need some guidelines for the calculation of variations. 1) Accurately calculating over the short distance of the first few moves is more important than the capacity to calculate long variations. A mistake in these first moves is more dangerous than a mistake ar the end of the variation.

Evaluation of the position Correct evaluation a position is the most important part of positional play. This is the great difference between a computer and a chess master. The computer has a program with constant values for each positional element such as: 1) The position of the king 2) Material superiority 3) Control of the centre 4) Piece activity 5) Pawn structure 6) Advantage in space 7) Open lines 8) The initiative Then the computer adds up all these values and gets an evaluation for the position. This list is not a bad one, but if after every simple move we check these eight criteria, we will lose by overstepping the time limit. For that reason the master thinks in a different way. He sees the important elements in the position and practically ignores the others. He sees a thread, a guiding line running through the game. The master has

no universal checklist: in one specific situation, one factor will be more important than the others; in different positions other motifs will be playing the decisive role.

To improve your positional play, you have to study lots of games by strong players with annotations and analysis. We shall take a look at two games. At each diagram, try to evaluate the position for yourself and to find the most important elements in the position.