SC Week 3/2: Fischer - Petrosian, Candidates' Final 1971 (Weak Pawns)
"Having successfully saddled Black with two isolated pawns Fischer now gives us a perfect lesson in how to go about taking full advantage of them."
Michael Stean
Notes and Observations
13 Re1 Rather than bank an exchange - and have to deal with Black’s active play - Fischer allows a trade of queens. He doesn’t mind the knight being dragged 'off-side' because on a4 it’s perfectly placed to support Be3-c5 with a favourable trade of dark-squared bishops.
18 b4 An advance that supports the knight on c5 and keeps the weak pawn fixed on a6.
22 Nxd7! Fischer is not averse to giving up good pieces for bad. Against Matulovic, Vinkovic 1968, he traded a very active bishop for a terrible knight. Here he does the exact opposite.
Bobby knows full well what my old friend Tom once told me - when you trade pieces it’s what remains on the board that matters not what leaves.
I fully agree with your comments. I also love the stament that when trading what matters is the pieces that remain yes. :)
ReplyDeleteI will also share the notes that I made:
- Interesting setup against the Sicilian Kan. Placing the bishop on d3 and exchanging the knight on c6. After this the c6-d5-e6 triangle centre can be attacked with e4 (which was already there) and the new pawn push c4! Leaving black with an isolani.
- The move 12 Qa4+ with the idea of centralizing with Qd4 is an interesting maneuvre. In most cases you want to put a knight in front of an isolani, but it makes sense that literally ultimate centralization of the queen t also makes sense. From d4 the Queen has a great attacking power and it can not be driven away easily in this positon.
- It is a powerful idea to create an outpost on c5 by exchanging the darksquared bishop on e7 and playing b4. Having changed the dark-squared bishops, the dark squares in front of the a6 and d5 weak pawns also become easier spots for white to put pieces on and control.
- The trade of the strong knight, on move 22, for the bishop on d7 is a fact of trading one advantage for another advantage. Fischer makes sure the black bishop can play no role in the defence of his weak pawns and having made this trades enables his rooks to penetrate the position.
- After 25 moves black's rooks are totally tied down to defending his weak pawns and he simply cannot move a piece. This júst holds everything together. By bringing an extra piece into action, namely the king (!), white's surplus in activity is decisive.
- When the white king starts penetrating the position, black decides to 'unleash' the knight, but shortly after that his position falls apart to the two superior rooks working together with the bishop on the 7th and 8th rank
- In general also: The less pieces there are left on the board the more decisive one or two active pieces versus one or two inactive pieces of the opponent becomes. This something to realize when trading! The activity of single pieces matters more the more pieces are trades. That is also simple mathematics. :)
A beautiful game which shows how the pieces of your opponent can be totally tied to defending the weak pawns. This gives time for you to activate and coordinate your army (including the king!), create an outpost by having traded off the one potential good piece of your opponent and there you go!