Basics of The Italian Game _ Chess

The position on the board , you can see blacks , bishops are doing a lot controlling a lot of squares because the position is open and they're not blocked by very many pieces in this position .

The bishops are gonna probably outperform the Knights .

On the other hand , in a position like this where lots of ponds are kind of blocked off and it's relatively closed .

You can see how Blacks , bishops aren't really doing a lot .

They're , they're running into ponds that are in the way and the knights can very easily hop around and get to wherever you need them to get to .

So in this case , the knights are gonna do better as opposed to the other position where it was more open , the bishops would be better .

Principle .

Number 21 the best way to deal with an attack on the flank is to counterattack in the center in this position .

White's castled .

If Black starts to launch a flank attack on the side , the best thing that White could do would be to strike back in the center and try to open up the center and take advantage of the fact that Black's king is still in the center .

So to deal with a flank attack , a counterattack in the center principle number 22 when you have an option to capture a piece with two different ponds , generally , you want to capture towards the center of the board in this position .

If Black captures this bishop on B three , white now has the option to capture with two different ponds .

So as the rule goes , generally speaking , you want to capture towards the center .

So you should take this way , we also get the added benefit in this position that we create a half open file for the rook principle .

Number 23 is that in an end game , the king is a valuable piece that must be used to help you win the game in this position .

It would be a mistake for white to leave his king sit over here and not try to use the king to help attack these pawns or these pawns .

Same thing for Black , he would need to use his king to try to get involved and do something to help out .

Principle .

Number 24 rooks should go behind past pawns in the position on the board .

Black has a past pawn on this G file .

If black tries to play here to try to get one of the two pawns again , white simply pushes the pond forward and after black captures , he gets a queen and you can see that if I move just one pond back now , black does have the ability to stop the ponds by moving his rook here .

If white tries to move this one forward , it's gonna get captured .

If he tries to move this one forward , it's gonna get captured and he doesn't have enough time .

Black is able to catch it and then capture the queen .

So going back , both of the connected pass points have to already be on the sixth rank and then the rook cannot stop them .

Principle number 26 is to attack the base of a pawn chain .

And this position , white has this very long pawn chain and you can see how all of these ponds are defended by the other ponds in the pawn chain except for the base .

That's the only pond that's not gonna be defended by another pond .

So if you're able to attack the base of the pawn chain , that's what you should do .

Now , this probably isn't the greatest example because it's gonna be very hard for Black to figure out a way to attack that pond right now .

But generally speaking , attack the base of a pawn chain principle 27 is that knights are usually one of the best blockaders of ponds .

So in this position , black has a past pond that he's trying to push forward .

And white would like to blockade it to keep it from moving .

A good option would be to blockade it with the knight .

The reason this is good is because knights can still function very well because they can jump over pieces .

They can still put pressure on the normal squares that they would be able to put pressure on .

At the same time , they're blockading the pond from moving principle .

Number 28 is if your position is cramped , you should try to trade pieces to open it up and give you more options .

So in this position , Black's position is very cramped .

This bishop is stuck .

This bishop is stuck .

He doesn't have a lot of options for his pieces .

So one thing that he should consider doing is trading pieces .

In this example , he can capture here .

If white captures , he can capture here .