Bronstein’s legacy

Last week I focused on the games and somewhat tragic career of the ingenious David Bronstein. Before his time the King’s Indian Defence was viewed with a certain degree of suspicion, not least because of the early and gigantic concessions it makes to White in terms of occupation of central terrain. It was Bronstein who resurrected and then espoused that previously neglected defence, paving the way for later practitioners, such as Tal, Fischer and Kasparov. Nowadays,the KID has become one of the main highways of opening theory, along which both grandmaster and neophyte may travel, secure in the knowledge that the defence is essentially sound.

A new book, The King’s Indian Defence: Move by Move (Everyman Chess) by Sam Collins brings the theory of this opening fully up to date. Here is a game with notes based on those from the book.

Gelfand-Nakamura; Bursa 2010; King’s Indian Defence

1 d4 Nf6 2 c4 g6 3 Nc3 Bg7 4 e4 d6 5 Nf3 0-0 6 Be2 e5 7 0-0 Nc6 8 d5 Ne7 9 Nd2 Ne8 10 b4 f5 11 c5 Nf6 A direct approach, aiming to force f2-f3 so that the kingside pawns can be set in motion. 11 … Kh8 is also possible. 12 f3 f4 13 Nc4 g5 14 a4 Ng6 15 Ba3 White can also play more directly with 15 cxd6 cxd6 16 Nb5. (diagram 1) 15 … h5 Nakamura crushed another expert of the Classical Variation, Alexander Beliavsky, after 15 … Rf7 16 a5 h5 17 b5 dxc5 18 b6 g4 19 bxc7 Rxc7 20 Nb5 g3 21 Nxc7 Nxe4 22 Ne6 Bxe6 23 dxe6 gxh2+ 24 Kxh2 Qh4+ 25 Kg1 Ng3. 16 b5 dxc5 17 Bxc5 Rf7 18 a5 g4 19 b6 g3 20 Kh1 Bf8 A logical move – the c5-bishop is perhaps White’s best piece and worth exchanging, plus the second rank is cleared for the black rook.