Archive for the ‘Moves I could never play’ Category

Moves I could not play 49

Posted in Moves I could never play on October 30, 2026| Leave a Comment »

Courtesy of friend Mark Ruston, Londoner and IM slayer, I have been alerted to a miniture played by GM Dubov, one of my favourite players. As I am sure you know, GM Dubov’s main coach was GM Morozevich, another favourite of mine, and he is known for his sacrificial chess. My favourite all time move in chess was played by him and can be found here. In the game below, the move 9. a4 is played.

Firstly, I am not a 1. d4 player so I don’t know how to play against the Queen’s Gambit Accepted. Secondly, I am not strong enough to play a move like that. Black can choose to push on b4 or gobble up pawns in the centre and capture on a6 with his bishop if necessary, can’t he? I am not strong enough to see that the rook can be deployed to d4, at which point it looks to me like black is suddenly in a world of trouble and required to play very precisely, especially if he castles kingside. With the rook on h4 black looks soon lost to me without accurate play, which in a rapid game is, of course, impossible.

The computer analysis shows black isn’t doing too badly until 17. Nd5, as is shown above, but who would want to be on the wrong side of that sort of attack anyway? One false step and its curtains, as proved to be the case.

You may find the minture here https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=2439171

M J M

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Moves I could not play 47

Posted in Moves I could never play on October 22, 2026| Leave a Comment »

In not being a professional player, deep prep is not a path I ever go down. Unsurprisingly, then, the move shown below, that being 13. …Rxc3, is not one I could play. Yes of course I know that such exchange sacrifices do occur in that defence to the extent where they are considered thematic, especially with the Dragon variation but the move below is not part of a position which has a bishop on g7 beaming down on the queenside, and black’s minor pieces are not set up for immediate counter-play either, so there’s no quick attack coming. The level of expertise required to pull that off against someone rated 2660 at the time was very high indeed, and obviously way above my level, along with everyone else on the planet!

Kasparov plays 13. …Rxc3

This is a truly great game by Kasparov. It’s a shame he had to ruin things by shooting his mouth off after it (not exactly the first time he’s done that, please do you own research on that if you must). I would imagine his Armenian mother would not have been too pleased. You can find the game below.

https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1287630

M J M

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Moves I could not play 46

Posted in Moves I could never play on October 16, 2026| Leave a Comment »

Last month I had the great pleasure of meeting GM Wesley So at the most recent olympiad in Samarkand, Uzbekistan.

I was quite touched by how polite he was to me, even asking where I am from -a true gentleman. Since then I have thought I should make more effort to look at his games and quickly remembered which one stood out the most. It was televised in 2016, when Kasparov made something of a comeback in blitz and took on the world’s best. I watched how this went horrendously wrong against GM So, and so GM Kasparov did not last long in the game. In looking at it again, GM Kasparov plays 17. …h6 in the diagram below. I could not play that move -it looks too suicidal to me! I think he wants to play f5 and stop Ng5 or something but his pieces are poorly placed and he’s now moved all his kingside pawns! Unsurprisingly, he doesn’t last very long here.

Here GM Kasparov plays 17. …h6

I have to admit, I did like how GM So played the moves towards the end of the game, they were clearly well calculated winning moves but played as if they were tactical ripostes almost.

The game can be found here: https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1820152

M J M

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Moves I could not play 45

Posted in Moves I could never play on October 16, 2026| Leave a Comment »

In my teens much if not most of the chess world was polarized over the K-K matches. I never did side with Kasparov back then, mainly because I found his chess to be too tactical and hard to calculate, whereas Karpov had a tendency to opt for quieter moves and quieter positions. They were not as hard to get your head round as the positional elements of his play were easier to appreciate than solid, hard calculations involving powerful tactical threats. In the game below, Kasparov defeats his first challenger after Karpov, GM Nigel Short. In the press conference to that match he said ‘My opponent for this match is short and it will be short. This game partially explains why he might have thought that I think. The way he plays the Botvinnik set up in the English is quite something, then he sacs a pawn, then a knight to seize the initiative. In the position below, GM Kasparov plays 28. Nxb6. I could not play this move as I could only sac for an immediate and obvious win, which clearly isn’t coming.

GM Kasparov plays 28. Nxb6

I ran this through the engines but what they show doesn’t help much as they cannot tell what impact the sac had a GM Short and the demands it placed -quite huge I would imagine. It’s clearly not a winnning move, so they engines show, but it required very accurate play by GM Short to avoid defeat, which he could not maintain.

Some analysis of this game came be found here. To me this game shows a noticeable difference in strength between GM Kasparov and GM Short.

The game can be found here: https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1070502

M J M

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Moves I could not play 44

Posted in Moves I could never play on October 11, 2026| Leave a Comment »

Marcus the reprobate1 has nothing better to do early on a Sunday morning than look at a game in which, as I remember it, GM Carlsen looked more depressed in the postgame analysis than any other I’ve ever seen him comment on and play through. It was at the London Chess Classic 2010, which I had the good fortune to attend whilst completing my Master’s Degree. I’m such a lowlife I even messaged a friend about this game this morning, and as can be gleaned from the chat, I’ve become so hopeless at chess, as time has gone by, I am reliant on engines now to make sense of it all -what a life!2 Please note I cannot upload the voice messages shown below. Mark is very working class like me and they are full of swear words and lots of other foul language!3

On with the game. GM Luke Skywalker McShane plays 18. Nc6 here. I could not play this move. I would focus too much on the immediate tactics involved here, which do not seem to achieve very much in any of the lines I thought -and yes the engines seem to agree. What I cannot see is that 18.Nc6 allows white to reposition the knight to b4 and thus eye the d5 and a6 squares and how important that becomes, as it helps white to maintain a stranglehold on the queenside, which helps result in a decisive advantage soon enough.

