Hi there.
In this lecture, we see Alexander Alekhine playing against Mme Prat in 1914 and simultaneous display.
So we'll play like a prince.
Let's see what happened.
Default Alekhine.
We have D five, nine, ten, three and now Chigorin Defense.
See such a Korean names after the kind of font of the Soviet chess score.
Very creative player scoring defense making scoring.
Anyway, so we have e6 knight C free D take C for every 95 six Bishop take C four and now Bishop b4
Black is winning.
It seems to volunteer the dot square Bishop but overall this position seems passive.
Sometimes both bishops are given up in scoring and in the engine world the scoring doesn't do very well
for black whites, usually winning.
Now here, yes, we do have this dangerous bishop without a counterpart, and Black's central pressure
is kind of minimal here.
So Queen C 297 In fact, Bishop, a free black, is tied down, Can't move the knight to G six now C
six Dalton square weaknesses just basically feed this bishop we have here E4 and you might think E5
is coming.
This is an interesting point we have actually Rook 81 Bishop D7 So would you play E5 or something else?
Although the special hasn't got a counterpart, this one has got a passive counterpart.
And in fact, we're X-raying f7.
And in fact, it seems as though we'd be letting black off if we moved the rook to make them look cute
in the center.
Because the rook is kind of good by default here.
It's also X-raying f7.
So in fact 95 is played rather than E5.
For example here 95 Bishop b3 b5 one has a big advantage.
Now I mention this because there's an absolutely beautiful combination coming up and it's really good
if we can see the intricacies of how this was established.
So yes, making use of defaults here, establishing that as a of common square through the x rays.
This is a good tactical sense we can develop, I believe.
So the move is what do you think Alekhine played for 100 points.
And why once play, you might want to pause.
Then the video.
Yeah, we play.
If I were exploiting the default rook on F1 and we've got a ripping plan of F for F five to try and
rip open both the file and the diagonal on that F seven point.
So I believe 95 is quite instructive.
We have Rocky eight, if not G six.
Yeah, we can just, you know, take on G six, take on our faint.
Thanks very much.
So rookie eight I'm pinning from the relative pin but it weakens.
In fact I have seven which is great.
Now f four is even greater Queen C seven and now just F five we have 88.
If it takes F five, we're just going to take 1f7.
And then it's also like probing F seven as well.
Bishop takes E seven is the most accurate, leading to a tactical disaster because of 9g6 check and
96e7 So rook 88 and now here, guess what Alekhine plays in this position.
400 points.
James.
He just plays.
He plays Night Takes F seven, bringing the count F seven, and now just E five.
So night really can't move.
There'd be big trouble if the night moved.
F thanks was also like possible and bringing the king out like this, it's going to be very, very dangerous
for the king.
I mean, this situation is intolerable to take it further.
D five check C tanks, Rock takes the king's to expose, and we're going to win the Queen here.
That's just a fictional example.
So anyway, but the tension is actually kept here even more E5 e.g. Bishop D6 putting the Queen on a
bad square and Queenie two giving various options to why sometimes Queen H five will be possible.
We see b five if Knight's H seven that does weaken H five and in fact Queen H five check G six.
Queen 6g6 is a crisscross kind of mate, the Queen substituting the bishop as kind of Boden's mate pattern.
So anyway, we see B five bishop b3 e5 and now rook d14 and now and the Queen actually announced a mate
in ten and the engines do actually indicate this is a made ten.
He was right in 1913 he announces maintain it is actually a mate in ten funny stuff so just to point
out you.
Alaska was born out of the combination.
Alaska said Alekhine was born out of the combination.
Now, for me, you know, Checkmates are really beautiful.
So if you've seen the checkmate course upon me, if you've seen the Art of Checkmate course, then.
You know, you see the beauty of Checkmates and we're really in this course kind of trying to work out
exactly how to get those ingredients we need.
So we want to build up our combination of mastery, and we also want to be able to reverse engineer
to get those positions in the first place.
And here there's a concrete mate in ten, which is absolutely stunning.
And for me, you know, that makes a good story that imagine that he's based his play on beautiful attacking
combinations.
So it's going to be interesting.
The king you know beautiful chap mates to work this out if you want this good exercise in visualization.
So I'll give you time to pause the video.
There's actually a mate in ten.
So how would you do this, mate in ten?
It's really wonderful stuff.
It brings the king down the board.
That's my clue to you.
Okay.
The first move is Queen H five.
Check.
This leverage is now up to 9/10 because once the choice G six, we're just going to play Queen STS g6.
Checkmate.
So night six, and now we leverage a double check.
So it doesn't matter.
The bishop's attacked.
It's a double check from the pawn and the rook.
So the king has to move to G6.
And now the bishop is used to bring the king down the board.
Bishop C to check.
There's not too many choices.
Rook have five check.
And now King G thinks if King G4, we have h free check, King G3.
And guess what?
We can play here, which is simple and strong.
In this position.
If at some points.
We can cover escape squares.
We don't have to check immediately.
We can cover the H4 escape square, which makes rookie free much more effective without the four square.
And so here rookie free king of four is available, but rookie free is checkmate.
So that's on King G4, but we have King G six in the game and now another double check bringing the
king down the board.
So you know the bishop and rook double check Rook G6 check Bringing the king down the board.
Rook e4 check for rook.
Thanks for checking Range five.
And now there's two ways of mating quite quickly here.
Can you find one of them here?
Okay.
G phrase is one way for H for it's actually funny enough, blacks are not in any position to actually
defend the H four square.
So, you know, Black has to resign her.
Any move basically any move.
There's rook H for checkmate.
There was also for the record in this position, we could play rook G free, which does actually mean
there's various threats which can't be parried like Bishop G6, Bishop D1 and if G5 in fact.
Gee five looks as though well, Bishop D1 is King G6 now, but we switched to rule change free hair.
Checkmate.
So yes.
And if Rook have a we have Bishop D1.
Checkmate.
Yes, the rook is covering G5 or Bishop G6 is checkmate.
So anyway, the ingredients.
How did this occur for me?
You know, giving up a bishop in the opening like this is a recipe for disaster with it's not quite
a main line scoring.
This looks as though it's just a big, big, juicy advantage for why.
The instructive point is don't just be quick to put your rooks together.
You know, sometimes Capablanca did that, but Alekhine is concerned more about attacking combinations
and having, you know, this pressure on F7 Yeah, this 95 seems really like appropriate and you know,
it's putting pressure on F7 in its own right.
So really ripping open issues after 9/10 have some bringing the king out and not being content with
just f takes e6 plain vanilla.
This beautiful position here.
Black's really in big trouble with the king, but the rook move rook d one makes sure that.
The combination works even better than Queen H five immediately.
So Rook D one.
Then it's definitely a mate in ten.
So the rook is controlling some key squares which are useful for this mate in ten.
So yes, in particular coming up for using the E4 square.
Yeah, it's better than on its position.
So you can see, you know, he's optimised for this mate combination.
If the rook wasn't on E1, it wouldn't be so fantastic.
So the rook can sometimes use these squares, especially the E4, in the combination.
So a really, truly beautiful combination.
I'm really.
I really love this one, actually.
So bringing the king down the board and controlling care squares.
So.
Geoffrey.
Yeah.
End of game.
Hope you enjoyed it as much as me.
And so much.