Positioning

Recognize Positions Where Progress Cannot Be Made Quickly

• Black the position is closed, so there are no tactics available in the next few moves. When this is the case, we have time to place our pieces in their best locations, so think about multiple move sequences to reposition pieces, in this case Na6-Nc7 to support the b5 pawn push. Another example is playing white in the caro-kann style setup (or other where you take both center pawn squares), where our queenside knight can journey to the kingside, where it can attack f5 and threaten to turn it into an outpost.
• White London: should have traded off material after being up so much. No need to keep pushing attack and just solidify position instead.
• White London: did not recognize position where enemy could not make progress. Here you should move all your pieces to their optimal positions instead of worrying about pushing tempo.
• White London: in London, eyes on the e5 square as an outpost for the knight. Here missed opportunity to block dark-squared bishop, or exchange, winning the bishop pair. Knight can't take first because it leads to a minor piece fork.
• Black QID: after minor pieces are developed, push for center control before rooks.
• White London: missed free rook with bishop on long diagonal
• Black Najdorf: pre-emptive defensive move, weakening king pawn structure. Need to calculate more.
• White London: pre-emptive defensive move, weakening king pawn structure.

Opening Ideas

• White London: trading on the outpost results in a pawn occupying the square which makes fills the hole in their position. Instead, the hole needs to be used later for long term positioning of the knight.
• White London: need to watch out for opening the g-file when recapturing knight.
• White London vs KID: need to watch out for Bxh6+.
• White London: a c4 push (deep pawn chain), should not have been attempted to be broken with an e4 pawn break. Instead, play Qb2 in this position pinning the pawn to the unguarded bishop.
• White London: free kings pawn if they try to take your kingside dark bishop in the early game
• White against Philidor d6: early mating threat after dxe5.
• Black Najdorf: the b5 pawn push can be dangerous if played too early, since it leaves the rook on a8 exposed on the diagonal. This is especially a dangerous Najdorf line after 6.Be3 (English attack).
• White London: need to castle before launching the attack, otherwise kingside pawns are too weak.
• White London: double attack + pin tactic
• White London: should avoid the three separated pawn chains. It's better to try to open the h-file instead of the g-file with an isolated h-pawn.
• Black QID: need to watch for light-squared bishop attack, blocking with knight has been problematic over a few games.
• White London: in this game, black tries to push an early queenside attack, we miss the move a3 shutting it down. We would be up a pawn, convert the a pawn to a more central pawn, and recapture the space advantage on the queenside with good dynamic play on the kingside.
• Black Closed Sicilian: wins two pawns and keeps them passed. Notice that Ne4 here opens up the fork on f2 if Queens exchange.
• Black Sicilian: 4th rank queen forks.
• White London: often times, blocking the queen attack on b2 with our queen is fine

Attacking Ideas

• Black's King is stuck in the middle, so we should open up the position now.
• Lost a lot of tempo with weak, non-threatening or developing moves
• Missing g-pawn: need to watch out for Rg6 forcing the king into the corner.
• White London: pushing to c5 is usually a strategic inaccuracy because it is vulnurable to pawn breaks along the chain and leaves holes in the b-file. In this game I think it's good because it blocks the enemy queen making the queenside attack more effective, and the queenside attack is good this game due to the queenside castle. Queenside castle is considerably weaker since the corner pawn is exposed by default. In this case the king was trapped if our queen could get to a8. Here is another position where the c5 push is good. In this case, black castles kingside so b6 is a possibility, but again since the c5 push comes with an attack on a piece, it generates enough of a threat that it is a solid space gaining move. It only works because white has an immediate plan following, preventing black from having a chance to play b6 to challenge the pawn chain.