The engines don’t seem too convinced by 18. Nc6 but I think it’s a good move. The evaluations in the positions to follow show that black is soon lost, admittedly however, some of his moves weren’t the best -so speak the engines!. You may find the game here.4

https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1602060

M J M

  1. Marcus is my chess inspired namesake, which for well over a decade already I use in life more than my real name, which is Mark. It mostly comes from Marcus Misson. More about that can be found here. I am writing this post because I was supposed to go to Tashkent this morning but a change of plans by a colleague has left me with nothing much to do today instead of chat about games online with mates. ↩︎
  2. In the Autumn of 1989 I discovered who The Sex Pistols were and have liked punk ever since. London still has punk rockers in it today who look the same as they did back then but in the many documentaries and social media clips surfacing about them they are accused of clinging on to the past, and are often asked if the only reason they are still into punk is because they couldn’t find anything better. I cling onto chess for this very reason. I couldn’t find anything better to do ever and have got stuck with it. I love to write about it but have hardly played in well over a decade already. This has come about because I can’t find anything better to do in life for the most part but also because I can’t admit I’ve never achieved anything in chess and should have left it behind long ago. This is why I am such a down and out but also well suited to chess in some respects. ↩︎
  3. The foul language came about because whilst talking to Mark I became resigned to admitting I have nothing better to do with my life than look at old games I once remembered. The language worsened when I became sure the game is not as I remembered it, and didn’t quite go as I thought it did. The language worsened further when I realized I wanted to go out, get drunk and listen to music, as it suddenly became too difficult to reflect upon anything. It should added that whenever Mark and I chat about chess, it is usually very negative and often has lots of swear words anyway. This is because Mark and I know many criminals in the English chess scene, almost all of them in fact, and it’s quite normal for us to slag them off and throw insults about. It’s not just us. Many other chess players we chat to from England also do this (names withheld for the time being). ↩︎
  4. Please don’t comment on this post. I’ve been told all my life to stop taking the piss but I just can’t. I’ve been beaten up many times over it by kids at school, kids on my street, family members, members of my chess club, participants at tournaments and also arbiters. It won’t do again good to complain about this post! Just see it as a consequence of getting bored easily or something. ↩︎

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Moves I could never play 42

Posted in Moves I could never play on August 22, 2026| Leave a Comment »

How good are you at finding mate in 30? Alas, I found out from fb today that I am not very good at all. Of course I jest but the winning move from one of Capablanca’s games I also could not find without even knowing it leads to mate in 30, well according to Stockfish 18 it does. Here’s what I posted on facebook 15 years ago. I have to say, Kg6, as my friend Khalid suggested, looks like the right move to me now but I am wrong. I must have seen the answer at the time to know what the correct move is. Endgames are clearly not my forte.

Lichess confirms that mate in 30 is afoot, which I can’t see.

M J M

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Moves I could never play 41

Posted in Moves I could never play on July 30, 2026| Leave a Comment »

I’ve always been an admirer of Smyslov, mostly for his positional and endgame play. Still to this day I have never found anyone who can handle IQP positions as well as he could. The game below, however, shows his attacking flair and involves a queen sac: his opponent starts going wrong and it’s not too long before Smyslov brings victory home. Unsurprisingly, queen sacs are well out of my league.

White plays 29. Rxf5 here.

You can find the game here: https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1126235

With regards to Smyslov’s handling of the IQP, does it get any better than this -surely not: https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1067631

M J M

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Moves I could never play 40

Posted in Moves I could never play on July 23, 2026| Leave a Comment »

Another block-busting move by Vishy that is too above my level to play. I am quite good at leaving a queen en prise and have a long history of doing so but this usually results in a loss and not a win, like what is shown below.

Here Vishy plays 26. …Rxc4!

https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1250407

M J M

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Moves I could never play 39

Posted in Moves I could never play on July 20, 2026| Leave a Comment »

I’ve never been the world champion and probably never sacced a rook either, so the move played below is off limits to me. When you are sacrificing that much material you have to be sure it’s going to work or you are busted. GM Anand is not here and it’s not long before his opponent’s position collapses completely.

Here Vishy plays 22, Rxe6.

You can find the game here: https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1266094

M J M

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Moves I could never play 38

Posted in Moves I could never play on July 16, 2026| Leave a Comment »

GM Mariotti, Italy’s first GM, played in the Beds. league for the 1970-71 season, hence the reason I take an interest in his games. I recently learnt that he liked to play the Dutch defence, Stonewall variation, and sometimes played it very well. The position below is from such a game and contains a move I could not play. With two pieces en prise I would be more interested in saving them than playing what is played below.

Here GM Mariotti plays 32. …f4

Here is the game: https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1093267

M J M

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